Thesis

Landscapes of ‘Civilisation’ and ‘Barbarity’ in the 1641 Irish Rebellion

Downloadable Content

Download PDF
Creator
Rights statement
Awarding institution
  • University of Strathclyde
Date of award
  • 2024
Thesis identifier
  • T16862
Person Identifier (Local)
  • 201859367
Qualification Level
Qualification Name
Department, School or Faculty
Abstract
  • The present research is comprised of an investigation into the organisation, execution, and reportage of the 1641 Irish rebellion in relation to the early modern Anglo-Irish struggle over ‘civility’ and ‘civilisation’, specifically by examining Irish and English perspectives of the ownership, use, and representation of the physical landscape throughout the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. In doing so, this investigation has contributed towards a greater understanding of the complexity of the Irish rebellion beyond its confessional scope, and has emphasised the significance of the landed dimension in relation to the continuation and endurance of Anglo-Irish conflict, from the Desmond Rebellions, to the Nine Years’ War, up until the outbreak of the Irish rebellion in 1641. By sampling individual testimonies of the Irish insurrection alongside larger contemporary accounts of the conflict, the English concern with the conquest and ‘civilisation’ of the physical Irish landscape and its inhabitants has been proven to extend across time, and was as much of a concern for average English and Protestant settlers seeking to ‘improve’ upon the land as for the colonial authorities of the crown, even after the onset of the conflict. As for the non-elite Irish population, who became the driving force behind the insurrection, given the scale of the displacement, dispossession, and devastation associated with the English conquest of Ireland, the rebellion was fought in order to reclaim their ancestral landscape, and was executed in order to restore the landscape to its former condition, use, and ownership, thus reinforcing Gaelic ties to the landscape itself. The rebellion constituted a battleground, not simply for the English conquest of the Irish landscape and its inhabitants, or even for religious denomination, but for the defence and advancement of English ‘civilisation’, or, from the perspective of the Irish, the restoration of Irish Gaeldom.
Advisor / supervisor
  • Fudge, Erica
  • Cathcart, Alison
Resource Type
DOI
Date Created
  • 2023

Relations

Items

Thumbnail Title Date Uploaded Visibility Actions
file details PDF of thesis T16862 2024-03-27 Public Download