Plantations of Ireland

Plantations Of Ireland

Plantations in 16th and 17th century Ireland were the confiscation of land by the English crown and the colonisation of this land with settlers from England and the Scottish Lowlands.

They followed smaller-scale emigration to Ireland as far back as the 12th century, which had resulted in a distinct ethnicity in Ireland known as the Old English.

The 16th century plantations were established throughout the country by the confiscation of lands occupied by Gaelic clans and Hiberno-Norman dynasties, but principally in the provinces of Munster and Ulster. The lands were then granted by Crown authority to colonists ("planters") from England. This process began during the reign of Henry VIII and continued under Mary I and Elizabeth I. It was accelerated under James I, Charles I and Oliver Cromwell, and in their time the planters also came from Scotland.

The early plantations in the 16th century tended to be based on small "exemplary" colonies. The later plantations were based on mass confiscations of land from Irish landowners and the subsequent importation of large numbers of settlers from England and Wales, later also from Scotland.

The final official plantations took place under the English Commonwealth and Cromwell’s Protectorate during the 1650s, when thousands of Parliamentarian soldiers were settled in Ireland. Apart from the plantations, significant migration into Ireland continued well into the 18th century, from both Great Britain and continental Europe.

The plantations changed the demography of Ireland by creating large communities with a British and Protestant identity. These communities replaced the older Catholic ruling class, which shared with the general population a common Irish identity and set of political attitudes. The physical and economic nature of Irish society was also changed, as new concepts of ownership, trade and credit were introduced. These changes led to the creation of a Protestant ruling class, which secured the authority of Crown government in Ireland during the 17th century.

Read more about Plantations Of Ireland:  Early Plantations (1556–1576), Munster Plantation (1586 Onwards), Ulster Plantation (1606 Onwards), Later Plantations (1610–1641), The 1641 Rebellion, Cromwellian Land Confiscation (1652), Subsequent Settlement, Long-term Results

Famous quotes containing the words plantations and/or ireland:

    The greater speed and success that distinguish the planting of the human race in this country, over all other plantations in history, owe themselves mainly to the new subdivisions of the State into small corporations of land and power.
    Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)

    No people can more exactly interpret the inmost meaning of the present situation in Ireland than the American Negro. The scheme is simple. You knock a man down and then have him arrested for assault. You kill a man and then hang the corpse.
    —W.E.B. (William Edward Burghardt)