England’s break
with the Catholic Church, the dissolution of the monasteries and Henry VIII’s
assumption of the title King of Ireland incensed both the old Anglo-Norman
dynasties and resurgent Irish clans such as the O’Neills. Resistance to foreign
rule was fierce and it took over 150 years of war to establish the English
Protestant Ascendancy. Tudor and Stuart monarchs adopted a policy of military
persuasion, then Plantation. Oliver Cromwell was even more forceful. Irish hopes
were raised when the Catholic James II ascended to the English Throne, but he
was deposed and fled to Ireland, where he was defeated by William of Orange
(William III) in 1690.
1500
1504 8th Earl of Kildare become master of
Ireland after victory at Knocktoe.
1525
1534 Silken Thomas rebels against Henry VIII
1539 Henry VIII dissolves monasteries
1541 Henry VIII Henry VIII declare King of Ireland by Irish
Parliament
1550
1557 Mary I orders first plantations inn Offaly and Laois
1575
1582 Desmond rebellion in Munster
1585 Ireland is mapped and divided into 32 counties
1588 Spanish Armada wrecked off west coast
1592 Trinity College, Dublin founded
1600
1603 Earl of Tyrone ends eight years of war by signing the
Treaty of Mellifont
1607 Flight of the Earls: old Irish leaders flee to the
Continent; Plantation of Ulster
1625
1632 Important Irish History, The Annals of the Four Masters, written by four Franciscan friars
from Donegal
1641 Armed rebellion in Ulster opposes Plantation
1649 Cromwell lands in Dublin; razes Drogheda and Wexford;
Catholic landowners transplanted to far west
1650
1675
1688 James II, deposed Catholic king of England, flees to
Ireland and raises army
1689 Siege of Derry
1690 William of Orange defeats James II at Battle of the
Boyne; James’s army surrenders the following year in Limerick
1695 Penal code severely reduces rights of Roman Catholics
1700
