For a large part of its geologic history these parts of Ireland were part of the continent of Laurentia, the bigger part of which is now part of Canada and the northern United States. These rocks remain as the foundations of the island to the north and west of the fabulously named Iapetus Suture which runs from the Shannon estuary to Clogherhead, north of Dublin on the east coast. Ireland’s oldest exposed rocks are the 1.8 billion-year-old granitic gneisses of Inishtrahull, an island visible from Malin Head in the far north west. Further south along the Wild Atlantic Way you will find the 200m high Cliffs of Mohr, made of Namurian slates and sandstones about 320 million years old. Close by are the rock pavements of the Aran Islands, and the neighbouring Burren, shaped from slightly older Carboniferous limestone.
The bays and peninsulas of Kerry and Cork were shaped into their east–west alignment by movements some 270 million years ago (known as Armorican folding), while in the north and west the mountains follow the northwest–southeast alignment of the far earlier Caledonian stage of mountain building, some 500 million years ago.
Fine glaciated features at the Poisoned Glen, Dunlewey (Route 1, Stage 6)
During the most recent ice age much of what is now Ireland was covered by ice, and the landscape retains some of the finest glacial scenery in Europe. Doo Lough Glen in County Mayo and the Poisoned Glen in County Donegal are glacial valleys of the highest order. Two glacial landforms, the esker and the drumlin, take their English names from Irish words. Drumlins are low, whale-backed hills deposited under the ice, while eskers are long sinuous ridges believed to result from water flowing under the ice.
Wildlife and flowers
The development boom of the ‘Celtic Tiger’ economy increased the pressures on Ireland’s wild places, but as a cycle trip along the Wild Atlantic Way will reveal, Ireland remains predominantly rural.
Ireland’s plant and animal populations are typical for a northwest European country. The main points of interest are some absences – Ireland has a slightly impoverished flora and fauna compared to mainland Europe and Britain – and a handful of unexpected species. Of the absences on the animal side, most notable are the snakes which, according to legend, St Patrick banished from Ireland in the fifth century.
The few unexpected residents mostly fall into the category of Lusitanian species – which are more commonly found in northern Spain and Portugal and are absent from Britain. There is no conclusive explanation for these disjunct populations. The most visible Lusitanian species to the casual observer is the strawberry tree (Arbutus unedo) of West Cork, Kerry and Sligo, which produces spiky bright-red fruits from September to December. A similar curiosity in the animal kingdom is the spotted Kerry slug, which is found in only three sites in Ireland – including the Killarney National Park – although it also occurs on the Iberian peninsula.
Ireland is an important bird habitat. The long coastline and position at the northwest corner of the Eurasian landmass attract countless seabirds. Little Skellig Island off the Kerry coast is home to some 70,000 gannets – one of the largest colonies in the world. Puffins also breed here and at other sites along the Atlantic coast including the Cliffs of Mohr.
History
Ireland’s history has been turbulent right up until the recent past. For many centuries, the island was ruled by England, later Great Britain, and much of Ireland’s more recent history has been consumed by tensions relating to that colonial legacy.
The island of Ireland is divided into two political units. All but a few kilometres of the routes in this book are in the sovereign country of Ireland – the term Republic of Ireland (RoI) is sometimes used to distinguish this state from the totality of the geographical island, also called Ireland. The remainder of the island is taken up by Northern Ireland, part of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland. The political division of the island reflects a complex and at times violent history with periods of tension continuing through to the present day.
Early times
Christianity is thought to have come to Ireland in the fifth century, or even earlier. By tradition this was at the hand of St Patrick who landed in 432. In what was a relatively stable land, Christian scholarship and ministry flourished as the rest of Europe descended into chaos with the fall of the Roman Empire. Irish monks then contributed greatly to the spread of Christianity throughout Britain and the rest of Europe with, for example, Columbanus establishing monasteries in France and Bobbio in Italy, where he died in 615.
Ross Errilly Friary has a well-preserved cloister (Route 3, Stage 8)
From the late eighth century onwards Irish settlements and monasteries became targets of Viking coastal raiders. The Vikings established permanent bases in Dublin, Wexford, Waterford, Cork and Limerick which went on to become the first significant towns in Ireland.
Politically, Ireland had been ruled, since prehistoric times, as a series of regional kingdoms with, occasionally, one king emerging as more powerful than his rivals and claiming suzerainty. Ireland’s first High King, Brian Boru, was crowned in 1002. He is credited with bringing stability to the island, supressing the Viking threat and restoring some of the damage inflicted on the monasteries during the preceding century.
English invasion and religious division
The Anglo Norman invasion of 1169 began a process of the slow seizure of power from the traditional Gaelic rulers of Ireland. But the Gaelic political and social order that had flourished since prehistoric times persisted into the 17th century in much of Ireland.
English interest in Ireland waxed and waned periodically after the initial invasion, before reawakening in earnest during the 16th century. The first of the British rulers to claim the title of King of Ireland was King Henry VIII of England in 1541. Much of the conflict in Britain and Europe over the following two centuries stemmed from Henry’s decision to split the church in England away from the Catholic church, alongside the wider ructions of the Reformation. It became Ireland’s destiny to be proxy battleground for wider disputes between England and other European powers.
In 1594 a full-on Irish rebellion against English rule broke out. What is now called the Nine Years’ War ended in 1603 following the defeat of the Irish, and an invading Spanish force, by the English at Kinsale. In 1607 the Ulster chieftains sailed out of Lough Swilly on the Donegal coast and into exile in France. This ‘Flight of the Earls’ marks the end of the power of the traditional Irish dynasties on the island.
English-backed Protestant settlement of Ireland soon began in earnest. This, together with authoritarian attempts to impose the Reformation, set in place a religious divide that grew wider with the enacting of laws that discriminated against Catholics – who tended to be native Irish – and cemented the power of a ruling Protestant gentry. A period of open warfare, and a brief flowering of Catholic power, came to a brutal end in 1649 at the hand of England’s Lord Protector Oliver Cromwell. More than a quarter of the island was then handed to Cromwell’s followers. The century ended in more tumult as the conflict between the deposed Catholic King of England James II and his Protestant successor William of Orange was fought out in Ireland. James was defeated at the Battle of the Boyne in 1690 foreshadowing another century of oppression of Catholics.
The United Irishmen Rebellion of 1798 – inspired by revolutions in North America and France – tried to unite Catholics and Protestants behind the cause of Irish freedom. But it prompted a backlash from Britain, not least because it was supported by a small-scale French invasion of Ireland. In the aftermath, the Irish Parliament was dissolved and Ireland was absorbed into the new Kingdom of Great
