THE PIKEMAN OF TRALEE: A Tale of Continuity and Change

popular imagination monuments appear to be timeless and unchanging. Once erected they quickly become a ‘natural’ fixture in the landscape. Highly visible and inhabiting a public space they encourage the viewer, as one writer has pointed out, ‘to mistake material presence and weight for immutable permanence’. Yet these silent, still, stone and bronze edifices have … Read more

The Rebellion Papers

The collection known as the ‘Rebellion Papers’ in the National Archives, Dublin, has been described as ‘the largest single source for the study of the 1790s’. The material ranges from the early 1790s to 1808, a period which witnessed developments that were to shape modern Ireland: the spread from revolutionary France of republicanism as a … Read more

Wexford’s Comoradh ’98

Launching the Irish government’s 1798 commemorations earlier this year, the Taoiseach, Mr Ahern, declared: ‘we are commemorating the most sustained effort in Irish history to reconcile and unite what were the three communities with different religious beliefs and ethnic backgrounds—Protestants, Catholics and Dissenters’. He spoke on behalf of ‘a sovereign Irish government’, that, he claimed, … Read more

1798, 1898 & the Political Implications of Sheppard’s Monument

Public memorials are often more about the politics of the time of commemoration than of the events or people commemorated. This is true of Oliver Sheppard’s celebrated bronze figures in Wexford and Enniscorthy commemorating the 1798 Rebellion. The centenary celebrations of 1898 marked a new departure in Irish political life, since the 1890s had been … Read more