General works

Informative surveys of Ireland’s history include James McGuire and James Quinn (eds.), Dictionary of Irish Biography: From the Earliest Times to the Year 2002, 9 vol. (2009); John O’Beirne Ranelagh, A Short History of Ireland, 3rd ed. (2012); T.W. Moody, F.X. Martin, and F.J. Byrne (eds.), A Chronology of Irish History to 1976 (1982); S.J. Connolly (ed.), The Oxford Companion to Irish History, 2nd ed. (2002); Ruth Dudley Edwards and Bridget Hourican, An Atlas of Irish History, 3rd ed. (2005); Séan P. Ó Ríordáin, Antiquities of the Irish Countryside, 5th ed., rev. (1979, reprinted 1991); J.C. Beckett, The Making of Modern Ireland, 1603–1923, new ed. (1981); R.F. Foster, Modern Ireland, 1600–1972 (1988, reissued 2002); Jonathan Bardon, A History of Ulster (1992); and A.T.Q. Stewart, The Narrow Ground: The Roots of Conflict in Ulster, rev. ed. (1989, reissued 1993).

Modern Ireland under British rule (17th–19th century)

T.W. Moody and W.E. Vaughan (eds.), Eighteenth-Century Ireland, 1691–1800 (1986), provides a comprehensive history of most of the period, as do Nicholas P. Canny, The Formation of the Old English Elite in Ireland (1975); Ciaran Brady and Jane Ohlmeyer (eds.), British Interventions in Early Modern Ireland (2004); Micheál Ó Siochrú, God’s Executioner: Oliver Cromwell and the Conquest of Ireland (2008); Jane Ohlmeyer (ed.), Ireland from Independence to Occupation, 1641–1660 (1995, reissued 2002); T.C. Barnard, Cromwellian Ireland (1975); Éamonn Ó Ciardha, Ireland and the Jacobite Cause, 1685–1766 (2002); Thomas Bartlett, The Fall and Rise of the Irish Nation: The Catholic Question, 1690–1830 (1992); and James Kelly, Prelude to Union: Anglo-Irish Politics in the 1780s (1992).

Nicholas Mansergh, The Irish Question, 1840–1921: A Commentary on Anglo-Irish Relations and on Social and Political Forces in Ireland in the Age of Reform and Revolution, 3rd ed. (1975), provides an overview of British-Irish relations under the Act of Union. Also informative are S.J. Connolly, Priests and People in Pre-Famine Ireland, 1780–1845 (1982, reissued 2001), and Religion and Society in Nineteenth-Century Ireland (1985). Oliver MacDonagh, The Hereditary Bondsman: Daniel O’Connell, 1775–1829 (1988), and The Emancipist: Daniel O’Connell, 1830–47 (1989), both volumes published together as O’Connell: The Life of Daniel O’Connell, 1775–1847 (1991); and Patrick M. Geoghegan, King Dan: The Rise of Daniel O’Connell, 1775–1829 (2008), are reflections on the life of Daniel O’Connell. K.H. Connell, The Population of Ireland, 1750–1845 (1950, reprinted 1975), presents a scholarly account. John Crowley, William J. Smyth, and Mike Murphy (eds.), Atlas of the Great Irish Famine (2012); and R. Dudley Edwards and T. Desmond Williams (eds.), The Great Famine: Studies in Irish History, 1845–52 (1956, reissued 1994), discuss one of the worst disasters that influenced the course of Irish history, as do Mary E. Daly, The Famine in Ireland (1986); and Cormac Ó Gráda, The Great Irish Famine (1989, reissued 1995).

Important monographs on 19th-century Irish politics include K. Theodore Hoppen, Elections, Politics, and Society in Ireland, 1832–1885 (1984); R.V. Comerford, The Fenians in Context: Irish Politics and Society, 1848–82 (1985, reissued 1998); Tom Garvin, Nationalist Revolutionaries in Ireland, 1858–1928 (1987); James Loughlin, Gladstone, Home Rule, and the Ulster Question, 1882–93 (1987); F.S.L. Lyons, Charles Stewart Parnell (1977, reissued 1991); R.F. Foster, Charles Stewart Parnell: The Man and His Family, 2nd ed. (1979); and F.S.L. Lyons and R.A.J. Hawkins (eds.), Ireland Under the Union: Varieties of Tension (1980), a collection of survey analyses.

The 20th century

Alvin Jackson, Ireland 1798–1998 (1999), considers the 19th and 20th centuries. More specific topics focused primarily on the 20th century are examined in F.S.L. Lyons, Ireland Since the Famine, 2nd rev. ed. (1973, reissued 1985); Oliver MacDonagh, Ireland: The Union and Its Aftermath, rev. and enlarged ed. (1977); Dervla Murphy and Klaus Francke, Ireland (1985), a pictorial work; John A. Murphy, Ireland in the Twentieth Century (1975, reissued 1989); J.R. Hill (ed.), Ireland, 1921–1984 (2003); Ronan Fanning, Independent Ireland (1983); and Diarmaid Ferriter, The Transformation of Ireland, 1900–2000 (2004). Specific 20th-century developments are considered in Patrick Maume, The Long Gestation: Irish Nationalist Life, 1891–1918 (1999); D.G. Boyce (ed.), The Revolution in Ireland, 1879–1923 (1988); David W. Miller, Church, State, and Nation in Ireland, 1898–1921 (1973); A.T.Q. Stewart, The Ulster Crisis (1967, reissued 1997); Charles Townshend, Easter 1916: The Irish Rebellion (2005); Michael Laffan, The Partition of Ireland, 1911–25 (1983), and The Resurrection of Ireland: The Sinn Féin Party, 1916–1923 (1999); Joseph M. Curran, The Birth of the Irish Free State, 1921–1923 (1980); Peter Hart, Mick: The Real Michael Collins (2005); Michael Hopkinson, Green Against Green: The Irish Civil War (1988, reissued 2004); Paul Canning, British Policy Towards Ireland, 1921–1941 (1985); Deirdre McMahon, Republicans and Imperialists: Anglo-Irish Relations in the 1930s (1984); Nicholas Mansergh, The Unresolved Question: The Anglo-Irish Settlement and Its Undoing, 1912–72 (1991); Terence Brown, Ireland (1985), an analysis of social and cultural factors contributing to the sense of national identity from 1922 to 1985; Ronan Fanning, The Irish Department of Finance, 1922–58 (1978); Michael Kennedy, Division and Consensus: The Politics of Cross-Border Relations in Ireland, 1925–1969 (2000); Liam Kennedy, The Modern Industrialisation of Ireland, 1940–1988 (1989); Robert J. Savage, Jr., Irish Television: The Political and Social Origins (1996); and J. Bowyer Bell, The Secret Army: The IRA, rev. 3rd ed. (1997), and The Irish Troubles: A Generation of Violence, 1967–1992 (1993).