When the bankrupt dandy Prince Hermann von Pückler-Muskau arrived in 1828 more or less by coincidence, his mind was a clean slate with regard to Ireland. He was appalled by the squalor he saw. ‘The dirt, poverty and ragged dress of the common man’, he exclaimed, ‘is beyond belief!’ Of the city of Galway he … Read more
Sir,—In his recent letter (HI 4.4, Spring 1997) Patrick Maume correctly states that in some districts Protestant yeomanry corps continued to exist on an unofficial basis following the disbandment of the yeomanry as a body. He also says that such a body existed in the Crom Castle area of Fermanagh under the patronage of the … Read more
Sir,—The article ‘The Hue and Cry of Heresy’ by Philip McGuinness (HI4.4, Winter 1996), while interesting, was fundamentally flawed. Theauthor invites the reader to ‘dig deeper into the science and societyin which Newton was embedded, and one is allowed…a fascinatinginsight into the use and abuse of science by ideologues…’. As one whohas done this I … Read more
The editors have set out to place County Donegal in its local, national and European contexts by combining the work of archaeologists, medievalists, Celtic scholars, geographers, place name scholars and historians of economics, culture and politics. The result is the most comprehensive interdisciplinary study ever undertaken of Donegal. The geographical entity we know today as … Read more
Eight years after the fall of the Berlin Wall seems an appropriate time for the arrival of new European histories which attempt to give East and West parity of esteem. Such histories are now wending their way to the bookstores. Europe: a History has garnered the most headlines (and sales). The layout is innovative. The … Read more