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The writing of Irish medieval history

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 July 2016

Art Cosgrove
Art Cosgrove*
Affiliation:
Department of Medieval History, University College, Dublin
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Extract

This paper has been prompted by two recent articles in Irish Historical Studies. Both are by distinguished historians from outside Ireland — Professor Michael Richter from Germany (to which he has recently returned) and Dr Steven G. Ellis from England — who have spent many years teaching in the history departments of University College, Dublin, and University College, Galway, respectively. Their different backgrounds and experiences enable them to bring fresh perspectives to bear upon the history of medieval Ireland and have led them to question some traditional assumptions about the Irish past. Here I should confess that coming as I do from Northern Ireland I am something of an outsider myself, and my own origin and background must inevitably influence my interpretation of the past.

Professor Richter took the opportunity granted by a review of an important collection of essays to challenge ‘the unquestioned assumption that the Anglo-Norman invasion of Ireland marked a turning point in Irish history’. Arguing that the event should be seen in a wider context, both geographical and chronological, he suggested that a close parallel to the Anglo-Norman invasion of Ireland is provided by the German expansion into western Slav territories and that a comparison with the Scandinavian impact in the three centuries prior to 1169 would help to get the importance of the English in medieval Ireland into perspective.

Type
Historiography
Information
Irish Historical Studies , Volume 27 , Issue 106 , November 1990 , pp. 97 - 111
Copyright
Copyright © Irish Historical Studies Publications Ltd 1990

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References

1 Richter, Michael, ‘The interpretation of medieval Irish history’ in I.H.S., xxiv, no. 95 (May 1985), pp 289-98Google Scholar; Steven G. Ellis, ‘Nationalist historiography and the English and Gaelic worlds in the late middle ages’ in ibid., xxv, no. 97 (May 1986), pp 1–18. The present article is based on a presidential address to the Irish Historical Society in December 1987.

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4 A point developed more recently by Simms, Anngret, ‘Core and periphery in medieval Europe: the Irish experience in a wider context’ in Smyth, William J. and Whelan, Kevin (ed.), Common ground: essays on the historical geography of Ireland presented to T. Jones Hughes (Cork, 1988), pp 22–40 Google Scholar.

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6 Ellis, ‘Nationalist historiography’, pp 1–2.

7 Ibid., p. 4, n. 14. Does this mean that the five exceptions are ‘unionists’ or have put forward a ‘unionist interpretation’?

8 I pointed to a specific instance in the use of a phrase, ‘Hiberniores ipsis Hibernis’ in Cosgrove, Art and McCartney, Donal (ed.), Studies in Irish history presented to R. Dudley Edwards (Dublin, 1979), pp 1–14 Google Scholar. For a brief general account of the nationalist influence, see Cosgrove, Art, ‘Approaches to late medieval Ireland’ in Stair: journal of the History Teachers’ Association of Ireland (1983), pp 2–4 Google Scholar.

9 Ellis, ‘Nationalist historiography’, p. 9.

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39 Ellis, ‘Nationalist historiography’, pp 7–8. How does an identity based on race and culture differ from nationality?

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44 Canny, Nicholas, ‘Protestants, planters and apartheid in early modern Ireland’ in I.H.S., xxv, no. 98 (Nov. 1986), p. 115 Google Scholar. Professor Canny’s recent use of the term ‘Anglo-Irish’ has done little to resolve the confusion. He defines the Anglo-Irish as ‘the English settlers and their descendants who asserted their authority over Ireland during the period 1560–1660 and who were to maintain a political ascendancy over the country from then until the mid-nineteenth century’ (’Identity formation in Ireland: the emergence of the Anglo-Irish’ in Canny, Nicholas and Pagden, Anthony (ed.), Colonial identity in the Atlantic world (Princeton, 1987), p. 159 Google Scholar). This raises the possibility that Old English and New English will become Old Anglo-Irish and New Anglo-Irish!

45 On this point see Phillips, J.R.S., ‘The Anglo-Norman nobility’ in Lydon, James (ed.), The English in medieval Ireland (Dublin, 1984), p. 88 Google Scholar.

46 Cosgrove, Art (ed.), A new history of Ireland, ii: medieval Ireland, 1169–1534 (Oxford, 1987), p. lii Google Scholar. Pp xlix-liii and lx-lxii of the introduction were, in their original form, written by Professor F.J. Byrne and myself.

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53 Spenser, Edmund, A view of the present state of Ireland, ed. Renwick, W.L. (Oxford, 1970), p. 70 Google Scholar; Cf.Brady, Ciaran, ‘Spenser’s Irish crisis: humanism and experience in the 1590s’ in Past & Present, no. 111 (1986), p. 24, n. 21CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

54 Spenser, View, p. 48; cf. ibid., pp 63, 66.

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63 Secular authorities could not prevent people from marrying — decisions on marital matters rested with the ecclesiastical courts. But parties could be punished subsequent to their marriage as Elizabeth de Véale was for her marriage to Art MacMurrough.

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65 Above, p. 106.

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70 Ibid., p. 15.

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73 Cf. Cosgrove, Late medieval Ireland, pp 32–6.

74 N.L.I., Harris Collectanea, MS 4, f. 337b.

75 A similar conclusion was reached by Bradshaw, Brendan in ‘Nationalism and historical scholarship in modern Ireland’ in I.H.S., xxvi, no. 104 (Nov. 1989), pp 331-2Google Scholar.

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77 Well described by Frame, Robin, ‘English policies and Anglo-Irish attitudes in the crisis of 1341–1342’ in Lydon, James (ed.), England and Ireland in the later middle ages: essays in honour of Jocelyn Otway-Ruthven (Dublin, 1981), pp 86–103 Google Scholar.