170-640: The Great Famine , also known as the Great Hunger ( Irish : an Gorta Mór [ənˠ ˈɡɔɾˠt̪ˠə ˈmˠoːɾˠ] ), the Famine and the Irish Potato Famine , was a period of mass starvation and disease in Ireland lasting from 1845 to 1852 that constituted a historical social crisis and had a major impact on Irish society and history as a whole. The most severely affected areas were in
340-602: A Royal Commission , chaired by the Earl of Devon ( Devon Commission ), to enquire into the laws regarding the occupation of land. Irish politician Daniel O'Connell described this commission as "perfectly one-sided", being composed of landlords with no tenant representation. In February 1845, Devon reported: It would be impossible adequately to describe the privations which they [the Irish labourer and his family] habitually and silently endure ... in many districts their only food
510-547: A unique dialect of Irish developed before falling out of use in the early 20th century. With a writing system , Ogham , dating back to at least the 4th century AD, which was gradually replaced by Latin script since the 5th century AD, Irish has one of the oldest vernacular literatures in Western Europe . On the island, the language has three major dialects: Connacht , Munster and Ulster Irish . All three have distinctions in their speech and orthography . There
680-559: A "defence fund" for legal representation in eviction cases and support for evicted families. Rent strikes could also be effected in a Slowdown way, with paying a fraction now and promising more next week while making oneself unavailable, it could include obstacles for rent collectors, re-occupation of farms rented by evicted defaulters, etc. The Meaghers of Kilbury are credited as the inventors of this kind of tactics when they practiced it in January 1880. Contemporary opponents argued that
850-717: A bargaining chip during government formation in Northern Ireland, prompting protests from organisations and groups such as An Dream Dearg . Irish became an official language of the EU on 1 January 2007, meaning that MEPs with Irish fluency can now speak the language in the European Parliament and at committees, although in the case of the latter they have to give prior notice to a simultaneous interpreter in order to ensure that what they say can be interpreted into other languages. While an official language of
1020-523: A better future for Ireland and all her citizens." The Strategy was produced on 21 December 2010 and will stay in action until 2030; it aims to target language vitality and revitalization of the Irish language. The 30-page document published by the Government of Ireland details the objectives it plans to work towards in an attempt to preserve and promote both the Irish language and the Gaeltacht. It
1190-552: A combination of heavy rains, poor yields and low prices that brought widespread hunger and deprivation. Compounded by the reduction in opportunities for outside income, especially seasonal agricultural income in Great Britain, many smallholders were faced with hunger and unable to pay their rent. Some landlords offered rent abatement, while others refused on the grounds that their tenants were participating in anti-landlord agitation. Irish historian Paul Bew notes that five of
1360-530: A comparatively small space. By 1800, the potato had become a staple food for one in three Irish people, especially in winter. It eventually became a staple year-round for farmers. A disproportionate share of the potatoes grown in Ireland were the Irish Lumper , creating a lack of genetic variability among potato plants, which increased vulnerability to disease. Potatoes were essential to the expansion of
1530-478: A cultural and social force. Irish speakers often insisted on using the language in law courts (even when they knew English), and Irish was also common in commercial transactions. The language was heavily implicated in the "devotional revolution" which marked the standardisation of Catholic religious practice and was also widely used in a political context. Down to the time of the Great Famine and even afterwards,
1700-512: A defeat for the small farmers; besides "a legacy of bitterness and cynicism in Connaught", the main effect of their campaign was to show how Irish nationalism had become a bourgeois movement, including many large graziers. By the Irish War of Independence (1918–1922) about half a million people were occupying uneconomic smallholdings, mostly in the west of Ireland. In addition, veterans of
1870-553: A degree course in the NUI federal system to pass the subject of Irish in the Leaving Certificate or GCE / GCSE examinations. Exemptions are made from this requirement for students who were born or completed primary education outside of Ireland, and students diagnosed with dyslexia . NUI Galway is required to appoint people who are competent in the Irish language, as long as they are also competent in all other aspects of
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#17327654373222040-953: A disease that had attacked the potato crops in America for two years. In 1843 and 1844, blight largely destroyed the potato crops in the Eastern United States. Ships from Baltimore , Philadelphia , or New York City could have carried diseased potatoes from these areas to European ports. American plant pathologist William C. Paddock posited that the blight was transported via potatoes being carried to feed passengers on clipper ships sailing from America to Ireland. Once introduced in Ireland and Europe, blight spread rapidly. By mid-August 1845, it had reached much of northern and central Europe; Belgium, The Netherlands, northern France, and southern England had all already been affected. On 16 August 1845, The Gardeners' Chronicle and Horticultural Gazette reported "a blight of unusual character" on
2210-400: A disincentive to local relief efforts. Due to poor weather conditions, the first shipment did not arrive in Ireland until the beginning of February 1846. The initial shipments were of unground dried kernels, but the few Irish mills in operation were not equipped for milling maize and a long and complicated milling process had to be adopted before the meal could be distributed. In addition, before
2380-460: A fully recognised EU language for the first time in the state's history. Before Irish became an official language it was afforded the status of treaty language and only the highest-level documents of the EU were made available in Irish. The Irish language was carried abroad in the modern period by a vast diaspora , chiefly to Great Britain and North America, but also to Australia , New Zealand and Argentina . The first large movements began in
2550-534: A holding by a tenant became the property of the landlord when the lease expired or was terminated, the incentive to make improvements was limited. Most tenants had no security of tenure on the land; as tenants "at will", they could be turned out whenever the landlord chose. The only exception to this arrangement was in Ulster where, under a practice known as "tenant right" , a tenant was compensated for any improvement they made to their holding. According to Woodham-Smith,
2720-477: A hostile place in which to live. Some landlords visited their property only once or twice in a lifetime, if ever. The rents from Ireland were generally spent elsewhere; an estimated £6,000,000 was remitted out of Ireland in 1842. In 1843, the British Government recognized that the land management system in Ireland was the foundational cause of disaffection in the country. The Prime Minister established
2890-474: A mass meeting in Irishtown, County Mayo organised by local and Dublin-based activists, led by Davitt and James Daly . The activists tried to mobilize an alliance of tenant farmers, shopkeepers and clergy in favour of land reform. Although the clergy refused to participate, some 7,000 to 13,000 people attended the meeting, having come from all parts of Mayo and counties Roscommon and Galway . The main issue
3060-589: A meeting on 1 June 1879 in Dublin between Devoy, Parnell, and Michael Davitt . It is disputed what was actually agreed to. Davitt maintained that there was no formal agreement, while Devoy claimed that the IPP had promised not to act against the Irish Republican Brotherhood (IRB) and made other concessions in exchange for Irish-American support. The west of Ireland was hit by the 1879 famine ,
3230-522: A mixture of "indoor" and "outdoor" direct relief; the former administered in workhouses through the Irish Poor Laws , the latter through soup kitchens . The costs of the Poor Law fell primarily on the local landlords, some of whom in turn attempted to reduce their liability by evicting their tenants or providing some relief through the conversionist practice of Souperism . On 1 March 1847,
3400-548: A new Whig administration in London, which pursued a laissez-faire economic doctrine, but also because some in power believed in divine providence or that the Irish lacked moral character , with aid only resuming to some degree later. Large amounts of food were exported from Ireland during the famine and the refusal of London to bar such exports, as had been done on previous occasions, was an immediate and continuing source of controversy, contributing to anti-British sentiment and
3570-547: A new non-violent moral tactic against those taking over the land of evicted tenants. Parnell gave a speech in Ennis in 1889, proposing that when dealing with such tenants, rather than resorting to violence, everyone in the locality should instead shun them. This tactic was then widened to landowners. The term "boycott" was coined later that year following the successful campaign against County Mayo land agent Charles Boycott . The concerted action taken against him meant that Boycott
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#17327654373223740-585: A paper suggested that within a generation, non-Gaeltacht habitual users of Irish might typically be members of an urban, middle class, and highly educated minority. Parliamentary legislation is supposed to be available in both Irish and English but is frequently only available in English. This is notwithstanding that Article 25.4 of the Constitution of Ireland requires that an "official translation" of any law in one official language be provided immediately in
3910-417: A parallel in the world. It allowed proprietors to suck the very life-blood of that wretched race". The "Gregory clause" of the Poor Law, named after William H. Gregory , MP, prohibited anyone who held at least 1 ⁄ 4 acre (0.1 ha) from receiving relief. In practice, this meant that the many farmers who had to sell all their produce to pay rent and taxes, would have to deliver up all their land to
4080-575: A pass in Leaving Certificate Irish or English, and receive lessons in Irish during their two years of training. Official documents of the Irish government must be published in both Irish and English or Irish alone (in accordance with the Official Languages Act 2003, enforced by An Coimisinéir Teanga , the Irish language ombudsman). The National University of Ireland requires all students wishing to embark on
4250-625: A religious context. An Irish translation of the Old Testament by Leinsterman Muircheartach Ó Cíonga , commissioned by Bishop Bedell , was published after 1685 along with a translation of the New Testament. Otherwise, Anglicisation was seen as synonymous with 'civilising' the native Irish. Currently, modern day Irish speakers in the church are pushing for language revival. It has been estimated that there were around 800,000 monoglot Irish speakers in 1800, which dropped to 320,000 by
4420-676: A reported 20,000–30,000 turnout, in protest of the Church's position. Another meeting was held in Westport, County Mayo on 8 June, in protest against the Marquess of Sligo , the largest landowner in Mayo; Davitt persuaded Parnell to speak and 8,000 people turned out. Parnell went on with the engagement even after John MacHale , Archbishop of Tuam , denounced the meeting in a 7 June letter to The Freeman's Journal . Parnell also wanted to prevent
4590-492: A result of linguistic imperialism . Today, Irish is still commonly spoken as a first language in Ireland's Gaeltacht regions, in which 2% of Ireland's population lived in 2022. The total number of people (aged 3 and over) in Ireland who declared they could speak Irish in April 2022 was 1,873,997, representing 40% of respondents, but of these, 472,887 said they never spoke it and a further 551,993 said they only spoke it within
4760-630: A single island in history. The proximate cause of the famine was the infection of potato crops by blight ( Phytophthora infestans ) throughout Europe during the 1840s. Blight infection caused 100,000 deaths outside Ireland and influenced much of the unrest that culminated in European Revolutions of 1848 . Longer-term reasons for the massive impact of this particular famine included the system of absentee landlordism and single-crop dependence. Initial limited but constructive government actions to alleviate famine distress were ended by
4930-423: A tenant had been evicted, and purchasing their holding under the 1885 Ashbourne Act . Other forbidden actions included "participating in evictions, fraternizing with, or entering into, commerce with anyone who did; or working for, hiring, letting land from, or socializing with, boycotted person". Tribunals were typically led by the leaders of local chapters, holding open proceedings with a common law procedure. This
5100-545: A wider meaning, including the Gaelic of Scotland and the Isle of Man , as well as of Ireland. When required by the context, these are distinguished as Gaeilge na hAlban , Gaeilge Mhanann and Gaeilge na hÉireann respectively. In English (including Hiberno-English ), the language is usually referred to as Irish , as well as Gaelic and Irish Gaelic . The term Irish Gaelic may be seen when English speakers discuss
5270-399: A working wage. They had to work for their landlords in return for a small patch of land to farm. This forced Ireland's peasantry to practice continuous monoculture , as the potato was the only crop that could meet nutritional needs. The potato was introduced in Ireland as a garden crop of the gentry . By the late 17th century, it had become widespread as a supplementary food; their main diet
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5440-603: Is a Celtic language of the Indo-European language family . It is a member of the Goidelic language group of the Insular Celtic sub branch of the family and is indigenous to the island of Ireland . It was the majority of the population's first language until the 19th century, when English gradually became dominant, particularly in the last decades of the century, in what is sometimes characterised as
5610-452: Is also An Caighdeán Oifigiúil , a standardised written form devised by a parliamentary commission in the 1950s. The traditional Irish alphabet , a variant of the Latin alphabet with 18 letters , has been succeeded by the standard Latin alphabet (albeit with 7–8 letters used primarily in loanwords ). Irish has constitutional status as the national and first official language of
5780-582: Is always denoted with a capital letter to express its specific historic meaning. The period of the potato blight in Ireland from 1845 to 1851 was full of political confrontation. A more radical Young Ireland group seceded from the Repeal movement in July 1846, and attempted an armed rebellion in 1848 . It was unsuccessful. In 1847, William Smith O'Brien , leader of the Young Ireland party, became one of
5950-579: Is called 'cholera' in potatoes in Ireland, especially in the north". On 13 September, The Gardeners' Chronicle announced: "We stop the Press with very great regret to announce that the potato Murrain has unequivocally declared itself in Ireland." Nevertheless, the British government remained optimistic over the next few weeks, as it received conflicting reports. Only when the crop was harvested in October did
6120-511: Is divided into four separate phases with the intention of improving 9 main areas of action including: The general goal for this strategy was to increase the number of daily speakers from 83,000 to 250,000 by the end of its run. By 2022, the number of such speakers had fallen to 71,968. Before the partition of Ireland in 1921, Irish was recognised as a school subject and as "Celtic" in some third level institutions. Between 1921 and 1972, Northern Ireland had devolved government. During those years
6290-587: Is only in Gaeltacht areas that Irish continues to be spoken as a community vernacular to some extent. According to data compiled by the Department of Tourism, Culture, Arts, Gaeltacht , Sport and Media , only 1/4 of households in Gaeltacht areas are fluent in Irish. The author of a detailed analysis of the survey, Donncha Ó hÉallaithe of the Galway-Mayo Institute of Technology , described
6460-412: Is still spoken daily to some extent as a first language . These regions are known individually and collectively as the Gaeltacht (plural Gaeltachtaí ). While the fluent Irish speakers of these areas, whose numbers have been estimated at 20–30,000, are a minority of the total number of fluent Irish speakers, they represent a higher concentration of Irish speakers than other parts of the country and it
6630-430: Is the potato, their only beverage water ... their cabins are seldom a protection against the weather ... a bed or a blanket is a rare luxury ... and nearly in all their pig and a manure heap constitute their only property. The Commissioners concluded they could not "forbear expressing our strong sense of the patient endurance which the labouring classes have exhibited under sufferings greater, we believe, than
6800-666: The Fíor-Ghaeltacht (true Gaeltacht ), a term originally officially applied to areas where over 50% of the population spoke Irish. There are Gaeltacht regions in the following counties: Gweedore ( Gaoth Dobhair ), County Donegal, is the largest Gaeltacht parish in Ireland. Irish language summer colleges in the Gaeltacht are attended by tens of thousands of teenagers annually. Students live with Gaeltacht families, attend classes, participate in sports, go to céilithe and are obliged to speak Irish. All aspects of Irish culture and tradition are encouraged. The Act
6970-451: The 1st Earl of Clare observed of landlords that "confiscation is their common title". According to the historian Cecil Woodham-Smith , landlords regarded the land as a source of income, from which as much as possible was to be extracted. With the peasantry "brooding over their discontent in sullen indignation" (in the words of the Earl of Clare), the landlords largely viewed the countryside as
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7140-739: The Anti-Treaty side in the following Irish Civil War . In the Irish Free State , their grievances fueled the Fianna Fáil party and led to the Land Acts of 1923 and 1933, which caused the "dramatic redistribution" of large farms and estates to smallholders and the landless. Some of the Land League's local branches established arbitration courts in 1880 and 1881, which were explicitly modelled on British courts. Typically,
7310-790: The Irish Coercion Act . While in jail, they issued the No Rent Manifesto , calling for a national tenant farmer rent strike until their release. Finally, on 20 October the Government moved to suppress the Land League. A genuine No Rent campaign was virtually impossible to organise, and many tenants were more interested in "putting the Land Act to the test". It further seemed that the Coercion Act, instead of banishing agrarian crime, had only intensified it. Although
7480-567: The Irish National Land League based in Dublin, with Parnell made its president. As the land agitation progressed, it was taken over by larger farmers and the centre of gravity shifted away from the distressed western districts. In Mayo, the autumn potato harvest was only 1.4 tons per acre, less than half of the previous year. At the Land League conference in April 1880, Parnell's program of conciliation with landlords
7650-542: The Irish National League and the United Irish League , and aimed to secure fair rent, free sale, and fixity of tenure for tenant farmers and ultimately peasant proprietorship of the land they worked. From 1870, various governments introduced a series of Land Acts that granted many of the activists' demands. William O'Brien played a leading role in the 1902 Land Conference to pave
7820-462: The Irish National League . Preceded by economic difficulties due to droughts in 1884 and 1887 as well as industrial depression in England causing shrinking markets, the 1886–1891 Plan of Campaign was a more focused version of agitation and rent strikes. Tenants on an estate would meet and decide on what was a fair rent to pay their landlord, even though rents had already been judicially fixed by
7990-535: The Irish Volunteers and first Irish Republican Army had been promised land in exchange for their service. In 1919–1920, a wave of land seizures took place in western Ireland, and in 1920 agrarian crimes were recorded at their highest level since 1882. When their hopes for acquiring more land were dashed by the fact that the Anglo-Irish Treaty made no mention of the land issue, many joined
8160-556: The Isle of Wight . A week later, on 23 August, it reported that "A fearful malady has broken out among the potato crop ... In Belgium the fields are said to be completely desolated. There is hardly a sound sample in Covent Garden market ... As for cure for this distemper, there is none." These reports were extensively covered in Irish newspapers. On 11 September, the Freeman's Journal reported on "the appearance of what
8330-521: The Land Commission in 1881 with quasi-judicial powers that eventually enabled most tenant farmers to buy freehold interests in their land. After the general election of April 1880 with the Land War still raging, Parnell believed then that supporting land agitation was a means to achieving his objective of self-government. Prime Minister Gladstone attempted to resolve the land question with
8500-624: The Land Law (Ireland) Act 1881 . The Act gave greater rights to tenant farmers, so-called dual ownership , but failed to eliminate tenant evictions. Parnell and his party lieutenants, William O'Brien, John Dillon and Willie Redmond went into a bitter verbal offensive against the Act and were imprisoned in October 1881 in Kilmainham Jail , together with other prominent members of the League, under
8670-528: The League could not possibly exist". The land question in Ireland was ultimately defused by a series of Irish Land Acts , beginning in 1870 with rent reform, establishing the Land Commission in 1881, and providing for judicial reviews to certify fair rents. The Ashbourne Act of 1885 started a limited process of allowing tenant farmers to buy their freeholds , which was greatly extended following
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#17327654373228840-545: The Lord Mayor , went to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, Lord Heytesbury to discuss the issue. They offered suggestions such as opening the ports to foreign corn, stopping distillation from grain, prohibiting the export of foodstuffs, and providing employment through public works. Lord Heytesbury urged them not to be alarmed, that they "were premature", that scientists were enquiring into all those matters, and that
9010-631: The Republic of Ireland , and is also an official language of Northern Ireland and among the official languages of the European Union . The public body Foras na Gaeilge is responsible for the promotion of the language throughout the island. Irish has no regulatory body but An Caighdeán Oifigiúil , the standard written form, is guided by a parliamentary service and new vocabulary by a voluntary committee with university input. In An Caighdeán Oifigiúil ("The Official [Written] Standard ")
9180-496: The Route Tenants' Defence Association , was however hostile towards the League. Agrarian crimes were rising during the late 1870s, from 135 in 1875 to 236 two years later. At the same time emigration (which acted as a pressure valve for political tension) decreased by more than half. Nevertheless, as late as 1877 the areas which would be heavily affected by Land League agitation were completely calm, without any hint of what
9350-798: The Sacred Congregation for Propaganda . In 1887 the Criminal Law and Procedure (Ireland) Act 1887 was passed to deal with the offenses surrounding the Campaign. After the 1881 and 1885 Land Reform Acts (see below), many Tory press commentators described the Plan of Campaign as an opportunistic and cynical method of revenge following the division of the Liberal Party and the rejection of the first Irish Home Rule Bill in June 1886. It
9520-417: The cottier system ; they supported an extremely cheap workforce, but at the cost of lower living standards. For the labourer, "a potato wage" shaped the expanding agrarian economy. The potato was also used extensively as a fodder crop for livestock immediately prior to the famine. Approximately 33% of production, amounting to 5,000,000 short tons (4,500,000 t ), was typically used in this way. Prior to
9690-402: The second reading of the government's Irish Coercion Bill was defeated by 73 votes in the House of Commons by a combination of Whigs , Radicals , Irish Repealers, and protectionist Conservatives. Peel was forced to resign as prime minister on 29 June, and the Whig leader, Lord John Russell , became prime minister. The measures undertaken by Peel's successor, Russell, proved inadequate as
9860-400: The 17th century, largely as a result of the Cromwellian conquest of Ireland , which saw many Irish sent to the West Indies . Irish emigration to the United States was well established by the 18th century, and was reinforced in the 1840s by thousands fleeing from the Famine . This flight also affected Britain. Up until that time most emigrants spoke Irish as their first language, though English
10030-416: The 1885 act. They would offer to pay the lower rent, and if it was refused, would instead pay it to the Plan of Campaign fund. These rent strikes targeted the most heavily indebted and financially insecure landlords, who faced a choice between immediate bankruptcy and accepting a lower income. Lord Clanricarde had evicted many tenants and became the main target. Given the extended franchise allowed in 1884 ,
10200-420: The 1902 Land Conference , by the Land Purchase (Ireland) Act 1903 . Augustine Birrel 's Act of 1909 allowed for compulsory purchase , and also allowed the purchase and division of untenanted land that was being directly farmed by the owners. These Acts allowed tenants first to attain extensive property rights on their leaseholdings and then to purchase their land off their landlords via UK government loans and
10370-604: The 1998 Good Friday Agreement , the language gradually received a degree of formal recognition in Northern Ireland from the United Kingdom, and then, in 2003, by the British government's ratification in respect of the language of the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages . In the 2006 St Andrews Agreement the British government promised to enact legislation to promote the language and in 2022 it approved legislation to recognise Irish as an official language alongside English. The bill received royal assent on 6 December 2022. The Irish language has often been used as
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#173276543732210540-439: The 40 years that followed the union, successive British governments grappled with the problems of governing a country which had, as Benjamin Disraeli stated in 1844, "a starving population, an absentee aristocracy, an alien established Protestant church , and in addition, the weakest executive in the world". One historian calculated that, between 1801 and 1845, there had been 114 commissions and 61 special committees inquiring into
10710-403: The 6th century, used the Latin alphabet and is attested primarily in marginalia to Latin manuscripts. During this time, the Irish language absorbed some Latin words, some via Old Welsh , including ecclesiastical terms : examples are easpag (bishop) from episcopus , and Domhnach (Sunday, from dominica ). By the 10th century, Old Irish had evolved into Middle Irish , which
10880-466: The Act all detailing different aspects of the use of Irish in official documentation and communication. Included in these sections are subjects such as Irish language use in official courts, official publications, and placenames. The Act was recently amended in December 2019 in order to strengthen the already preexisting legislation. All changes made took into account data collected from online surveys and written submissions. The Official Languages Scheme
11050-412: The Bank of England announced plans to raise a loan of £14 million to relieve the Irish crisis, and also for unfunded tax cuts. This led to the Panic of 1847 , in which gold was withdrawn from circulation, so reducing the amount of bank notes that the Bank could legally circulate. By 17 April 1847 the bullion reserve of the Bank of England had diminished from £15 million in January to some £9 million, and it
11220-404: The European Union , only co-decision regulations were available until 2022, due to a five-year derogation, requested by the Irish Government when negotiating the language's new official status. The Irish government had committed itself to train the necessary number of translators and interpreters and to bear the related costs. This derogation ultimately came to an end on 1 January 2022, making Irish
11390-497: The Great Famine evictions. For radicals such as Michael Davitt, it meant land nationalization. The fusion between land agitation and nationalist politics was based on the idea that the land of Ireland rightfully belonged to the Irish people but had been stolen by English invaders who had foisted a foreign system of land tenure upon it. Nominally, the Land League condemned large-scale grazing as improper use of land that rightfully belonged to tillage farmers. As investment in grazing land
11560-488: The IPP had to gain credibility with the larger number of new voters, choosing the most numerous Irish group: the low-to-middle-income rural electorate. Most IPP members were Catholic, and appealed to Rome for moral support. So did the government, and the Vatican issued a Papal Rescript followed by an encyclical " Saepe Nos " in 1888, condemning the activities of the Land League, particularly boycotting. Saepe Nos also claimed to extend and clarify an earlier similar ruling by
11730-407: The Inspectors of Constabulary and Stipendiary Magistrates were charged with making constant reports from their districts, and there was no "immediate pressure on the market". On 8 December 1845, Daniel O'Connell, head of the Repeal Association , proposed several remedies to the pending disaster. One of the first things he suggested was the introduction of Tenant-Right as practised in Ulster, giving
11900-425: The Irish language policy followed by Irish governments as a "complete and absolute disaster". The Irish Times , referring to his analysis published in the Irish language newspaper Foinse , quoted him as follows: "It is an absolute indictment of successive Irish Governments that at the foundation of the Irish State there were 250,000 fluent Irish speakers living in Irish-speaking or semi Irish-speaking areas, but
12070-442: The Land Commission. The 1903 Act gave Irish tenant farmers a government-sponsored right to buy, which is still not available in Great Britain today. The success of the Land Acts in reducing the concentration of land ownership is indicated by the fact that in 1870, only 3% of Irish farmers owned their own land while 97% were tenants. By 1929, this ratio had been reversed with 97.4% of farmers holding their farms in freehold. However,
12240-470: The Land War amounted to an "organised campaign of terrorism". In his biography of Michael Davitt, T. W. Moody acknowledged that the crime resulted from the Land League's militancy, but argued that statistics disprove the idea that the Land League maintained a "reign of terror". The most common type of agrarian offence was the sending of threatening letters. Davitt and other Land League leaders denounced agrarian crime in strong language, and local chapters of
12410-400: The League discouraged violence, agrarian crimes increased widely. For the ten months before the Land Act was passed (March–December 1880), the number of "outrages" were 2,379, but in the corresponding period of 1881 with the Act in full operation the numbers were 3,821. The figures to March 1882, with Parnell in jail, showed a continued increase. In April 1882 Parnell moved to make a deal with
12580-516: The National League passed many resolutions against it. However, the organisations were not in control of their rank-and-file. Between 1879 and in 1881, crimes related to the Land War rose from 25% to 58% of all crime in Ireland, without the leaders calling for an end to the agitation. Only 16 percent of agrarian crimes led to arrests, much less than the 50% rate for non-agrarian offences. Gladstone believed that escalating crimes were proof of
12750-601: The Pale (i.e., before the union with Great Britain in 1801) had adopted in periods of distress. Contemporaneously, as found in letters from the period and in particular later oral memory, the name for the event is in Irish : An Drochshaol , though with the earlier spelling standard of the era , which was Gaelic script , it is found written as in Droċ-Ṡaoġal. In the modern era, this name, while loosely translated as "the hard-time",
12920-620: The Republic of Ireland ), new appointees to the Civil Service of the Republic of Ireland , including postal workers , tax collectors , agricultural inspectors, Garda Síochána (police), etc., were required to have some proficiency in Irish. By law, a Garda who was addressed in Irish had to respond in Irish as well. In 1974, in part through the actions of protest organisations like the Language Freedom Movement ,
13090-464: The amount of rent they could obtain. Tenants could be evicted for reasons such as non-payment of rents (which were high), or a landlord's decision to raise sheep instead of grain crops . Cottiers paid their rent by working for the landlord while the spalpeens (itinerant labourers) paid for short-term leases through temporary day work. A majority of Catholics, who constituted 80% of the Irish population, lived in conditions of poverty and insecurity. At
13260-492: The arrival of Phytophthora infestans , commonly known as "blight", only two main potato plant diseases had been discovered. One was called "dry rot" or "taint", and the other was a virus known popularly as "curl". Phytophthora infestans is an oomycete (a variety of parasitic, non-photosynthetic organisms closely related to brown algae , and not a fungus). In 1851, the Census of Ireland Commissioners recorded 24 failures of
13430-693: The beginning of the following academic year. For a number of years there has been vigorous debate in political, academic and other circles about the failure of most students in English-medium schools to achieve competence in Irish, even after fourteen years of teaching as one of the three main subjects. The concomitant decline in the number of traditional native speakers has also been a cause of great concern. In 2007, filmmaker Manchán Magan found few Irish speakers in Dublin , and faced incredulity when trying to get by speaking only Irish in Dublin. He
13600-513: The campaign for independence. Additionally, the famine indirectly resulted in tens of thousands of households being evicted , exacerbated by a provision forbidding access to workhouse aid while in possession of more than one-quarter acre of land. The famine was a defining moment in the history of Ireland, which was part of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland from 1801 to 1922 . The famine and its effects permanently changed
13770-729: The campaign were abandoned on the run-up to the debates on the Second Irish Home Rule Bill in 1893. The IPP was by then divided into the Irish National Federation and the Irish National League over Parnell's divorce crisis. Between 1906 and 1909, smallholders seeking more land launched the Ranch War , demanding the sale of untenanted land owned by landlords and the breakup of large grazing farms. Opponents of ranching highlighted
13940-419: The cases were heard by the executive committee, which would summon both parties, call witnesses, examine evidence presented by the parties, make the judgment and assign a penalty if the code had been broken. Sometimes, juries would be called from the local communities and the plaintiff occasionally acted as prosecutor. Despite the trappings of common-law procedure, American historian Donald Jordan emphasizes that
14110-542: The commission stated that "the superior prosperity and tranquillity of Ulster, compared with the rest of Ireland, were due to tenant right". Landlords in Ireland often used their powers without compunction , and tenants lived in dread of them. Woodham-Smith writes that, in these circumstances, "industry and enterprise were extinguished and a peasantry created which was one of the most destitute in Europe". Immense population growth , from about 2 million in 1700 to 8 million by
14280-582: The complicated history of the period. The potato blight returned to Europe in 1879 but, by this time, the Land War (one of the largest agrarian movements to take place in 19th-century Europe) had begun in Ireland. The movement, organized by the Land League , continued the political campaign for the Three Fs which was issued in 1850 by the Tenant Right League during the Great Famine. When
14450-652: The conditions that led to the famine. However, it was asserted that, since the Acts of Union 1800 , the British Parliament was partly to blame. This point was raised in The Illustrated London News on 13 February 1847: "There was no law it would not pass at their request, and no abuse it would not defend for them." On 24 March, The Times reported that Britain had permitted in Ireland "a mass of poverty, disaffection, and degradation without
14620-475: The cornmeal could be consumed, it had to be "very much" cooked again, or eating it could result in severe bowel complaints. Due to its yellow colour, and initial unpopularity, it became known as "Peel's brimstone". In October 1845, Peel moved to repeal the Corn Laws — tariffs on grain which kept the price of bread high—but the issue split his party and he had insufficient support from his own colleagues to push
14790-439: The crime he has committed... if the population of a county in Ireland carry out this doctrine, that there will be no man ... [who would dare] to transgress your unwritten code of laws. Charles Stewart Parnell , at Ennis meeting, 19 September 1880 One of the Land League's main tactics was the famous boycott , whose target at first was " land grabbers ". Land League speakers including Michael Davitt began to advocate
14960-436: The crisis deepened. The new Whig administration, influenced by the doctrine of laissez-faire , believed that the market would provide the food needed. They refused to interfere with the movement of food to England, and then halted the previous government's food and relief works, leaving many hundreds of thousands of people without access to work, money, or food. Russell's ministry introduced a new programme of public works that by
15130-412: The economic situation deteriorated. Involvement of the clergy made it much more difficult for the British government to take action against the movement, which instilled "almost perfect unity" among Irish tenant farmers. In several constituencies, Land League-backed candidates failed in the 1880 general election due to clerical opposition. On 21 October 1879, the land League of Mayo was superseded by
15300-664: The education system. Linguistic analyses of Irish speakers are therefore based primarily on the number of daily users in Ireland outside the education system, which in 2022 was 20,261 in the Gaeltacht and 51,707 outside it, totalling 71,968. In response to the 2021 census of Northern Ireland , 43,557 individuals stated they spoke Irish on a daily basis, 26,286 spoke it on a weekly basis, 47,153 spoke it less often than weekly, and 9,758 said they could speak Irish, but never spoke it. From 2006 to 2008, over 22,000 Irish Americans reported speaking Irish as their first language at home, with several times that number claiming "some knowledge" of
15470-428: The end of December 1846 employed some half a million but proved impossible to administer. Charles Trevelyan , who was in charge of the administration of government relief, limited the Government's food aid programme, claiming that food would be readily imported into Ireland once people had more money to spend after wages were being paid on new public-works projects. In a private correspondence, Trevelyan explained how
15640-474: The end of the famine, and under 17,000 by 1911. Irish is recognised by the Constitution of Ireland as the national and first official language of Republic of Ireland (English being the other official language). Despite this, almost all government business and legislative debate is conducted in English. In 1938, the founder of Conradh na Gaeilge (Gaelic League), Douglas Hyde , was inaugurated as
15810-471: The fact that Catholic Irish were tenants was worse than "the heaviest yoke of feudal servitude". The Devon Commission of 1843–44 found that various forms of tenant right were practiced throughout Ireland, not just in Ulster . There was a tension between English law, which protected the absolute property rights of the landlord, and Irish custom on the other hand in which the tenant enjoyed an "interest" in
15980-602: The fact that many ranches had been created after the famine from land formerly tilled by evicted smallholders. Organised by the United Irish League and Laurence Ginnell , the Ranch War involved cattle drives, public rallies, boycotting, and intimidation. Between August and December 1907 alone, 292 cattle drives were reported to the authorities. It was most intense in areas of Connacht, North and East Leinster and North Munster where large grazing farms and uneconomic smallholdings existed side by side. The campaign resulted in
16150-407: The failure both of his government's policy of coercion and the Land League's No Rent strategy. Agrarian outrages decreased significantly after the founding of the Irish National League in 1882, due to the latter's system of dispute resolution for agrarian issues which imposed boycotting as its most severe punishment. British officials often claimed that the National League's effectiveness was due to
16320-463: The famine could bring benefit to the English; As he wrote to Edward Twisleton : "We must not complain of what we really want to obtain. If small farmers go, and their landlords are reduced to sell portions of their estates to persons who will invest capital we shall at last arrive at something like a satisfactory settlement of the country". In January 1847, the government abandoned its policy of noninterference, realising that it had failed, and turned to
16490-526: The fear of violence from lawless elements if the litigant did not comply. Sociologist Samuel Clark argued that the threat of violence helped the Land League enforce its rulings and silence its enemies. In 1889, the Special Commission on Parnellism and Crime found no links between the IPP and agrarian crime. One British official explained that, while he was certain that the League did not plan or commit crimes, "without outrage and intimidation
16660-494: The first President of Ireland . The record of his delivering his inaugural Declaration of Office in Roscommon Irish is one of only a few recordings of that dialect. In the 2016 census, 10.5% of respondents stated that they spoke Irish, either daily or weekly, while over 70,000 people (4.2%) speak it as a habitual daily means of communication. From the foundation of the Irish Free State in 1922 (see History of
16830-481: The first deaths from starvation were recorded. Seed potatoes were scarce in 1847. Few had been sown, so, despite average yields, hunger continued. 1848 yields were only two-thirds of normal. Since over three million Irish people were totally dependent on potatoes for food, hunger and famine were widespread. The Corporation of Dublin sent a memorial to the Queen, "praying her" to call Parliament together early (Parliament
17000-447: The first widely circulated tracts on the famine, The Last Conquest of Ireland (Perhaps) , published in 1861. It proposed that British actions during the famine and their treatment of the Irish were a deliberate effort at genocide. It contained a sentence that has since become famous: "The Almighty, indeed, sent the potato blight, but the English created the Famine." Mitchel was charged with sedition because of his writings, but this charge
17170-575: The founding members of the Irish Confederation to campaign for a Repeal of the Act of Union, and called for the export of grain to be stopped and the ports closed. The following year, he helped organise the short-lived Young Irelander Rebellion of 1848 in County Tipperary . When Ireland experienced food shortages in 1782–1783, ports were closed to exporting food, with the intention of keeping locally grown food in Ireland to feed
17340-547: The government. The settlement, known as the Kilmainham Treaty , involved withdrawing the manifesto and undertaking to move against agrarian crime. By 2 May all internees were released from jail, Davitt on 6 May, the day of the Phoenix Park Murders . With the Land League still suppressed, Parnell resurrected it with much ceremony together with Davitt on 17 October, proclaimed as a new organisation called
17510-598: The hands of the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland and Chief Secretary for Ireland , who were appointed by the British government. Ireland sent 105 members of parliament to the House of Commons of the United Kingdom , and Irish representative peers elected 28 of their own number to sit for life in the House of Lords . Between 1832 and 1859, 70% of Irish representatives were landowners or the sons of landowners. In
17680-776: The hungry. Irish food prices promptly dropped. Some merchants lobbied against the export ban, but the government in the 1780s overrode their protests. Historian F. S. L. Lyons characterised the initial response of the British government to the early, less severe phase of the famine as "prompt and relatively successful". Confronted by widespread crop failure in November 1845, the Prime Minister, Sir Robert Peel, purchased £100,000 worth of maize and cornmeal secretly from America with Baring Brothers initially acting as his agents. The government hoped that they would not "stifle private enterprise" and that their actions would not act as
17850-517: The island's demographic, political, and cultural landscape, producing an estimated 2 million refugees and spurring a century-long population decline . For both the native Irish and those in the resulting diaspora, the famine entered folk memory . The strained relations between many Irish people and the then ruling British government worsened further because of the famine, heightening ethnic and sectarian tensions and boosting nationalism and republicanism both in Ireland and among Irish emigrants around
18020-462: The landlord a fair rent for his land, but giving the tenant compensation for any money he might have laid out on the land in permanent improvements. O'Connell noted actions taken by the Belgian legislature during the same season, as they had also been hit by blight: shutting their ports against the export of provisions and opening them to imports. He suggested that, if Ireland had a domestic Parliament,
18190-539: The landlord to qualify for public outdoor relief. Of this Law, Mitchel wrote that "it is the able-bodied idler only who is to be fed—if he attempted to till but one rood of ground, he dies". This simple method of ejectment was called "passing paupers through the workhouse"—a man went in, a pauper came out. These factors combined to drive thousands of people off the land: 90,000 in 1849, and 104,000 in 1850. The Incumbered Estates (Ireland) Act 1849 ( 12 & 13 Vict. c. 77) allowed landlord estates to be auctioned off upon
18360-665: The language family, is derived from the Old Irish term. Endonyms of the language in the various modern Irish dialects include: Gaeilge [ˈɡeːlʲɟə] in Galway, Gaeilg / Gaeilic / Gaeilig [ˈɡeːlʲəc] in Mayo and Ulster , Gaelainn / Gaoluinn [ˈɡeːl̪ˠən̠ʲ] in West/Cork, Kerry Munster , as well as Gaedhealaing in mid and East Kerry/Cork and Waterford Munster to reflect local pronunciation. Gaeilge also has
18530-410: The language was in use by all classes, Irish being an urban as well as a rural language. This linguistic dynamism was reflected in the efforts of certain public intellectuals to counter the decline of the language. At the end of the 19th century, they launched the Gaelic revival in an attempt to encourage the learning and use of Irish, although few adult learners mastered the language. The vehicle of
18700-425: The language. For most of recorded Irish history , Irish was the dominant language of the Irish people , who took it with them to other regions , such as Scotland and the Isle of Man , where Middle Irish gave rise to Scottish Gaelic and Manx . It was also, for a period, spoken widely across Canada , with an estimated 200,000–250,000 daily Canadian speakers of Irish in 1890. On the island of Newfoundland ,
18870-457: The largest landlords in Connacht also refused to contribute any money to relief funds, despite collecting more than £80,000 annually in rent. According to historians such as William Vaughan and Phillip Bull, the serious agricultural recession combined with a unified nationalist leadership set the stage to produce a powerful and lasting popular movement. The Land War began on 20 April 1879 at
19040-556: The leadership shifted from agitation to organization to harness the new energy for the nationalist cause. On 16 August 1879, the Land League of Mayo was founded in Castlebar , at which point the first overtures were made to the Catholic hierarchy. From September, priests quickly assumed leadership roles in the movement and presided over more than two thirds of the meetings in the rest of 1879. The movement continued to gain strength as
19210-606: The measure through. He resigned the premiership in December, but the opposition was unable to form a government and he was re-appointed. In March, Peel set up a programme of public works in Ireland, but the famine situation worsened during 1846, and the repeal of the Corn Laws in that year did little to help the starving Irish; the measure split the Conservative Party, leading to the fall of Peel's ministry. On 25 June,
19380-526: The mid-18th century, English was becoming a language of the Catholic middle class, the Catholic Church and public intellectuals, especially in the east of the country. Increasingly, as the value of English became apparent, parents sanctioned the prohibition of Irish in schools. Increasing interest in emigrating to the United States and Canada was also a driver, as fluency in English allowed
19550-403: The movement. The league adopted the slogan "the land for the people", which was vague enough to be acceptable to Irish nationalists across the political spectrum. For most of the tenant farmers, the slogan meant owning their own land. For smallholders on uneconomic holdings, especially in the congested western areas, it meant being granted larger holdings that their families had held previous to
19720-804: The name of the language is Gaeilge , from the South Connacht form, spelled Gaedhilge prior the spelling reform of 1948, which was originally the genitive of Gaedhealg , the form used in Classical Gaelic . The modern spelling results from the deletion of the silent ⟨dh⟩ in Gaedhilge . Older spellings include Gaoidhealg [ˈɡeːʝəlˠəɡ] in Classical Gaelic and Goídelc [ˈɡoiðʲelɡ] in Old Irish . Goidelic , used to refer to
19890-469: The new immigrants to get jobs in areas other than farming. An estimated one quarter to one third of US immigrants during the Great Famine were Irish speakers. Irish was not marginal to Ireland's modernisation in the 19th century, as is often assumed. In the first half of the century there were still around three million people for whom Irish was the primary language, and their numbers alone made them
20060-429: The new movement's capture by Fenian radicals, as the latter were unacceptable to the Catholic clergy and to larger tenants, on whose support Parnell depended. This meeting, especially Parnell's speech in which he promoted peasant proprietorship, was widely commented in the press as far afield as London. Initially, the movement was non-sectarian in character and Protestant tenants also took part in meetings. The focus of
20230-655: The number now is between 20,000 and 30,000." In the 1920s, when the Irish Free State was founded, Irish was still a vernacular in some western coastal areas. In the 1930s, areas where more than 25% of the population spoke Irish were classified as Gaeltacht . Today, the strongest Gaeltacht areas, numerically and socially, are those of South Connemara , the west of the Dingle Peninsula , and northwest Donegal, where many residents still use Irish as their primary language. These areas are often referred to as
20400-503: The other official language, if not already passed in both official languages. In November 2016, RTÉ reported that over 2.3 million people worldwide were learning Irish through the Duolingo app. Irish president Michael D. Higgins officially honoured several volunteer translators for developing the Irish edition, and said the push for Irish language rights remains an "unfinished project". There are rural areas of Ireland where Irish
20570-402: The people of any other country in Europe have to sustain". The Commission stated that bad relations between landlord and tenant were principally responsible for this suffering. Landlords were described in evidence before the commission as "land sharks", "bloodsuckers", and "the most oppressive species of tyrant that ever lent assistance to the destruction of a country". As any improvement made on
20740-506: The petition of creditors. Estates with debts were then auctioned off at low prices. Wealthy British speculators purchased the lands and "took a harsh view" of the tenant farmers who continued renting. The rents were raised, and tenants evicted to create large cattle grazing pastures. Between 1849 and 1854, some 50,000 families were evicted. Irish language Irish ( Standard Irish : Gaeilge ), also known as Irish Gaelic or simply Gaelic ( / ˈ ɡ eɪ l ɪ k / GAY -lik ),
20910-403: The political climate, in which the Irish famine occurred. The "middleman system" for managing landed property was introduced in the 18th century. Rent collection was left in the hands of the landlords' agents, or middlemen. This assured the landlord of a regular income and relieved them of direct responsibility while leaving tenants open to exploitation by the middlemen. The ability of middlemen
21080-557: The political party holding power in the Stormont Parliament , the Ulster Unionist Party (UUP), was hostile to the language. The context of this hostility was the use of the language by nationalists. In broadcasting, there was an exclusion on the reporting of minority cultural issues, and Irish was excluded from radio and television for almost the first fifty years of the previous devolved government. After
21250-770: The poor smallholders in Connacht which it was intended to help, the League spurred the creation of the Independent Irish Party . In 1870, the Liberal Prime Minister William Ewart Gladstone pushed through the Landlord and Tenant (Ireland) Act 1870 . The act actually increased agrarian tensions, as landlords attempted to evade provisions intended to protect departing tenants, while the tenants retaliated by setting up local Tenants' Defence Associations . One such
21420-454: The ports would be thrown open and the abundant crops raised in Ireland would be kept for the people of Ireland, as the Dublin parliament had done during the food shortages of the 1780s. O'Connell maintained that only an Irish parliament would provide both food and employment for the people. He said that repeal of the Act of Union was a necessity and Ireland's only hope. Mitchel later wrote one of
21590-417: The potato blight returned to Ireland in the 1879 famine , the League boycotted "notorious landlords" and its members physically blocked the evictions of farmers; the consequent reduction in homelessness and house demolition resulted in a drastic reduction in the number of deaths. Ireland was brought into the United Kingdom in January 1801 following the passage of the Acts of Union . Executive power lay in
21760-606: The potato crop going back to 1728, of varying severity. General crop failures, through disease or frost, were recorded in 1739, 1740, 1770, 1800, and 1807. In 1821 and 1822, the potato crop failed in Munster and Connaught . In 1830 and 1831, counties Mayo , Donegal , and Galway suffered likewise. In 1832, 1833, 1834, and 1836, dry rot and curl caused serious losses, and in 1835 the potato failed in Ulster. Widespread failures throughout Ireland occurred in 1836, 1837, 1839, 1841, and 1844. According to Woodham-Smith, "the unreliability of
21930-683: The potato was an accepted fact in Ireland". Experts are still unsure of how and when blight arrived in Europe; it almost certainly was not present prior to 1842, and probably arrived in 1844. The origin of the pathogen has been traced to the Toluca Valley in Mexico, whence it spread within North America and then to Europe. The 1845–1846 blight was caused by the HERB-1 strain of the blight. In 1844, Irish newspapers carried reports concerning
22100-459: The property, which he could buy or sell. This "interest" could be as much as 4–6 years rent, which incoming tenants had to pay with capital that they might otherwise have spent on their own improvements. In the decades following the Great Famine , rises in agricultural prices were not matched by rent increases, leading to an increase in the tenant's stake in the farm, which may have risen to as much as 10–20 years of rent. The existence of tenant right
22270-492: The relationship between the three Goidelic languages (Irish, Scottish Gaelic and Manx). Gaelic is a collective term for the Goidelic languages, and when the context is clear it may be used without qualification to refer to each language individually. When the context is specific but unclear, the term may be qualified, as Irish Gaelic, Scottish Gaelic or Manx Gaelic. Historically the name "Erse" ( / ɜːr s / URS )
22440-432: The requirement for entrance to the public service was changed to proficiency in just one official language. Nevertheless, Irish remains a required subject of study in all schools in the Republic of Ireland that receive public money (see Education in the Republic of Ireland ). Teachers in primary schools must also pass a compulsory examination called Scrúdú Cáilíochta sa Ghaeilge . As of 2005, Garda Síochána recruits need
22610-423: The rest of the community." Larger farmers and landlords were better able to cope with a boycott, by weathering temporary loss of income, hiring scabs, or ordering supplies by mail. While the effectiveness of boycotting has been disputed the phrase and tactic has passed into the language of non-violent action. Rent strikes were used as a means of pressuring landlords to reduce the rent. Withheld rents often went to
22780-647: The revival was the Gaelic League ( Conradh na Gaeilge ), and particular emphasis was placed on the folk tradition, which in Irish is particularly rich. Efforts were also made to develop journalism and a modern literature. Although it has been noted that the Catholic Church played a role in the decline of the Irish language before the Gaelic Revival, the Protestant Church of Ireland also made only minor efforts to encourage use of Irish in
22950-412: The same period—of which only 4–5% was reinvested. This led landlords to take on a role of non-productive managers within the island's overall economy. Conflict between landlords and tenants arose from opposing viewpoints on such issues as land consolidation , security of tenure , transition from tillage to grazing , and the role of the market. The Irish nationalist politician Isaac Butt pointed out
23120-525: The scale of destruction become apparent. Prime Minister Sir Robert Peel wrote to Sir James Graham in mid-October that he found the reports "very alarming", but allayed his fears by claiming that there was "always a tendency to exaggeration in Irish news". Crop loss in 1845 has been estimated at anywhere from one-third to one-half of cultivated acreage. The Mansion House Committee in Dublin , to which hundreds of letters were directed from all over Ireland, claimed on 19 November 1845 to have ascertained beyond
23290-410: The shadow of a doubt that "considerably more than one-third of the entire of the potato crop ... has been already destroyed". In 1846, three-quarters of the harvest was lost to blight. By December, a third of a million destitute people were employed in public works. According to Cormac Ó Gráda , the first attack of potato blight caused considerable hardship in rural Ireland from the autumn of 1846, when
23460-418: The state of Ireland, and that "without exception their findings prophesied disaster; Ireland was on the verge of starvation, her population rapidly increasing, three-quarters of her labourers unemployed, housing conditions appalling and the standard of living unbelievably low". Lectures printed in 1847 by John Hughes , Bishop of New York , are a contemporary exploration into the antecedent causes, particularly
23630-405: The time of the Great Famine, led to increased division of holdings and a consequent reduction in their average size. By 1845, 24% of all Irish tenant farms were of 0.4–2 hectares (1–5 acres) in size, while 40% were of 2–6 hectares (5–15 acres). Holdings were so small that no crop other than potatoes would suffice to feed a family. Shortly before the famine, the British government reported that poverty
23800-601: The top of the social hierarchy was the Ascendancy class , composed of English and Anglo-Irish families who owned most of the land and held more or less unchecked power over their tenants. Some of their estates were vast; for example, the Earl of Lucan owned more than 60,000 acres (240 km). Many of these landowners lived in England and functioned as absentee landlords . The rent revenue—collected from impoverished tenants who were paid minimal wages to raise crops and livestock for export—was mostly sent to England. In 1800,
23970-444: The tribunals essentially were an extension of the local branch judging if its own rules had been violated. These courts were described as a "shadow legal system" by British academic Frank Ledwidge. According to historian Charles Townshend , the formation of courts was the "most unacceptable of all acts of defiance" committed by the Land League. In 1881, Chief Secretary for Ireland William Edward Forster grumbled that Land League law
24140-620: The vacancy to which they are appointed. This requirement is laid down by the University College Galway Act, 1929 (Section 3). In 2016, the university faced controversy when it announced the planned appointment of a president who did not speak Irish. Misneach staged protests against this decision. The following year the university announced that Ciarán Ó hÓgartaigh , a fluent Irish speaker, would be its 13th president. He assumed office in January 2018; in June 2024, he announced he would be stepping down as president at
24310-525: The way for the most advanced social legislation in Ireland since the Union , the Land Purchase (Ireland) Act 1903 . This Act set the conditions for the break-up of large estates by government-sponsored purchase. Alongside the political and legal changes, the " Long Depression " affected rent yields and landlord-tenant relations across all of Europe from the 1870s to the 1890s. The population of Ireland
24480-410: The western and southern parts of Ireland — where the Irish language was dominant — hence the period was contemporaneously known in Irish as an Drochshaol , which literally translates to "the bad life" and loosely translates to "the hard times". The worst year of the famine was 1847, which became known as "Black '47". The population of Ireland on the eve of the famine was about 8.5 million, by 1901 it
24650-594: The work of such writers as Geoffrey Keating , is said to date from the 17th century, and was the medium of popular literature from that time on. From the 18th century on, the language lost ground in the east of the country. The reasons behind this shift were complex but came down to a number of factors: The change was characterised by diglossia (two languages being used by the same community in different social and economic situations) and transitional bilingualism (monoglot Irish-speaking grandparents with bilingual children and monoglot English-speaking grandchildren). By
24820-417: The world. English documentary maker John Percival said that the famine "became part of the long story of betrayal and exploitation which led to the growing movement in Ireland for independence." Scholar Kirby Miller makes the same point. Debate exists regarding nomenclature for the event, whether to use the term "Famine", "Potato Famine" or "Great Hunger", the last of which some believe most accurately captures
24990-451: Was a period of agrarian agitation in rural Ireland (then wholly part of the United Kingdom ) that began in 1879. It may refer specifically to the first and most intense period of agitation between 1879 and 1882, or include later outbreaks of agitation that periodically reignited until 1923, especially the 1886–1891 Plan of Campaign and the 1906–1909 Ranch War . The agitation was led by the Irish National Land League and its successors,
25160-431: Was accepted by creditors who would extend loans with the tenant right as collateral. During the Great Famine (1845–1849), the poorest cottiers and agricultural labourers died or were forced to emigrate, freeing up land that was purchased by larger farmers. In 1850, the Tenant Right League briefly dominated Irish politics with the demand for free sale, fixity of tenure, and fair rent . Although it never caught on with
25330-498: Was also described as cruel, as new rent strikes would inevitably result in more evictions and boycotting as before, with all the associated intimidation and violence. Other reporters saw it as a matter of justice and of continuing concern to genuine liberals. The Campaign led on to events such as the Mitchelstown massacre in 1887 and the imprisonment of IPP MPs such as William O'Brien for their involvement. The violent aspects of
25500-531: Was also sometimes used in Scots and then in English to refer to Irish; as well as Scottish Gaelic. Written Irish is first attested in Ogham inscriptions from the 4th century AD, a stage of the language known as Primitive Irish . These writings have been found throughout Ireland and the west coast of Great Britain. Primitive Irish underwent a change into Old Irish through the 5th century. Old Irish, dating from
25670-567: Was announced that the cost of famine relief would be transferred to local taxes in Ireland. The financial crisis temporarily improved, but the intended relief for Ireland did not materialise. In June 1847, the Poor Relief (Ireland) Act 1847 ( 10 & 11 Vict. c. 31) was passed which embodied the principle, popular in Britain, that Irish property must support Irish poverty. The landed proprietors in Ireland were held in Britain to have created
25840-509: Was ascendant: ... all law rests on the power to punish its infraction. There being no such power in Ireland at the present time, I am forced to acknowledge that to a great extent, the ordinary law of the country is powerless; but the unwritten law is powerful, because punishment is sure to follow its infraction. From 1882, the Irish National League organised courts to replace those of the earlier organisation. The key provisions forbade paying rent without abatements, taking over land from which
26010-484: Was at this time prorogued ), and to recommend the requisition of some public money for public works, especially railways in Ireland. The Town Council of Belfast met and made similar suggestions, but neither body asked for charity, according to John Mitchel , one of the leading Repealers. In early November 1845, a deputation from the citizens of Dublin, including the Duke of Leinster , Lord Cloncurry , Daniel O'Connell and
26180-400: Was dropped. He was convicted by a packed jury under the newly enacted Treason Felony Act and sentenced to 14 years transportation to Bermuda . According to Charles Gavan Duffy , The Nation insisted that the proper remedy, retaining in the country the food raised by her people until the people were fed, was one which the rest of Europe had adopted, and one which even the parliaments of
26350-609: Was enacted 1 July 2019 and is an 18-page document that adheres to the guidelines of the Official Languages Act 2003 . The purpose of the Scheme is to provide services through the mediums of Irish and/or English. According to the Department of the Taoiseach, it is meant to "develop a sustainable economy and a successful society, to pursue Ireland's interests abroad, to implement the Government's Programme and to build
26520-528: Was establishing itself as the primary language. Irish speakers had first arrived in Australia in the late 18th century as convicts and soldiers, and many Irish-speaking settlers followed, particularly in the 1860s. New Zealand also received some of this influx. Argentina was the only non-English-speaking country to receive large numbers of Irish emigrants, and there were few Irish speakers among them. Land War The Land War ( Irish : Cogadh na Talún )
26690-449: Was intended to uphold the League's image of being in favour of the rule of law, just Irish law instead of English law. When a man takes a farm from which another has been evicted, you must shun him on the roadside when you meet him, you must shun him in the streets of the town, you must shun him at the shop-counter, you must shun him in the fair and at the marketplace, and even in the house of worship... you must shun him your detestation of
26860-475: Was just 4.4 million. During the Great Hunger, roughly 1 million people died and more than 1 million more fled the country , causing the country's population to fall by 20–25% (in some towns, populations fell as much as 67%) between 1841 and 1871. Between 1845 and 1855, at least 2.1 million people left Ireland, primarily on packet ships but also on steamboats and barques —one of the greatest exoduses from
27030-446: Was measured by the rent income they could contrive to extract from tenants. Middlemen leased large tracts of land from the landlords on long leases with fixed rents and sublet to tenants, keeping any money raised in excess to the rent paid to the landlord. This system, coupled with minimal oversight of the middlemen, incentivised harsh exploitation of tenants. Middlemen would split a holding into smaller and smaller parcels so as to increase
27200-482: Was overwhelmingly rural; in 1841, four-fifths of the population lived in hamlets smaller than 20 houses. This ratio declined over the century, but only due to emigration from rural areas and not from growth of the towns and cities. Land in Ireland was concentrated into relatively few hands, many of them absentee landlords . In 1870, 50% of the island was owned by 750 families. Between 1850 and 1870, landlords extracted £340 million in rent—far exceeding tax receipts for
27370-474: Was passed 14 July 2003 with the main purpose of improving the number and quality of public services delivered in Irish by the government and other public bodies. Compliance with the Act is monitored by the An Coimisinéir Teanga (Irish Language Commissioner) which was established in 2004 and any complaints or concerns pertaining to the Act are brought to them. There are 35 sections included in
27540-446: Was rejected in favour a demand for the abolition of "landlordism", promoted by Davitt and other radicals. On 17 May, Parnell was elected to the presidency of the IPP. Local chapters of the Land League frequently were formed from previous associations such as Tenants' Defence Associations or Farmers' Clubs, which decided to join the Land League because of the greater financial resources offered; this brought larger farmers and graziers into
27710-641: Was rent, which was typically paid in the spring; due to the poor harvest tenants could not afford to pay and many had been threatened with eviction. The crowd was guided and led into position by local Fenians—recruited by Davitt in an earlier trip with help from local IRB leader Pat Nally —even though the IRB council refused to sanction agrarian activism. Speakers included John O'Connor Power MP, Fenian Thomas Brennan , Glasgow-based activist John Ferguson , and Daly. Local Fenians organised meetings, at Claremorris on 25 May with 200 attendees and Knock on 1 June with
27880-460: Was so widespread that one-third of all Irish small holdings could not support the tenant families after rent was paid; the families survived only by earnings as seasonal migrant labour in England and Scotland. Following the famine, reforms were implemented making it illegal to further divide land holdings. The 1841 census showed a population of just over eight million. Two-thirds of people depended on agriculture for their survival but rarely received
28050-693: Was spoken throughout Ireland, Isle of Man and parts of Scotland . It is the language of a large corpus of literature, including the Ulster Cycle . From the 12th century, Middle Irish began to evolve into modern Irish in Ireland, into Scottish Gaelic in Scotland, and into the Manx language in the Isle of Man . Early Modern Irish , dating from the 13th century, was the basis of the literary language of both Ireland and Gaelic-speaking Scotland. Modern Irish, sometimes called Late Modern Irish, as attested in
28220-491: Was still based on butter, milk, and grain products. The Irish economy grew between 1760 and 1815 due to infrastructure expansion and the Napoleonic Wars (1805–1815), which had increased the demand for food in Britain. Tillage increased to such an extent that there was only a small amount of land available to small farmers to feed themselves. The potato was adopted as a primary food source because of its quick growth in
28390-418: Was the main vehicle of upward mobility for rural Catholics, the new Catholic grazier class was torn between its natural allegiance to Irish nationalism and its economic dependence on landlords to rent land for grazing. Many sided with the Land League, creating a mixed-class body whose actual economic interests conflicted. This further consolidated the nationalist nature of the Land League. The government set up
28560-610: Was to come. In 1878, the Irish-American Clan na Gael leader John Devoy offered Charles Stewart Parnell , then a rising star in the Irish Parliamentary Party (IPP), a deal which became known as the New Departure . As a result of this agreement, the physical-force and parliamentary wings of Irish nationalism agreed to work together on the land issue. This collaboration was cemented by
28730-442: Was unable to accomplish some everyday tasks, as portrayed in his documentary No Béarla . There is, however, a growing body of Irish speakers in urban areas, particularly in Dublin. Many have been educated in schools in which Irish is the language of instruction. Such schools are known as Gaelscoileanna at primary level. These Irish-medium schools report some better outcomes for students than English-medium schools. In 2009,
28900-534: Was unable to hire anyone to harvest the crops in his charge. Boycott was forced to leave the country; and the tactic spread throughout the country. The use of "intimidation" to enforce a boycott had to be criminalized in the Prevention of Crime (Ireland) Act 1882 . According to the Inspector General, boycotting "constituted a form of imprisonment for the victim who was isolated and separated from
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