Читать книгу The Wild Atlantic Way and Western Ireland. 6 cycle tours along Ireland's west coast онлайн

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English-backed Protestant settlement of Ireland soon began in earnest. This, together with authoritarian attempts to impose the Reformation, set in place a religious divide that grew wider with the enacting of laws that discriminated against Catholics – who tended to be native Irish – and cemented the power of a ruling Protestant gentry. A period of open warfare, and a brief flowering of Catholic power, came to a brutal end in 1649 at the hand of England’s Lord Protector Oliver Cromwell. More than a quarter of the island was then handed to Cromwell’s followers. The century ended in more tumult as the conflict between the deposed Catholic King of England James II and his Protestant successor William of Orange was fought out in Ireland. James was defeated at the Battle of the Boyne in 1690 foreshadowing another century of oppression of Catholics.

The United Irishmen Rebellion of 1798 – inspired by revolutions in North America and France – tried to unite Catholics and Protestants behind the cause of Irish freedom. But it prompted a backlash from Britain, not least because it was supported by a small-scale French invasion of Ireland. In the aftermath, the Irish Parliament was dissolved and Ireland was absorbed into the new Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, governed from Westminster.