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An Open Access edition of this book is available on the Liverpool University Press website and the OAPEN library.
Beggars and begging were ubiquitous features of pre-Famine Irish society, yet have gone largely unexamined by historians. This book explores at length for the first time the complex cultures of mendicancy, as well as how wider societal perceptions of and responses to begging were framed by social class, gender and religion. The study breaks new ground in exploring the challenges inherent in defining and measuring begging and alms-giving in pre-Famine Ireland, as well as the disparate ways in which mendicants were perceived by contemporaries. A discussion of the evolving role of parish vestries in the life of pre-Famine communities facilitates an examination of corporate responses to beggary, while a comprehensive analysis of the mendicity society movement, which flourished throughout Ireland in the three decades following 1815, highlights the significance of charitable societies and associational culture in responding to the perceived threat of mendicancy. The instance of the mendicity societies illustrates the extent to which Irish commentators and social reformers were influenced by prevailing theories and practices in the transatlantic world regarding the management of the poor and deviant. Drawing on a wide range of sources previously unused for the study of poverty and welfare, this book makes an important contribution to modern Irish social and ecclesiastical history.
'McCabe initiates a much needed shift in focuses from the urgent response to a humanitarian crisis in the wake of the potato blight to a comprehensive analysis to how Irish society tackled the challenges and instituted a framework to meet the needs of the most vulnerable on a daily basis. In this way, McCabe's book is essential reading when considering the ways an analysis of class, gender and religion in Pre-Famine Ireland illuminates how a growing sense of social awareness not only surfaced in this period but shaped the way Irish society would define and advance itself into the modern era.'
Victoria Anne Pearson, Women's History Association Ireland
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