| John Stoner's WWW Sources for Irish History |
This is a sampler of World Wide Web resources for the study of Irish history. It is a "sampler" because no claim to comprehensiveness is being made here. This page is part of the larger Web site devoted to Web resources for the study of the history of the Celtic fringe--Ireland, Scotland, and Wales--as an integral part of British history. This page contains annotated links to relevant Web resources organized into eight major categories (see the Table of Contents).A good brief overview of Ireland is provided by City.net's Ireland Page. City.Net, a service of Excite, provides information on travel, entertainment, local business, government and community services for cities and countries world-wide. The service's Ireland page provides a good summary listing of current information sources on the Web related to Ireland. See especially the entry from the CIA's 1995 World Factbook As the Northern Ireland page is considered a "sub-page" of City.net's United Kingdom page, see especially the United Kingdom entry from the CIA's 1995 World Factbook for more information on Northern Ireland.
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- British and Irish History Documents and Web Sites
- A brief listing of Web sites and hypertext marked up documents relating to Irish and British history, this site is part of the larger Places on the World Wide Web for Historians, which is maintained as part of the History Program at California State University San Marcos.
- Celtic Homepage
- This brief historical overview of Celtic groups and history was created and is maintained by Joshua Kundert on a Web site at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. Kundert, currently a graduate assistant in the Resource Center for Computing and Communications Services Offices at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, holds a B.S. in engineering from that institution. This site has some useful links to other resources related to Irish history.
- The Complete Guide to Ireland
- This Web site, created and maintained by Andrew Gallagher has as its aim to provide a content-rich and nonpartisan guide to all aspects of Ireland, past and present, and to maintain a comprehensive catalogue of Irish WWW resources. This site is a student work in progress which resides on the Special Projects WWW Server at Queen's University of Belfast. While the History page contains only a few links (to outside sources) it does include a very useful Chronology. Also quite useful is the Irish Politics page, which includes a very thorough set of links to the major political parties and movements in Ireland.
- Diane's Page About Ireland
- While the emphasis of this Web site, created and maintained by Diane Shaw, tends to be contemporary, there are useful Irish history and Irish news sources links.
- The Eire-Ireland Page
- This site is part of The Gaelic Homepage, which is maintained at SunSITE at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill. The larger site is devoted to the language and culture of the Gaels, those people that speak or did speak any of the three Gaelic languages. The Eire-Ireland component of the site contains links to both contemporary and historical information. See especially Irish Politics and History.
- Guide to Irish Politics Resources
- This Web site provides pointers to a wide range of resources in the area of Irish politics: academic links (links to professional political science information), basic information (documents and other basic data), official agencies (links to a range of public sector web servers), political organizations (links to web servers of parties and other political bodies), current affairs (news, newspapers, newsgroups and discussion lists), and miscellaneous (other links of Irish interest). While the emphasis of the site, which is maintained by the University College Dublin Department of Politics, is primarily on current Irish political information resources on the Web, some links to historical sources are also included.
- Ireland Historical Studies Resource Page
- Presented under the auspices of The University of Florida Department of History, and Professor Harold Wilson. This page was created by Cristopher Bjelajac as part of independent study coursework for Professor Wilson. This page is intended as a reference page for students using the web to research Ireland. Primarily contemporary rather than historical emphasis.
- Irish and Irish Immigration Studies at Southern Illinois University at Carbondale
- The home page for Irish and Irish Immigration Studies at Southern Illinois University at Carbondale, this Web site provides access to resources on Irish history both at the university and on the Web. See especially the Resources for Irish and Irish Immigration Studies and, under Other Links for Irish Studies, the Genealogy and Irish History pages.
- Irish History on the Web
- This site was created and is maintained by Jacqueline Dana on a server at the University of Texas. The Web server is paid for with personal, not university funds and the university is not responsible for nor does it endorse the contents of this site. This site is found in searches of all the search engines used on this topic. The emphasis here is strongly political, with a contemporary focus. This site lacks some of the traditional academic efforts at "objectivity." However, it offers some of the broadest coverage of Irish historical sites on the Web and is a necessary starting place.
- Irish Language and Culture
- This Web site is part of Michael O'Callaghan's Texas Celtic Page. It is a brief annotated list of links to Web resources regarding, as the name indicates, Irish language and culture. However, some of the links also include resources on Irish history.
- Irish National Information Server
- The Irish National Information Server (INiS) aims to provide access to information--both Irish and world-wide--that is relevant to the academic, research and educational communities in Ireland. Of particular relevance to Irish history are the Irish Education Resources and Irish Resources links, as they provide access to government agencies and academic institutions, such as archives, libraries, and research sites.
- John P. Hogan's Irish Links
- This Web site was created and is maintained by John P. Hogan, a graduate student studying management information systems at the University of Arizona's Karl Eller School of Management. While fairly brief, Hogan provides links to interesting resources not easily found using the traditional Web search engines. A good example is his link to information on Country Mayo. At the Mayo Web site, see particularly the History and Genealogy Web pages.
- Northern Ireland
- Martin Nilsson's web site at the Lund University, Sweden, provides links to the web sites of the major political parties of Northern Ireland and the Irish Republic; Irish (related) newspapers on the WWW; "non-political" organizations; and various relevant documents online. An excellent site for accessing information on the web relevant to the current political situation in Ireland. Includes the Sinn Fein and An Phoblacht/Republican News home pages.
- Northern Ireland on the Internet
- This Web site, located on a server at Kings College, Cambridge University, was created and is maintained by Desmond Keane, manager of the College's computing facilities. The site is searchable by keyword, subject, or by using a map of Northern Ireland. This is a compact, well-organized site, with useful links to Web resources on the politics, society, history, and libraries of Northern Ireland.
- Researchers in British and Irish History
- A list by time period of researchers and their researches related to British and Irish history. The list is maintained by the Institute for Historical Research.
- Tom's Irish and Celtic Page
- This Web site, created and maintained by Tom Welsh on a server at the Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University. This site provides a broad range of Web resources regarding the Celtic fringe. The primary emphasis is on Ireland, but the site also contains links for Scotland and Wales, as well as more general Celtic information resources. The resources are balanced between contemporary and historical and provide a good introduction to Web resources on the Celtic fringe.
- Yahoo's Ireland History
- By following Yahoo's subject hierarchy along the following path: Regional:Countries:Ireland:Culture:History, the searcher comes up with links to web sites relating to Irish history. While certainly not comprehensive, this Yahoo site provides a quick and easy introduction to Web sites on Irish history. A good starting place.
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- 1798 Rebellion Home Page
- Located on a web server at the Regional Technical College, Carlow, Ireland, these web pages provide narrative historical information on the Irish Rebellion of 1798. Simple and straight-forward with citations to information sources, this site is similar to the The Fenian Research Project.
- Ancestral Heritage
- An official site of the Northern Ireland Tourist Board, this Web site provides links to information on preserved ancestral farmsteads and cottages of some of those Ulster emigrants who rose to positions of prominence in North America, Australia and New Zealand in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries.
- The Fenian Research Project
- These pages were created by History 277 (Canadian Survey) students under the direction of Professor Jay White at Western Washington. A collaborative class research project done during the 1995 fall quarter, this page focuses on the invasions of Canada by Fenians, a revolutionary group dedicated to the overthrow of British rule (the goal being to hold Canada ransom for a free Ireland). The page contains links to American and Irish Fenian history, biographical information, and related Web sources. Many of the pages indicate sources for their information.
- Great Famine Commemoration
- This site, created and maintained by Christopher K Smith, is a commemoration of the Great Famine (Ireland 1845). The famine in song, poetry, education, and history are dealt with extensively. Bibliographic information on the history of the famine is provided and, in addition, this Web site provides links to other non-famine Irish information sources, both historical and current. In terms of breadth of coverage on a single (and singular) topic in Irish history and in providing links to related web resources, this is an excellent site.
- The Great Famine - 150 Years of Remembrance
- This Web site covers a brief history of the famine in Ireland and the immigration of Irish to Canada. It was put up on the Web Solutions servers by the Irish Association of Manitoba, in commemoration of the 150th anniversary of the Great Irish Famine that killed one million and caused over two million to emigrate.
- History of Derry
- This Web site, which is part of the Official Guide to Northern Ireland provides a brief historical view of the city of Derry, one of the longest continuously inhabited places in Ireland.
- History of Galway
- This site is maintained by Wombat Research. It is has links to marked up versions of Hames Hardiman's History of Galway (1820) and William R. Wilde's Loigh Corrib (1869) as well as a brief introduction to Galway history. A good example of how scanned and/or marked up versions of historical documents on a narrow topic can be organized and mounted on the web.
- Ireland's Historic Science Centre
- This Web site is part of the Birr Scientific and Heritage Foundation's effort in developing an Historic Science Centre at Birr. The castle and estate at Birr, County Offaly in Ireland, has been owned by the Parsons family for over 300 years. During those centuries Birr castle has been the site of scientific and technological development in the areas of astronomy, photography, engineering, and horticulture. The goal of the Foundation is to develop a center which will act as a focus for the historical aspects of Irish science and technology. The University of Limerick is also a sponsor of the project.
- Northern Ireland Collection Historical Timeline
- This timeline provides a chronological outline of political developments in Northern Ireland from 1920 to 1992. This web site is part of the University of Ulster's Northern Ireland Collection. The outline is based on information derived from the CALM (Conflict: Accumulated Literature in Multimedia) material, which was developed by Professor Seamus Dunn, Director of University of Ulster's Centre for Conflict Studies, and Professor David Bustard, Department of Computer Science University of Ulster. The outline contains links to explanatory pages and documents. A good brief overview.
- Racism and Anti-Irish Prejudice in Victorian England
- This brief case study is by Anthony S. Wohl, Professor of History and former department chair at Vassar College. His areas of study are public health, race and class during the Victorian era. This piece on anti-Irish racism is part of Brown University's Victorian Web site (see the Social Context link from the Victorian Web Home Page).
- The Rural History Centre
- A department of the University of Reading, the Rural History Centre supports academic staff involved in teaching and research, mainly relating to the rural and agricultural history of Britain and Ireland. In addition, it houses important research collections which include an extensive collection of archives; a reference library; the Museum of English Rural Life; a photograph collection with over 1 million prints and negatives dating from the 19th century; and the Bibliography of British and Irish Rural History. The Web site provides mainly descriptions of the Centre's holdings and contact information for interested researchers.
- Sinn Fein Home Page
- Sinn Fein (from the Gaelic expression "Ourselves Alone'') is , according to this web site, the oldest political party in Ireland and the first party in Ireland to have a presence on the Web. Founded in 1905, Sinn Fein is committed to the expulsion of the British from Ireland and the unification of the island. The web site provides information on the party's history, objectives, historical documents, and affiliated organizations. While clearly an electronic political platform for Sinn Fein, this site does provide useful, if partisan, information.
- Stones of Ireland
- A Web site devoted to providing access to textual, visual, and cartographic resources on megalithic structures in Ireland. It is part of the larger Stone Pages site, devoted to megalithic structures in Europe.
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- Views of the Famine
- This Web site, created and maintained by Steve Taylor at Emory University, contains a selection of contemporary reports related to the Irish Famine of 1845-51 from The Illustrated London News, The Pictorial Times, and Punch. The site also contains a link to Related Resources.
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- GENUKI: The UK & Ireland Genealogical Information Service
- GENUKI attempts to serve as a "virtual reference library" of genealogical information that is of particular relevance to the UK and Ireland. It is a non-commercial service provided by volunteers in cooperation with the Federation of Family History Societies and a number of its member societies. See especially the The UK and Ireland page. This is probably the best "meta-site" for Irish genealogical research (it contains links to IRLGEN).
- Ireland Genealogical & Historical Societies
- This list of genealogical and historical societies of Ireland is part of TFC's Genealogical On-Ramp Web site. The list provides addresses as well as links to lists for genealogical societies in other parts of the world. Only one of the Irish genealogical societies listed here has a WWW site. See also the Ireland section of the Foreign Publications & Periodicals page at this site.
- The Irish Genealogical Historical BookSource
- This site is a list of published materials for tracing Irish genealogy. The list is maintained as part of the larger Genealogical and Historical BookSource. This vendor advertises that it attempts to provide superior materials for family research, including traditional genealogical sources, historic genealogical writings, and social histories.
- Irish Genealogical Society, International
- The IGSI was established in 1978. Based in Minnesota, the society's primary goals are to promote genealogical research and create interest in Irish and Scots-Irish ancestry and heritage. While the Society's Web site does not provide any Web access to the society's own resources or services other than a descriptive summary of its purpose and contact information, it does provide a useful set of related Web links regarding Irish history and genealogy. The ISGI is one of the branches of the Minnesota Genealogical Society.
- Irish Genealogy
- This Web site, created by Christine Gaunt and John Fuller and maintained by Christine Gaunt, provides a thorough listing of Web resources on Irish genealogy. It is part of a larger Web site on Genealogy Resources on the Internet which provides links to genealogy resources available through Mailing Lists, USENET newsgroups, anonymous File Transfer Protocol (FTP), Gopher, World Wide Web, Telnet, and E-Mail. This larger site and its various sub-pages is one of the major meta sites for genealogical resources on the Internet.
- Irish World
- This site provides access to Irish World Heritage Services, a participating member of both the Irish Genealogical Project and the Irish Family History Foundation that provides fee-based genealogical research. Irish World advertises that its database comprises some 7 million records, covering all of Ireland and allowing fast and accurate family history searches. The site provides information on available services.
- IRLGEN Home Page
- This site, based on John Grenham's book Tracing Your Irish Ancestors, is a guide to tracing Irish ancestors and in particular to doing genealogical research in Ireland. The page was developed by a group of third-year Information Systems students in the Department of Computer Science at Trinity College Dublin between 1994 and 1995. The providers of this site do not carry out genealogical research but provide links to valuable online resources and leads to record keepers who hold the most relevant paper records.
- Library of Congress Entries for Irish Genealogy
- This web document, which is connected to the Library of Congress Holdings section of the Researching From Abroad web page of the GENUKI site is a list of 275 entries from the Library of Congress's online catalog, found in the "PREM" (pre-1968) and "LOCI" (post-1968) files which were retrieved by searching under the Library of Congress subject heading "Ireland--genealogy".
- The North of Ireland Family History Society
- The North of Ireland Family History Society, a member of the Federation of Family History Societies, was formed in 1979 and now has eight branches in the north of Ireland. A voluntary non-profit organization, the Society attempts to foster interest in family history with special reference to families who have roots in the north of Ireland and their descendants. The site provides information about the society, some searchable online services, and an excellent set of links to relevant WWW genealogical sites. See especially Publications Held in the Society's Library and the searchable 1851 Census fragments for County Antrim.
- OLochlainns Irish Families
- This is the home page of the Irish Genealogical Foundation and OLochlainns Irish Family Journal. The organization provides a number of services and publications to members, and also provides a free email publication called "Irish Families Email Edition." The site also has a link to an extensive Genealogical WWW Sites which is quite thorough.
- Paddy's Genealogy Page
- This Web site, created and maintained by Paddy Waldron is located in the Faculty of Business, Economic and Social Studies (BESS) at Trinity College in Dublin, Ireland. It is devoted to Waldron's genealogical research on the Waldrons and related families. Since the summer of 1987, Waldron has been entering into a PAF database information on his ancestors and their collateral descendants. This site is a good example of individual genealogical research and "publication" on the Web. In addition, the site contains useful links to relevant genealogical sources on the Web--see especially The Family History Project being carried out by researchers at the University of Cambridge and Trinity College, Dublin and details of Documents in the United Kingdom Public Record Office dealing with emigrants.
- Sources for Irish Family History
- This Web site is basically an advertisement for three publications of Flyleaf Press, which specializes in publishing Irish family history guides and references. It also provides contact information
- Ulster Historical Foundation
- The Ulster Historical Foundation is a non-profit organization, founded in 1956 to promote Ulster history and genealogy, and to make information about the sources in the field more readily available. The site provides service and contact information as well as a list of the Foundation's publications as well as the publications of its heritage Center (named Familia).
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- History of Ireland -- Primary Documents
- This Web site, which provides links to transcribed primary documents on Irish history which are available on the Web, is part of the larger Eurodocs site. This latter site, which is maintained by Richard Hacken at the Harold B. Lee Library, Brigham Young University, Provo, Utah, provides links to Western European (mainly primary) historical documents that are transcribed, reproduced in facsimile, or translated.
- Ireland History Archives
- This Web site is part of the Europe History Archives section of the World History Archives, a repository for documents that support, as the site indicates "an understanding of world history and the struggle for social progress." The site is maintained by Haines Brown at the History Department, Central Connecticut State University. While there are some historic documents available through this site, the majority are contemporary political documents, primarily those of Sinn Fein.
- The National Archives of Ireland
- Due to the fact that almost all the archives accessioned by the Public Record Office of Ireland before 1922 were destroyed by fire and explosion at the beginning of the Civil War in June 1922, the archives now held by the National Archives date mainly from the 19th and 20th centuries, although some date back as far as the 13th century. Despite the loss of documentary heritage suffered during the Civil War, the National Archives of Ireland (the holdings of which number some 135,000 cubic feet) is an essential starting point for anyone interested in the study of the history of Ireland. The web site provides limited online indexes, as well as lists of sources for the study of family, genealogical, and women's history. See especially Transportation Records and the Great Famine.
- Public Record Office of Northern Ireland Home Page
- This site provides information concerning access to the holdings of The Public Record Office of Northern Ireland (PRONI), Belfast. PRONI was established by the Public Records Act (NI) 1923 as the official repository for public records in Northern Ireland. It holds millions of documents some dating back as far as the fourteenth century. This institution is a key archive for original documents concerning Irish history. While it provides no online indexes to documents, it provides useful information to the student of Irish history planning to visit the Office, including a Web listing and order form for PRONI Publications.
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- Bibliography of Irish History, Culture, Politics, and Religion
- This brief bibliography is part of a larger bibliography that is in turn part of A Teacher's Guide to the Signet Classic Edition of James Joyce's Dubliners. Teachers guides for various books are maintained as part of Penguin USA's Web Site.
- The British-Ulster Heritage Site
- This Unionist site provides Web access to publications of the Grand Orange Lodge Education Committee. It's header indicates that the site exists "For the Promotion of Ulster-British Heritage and Culture."
- Institute of Irish Studies Recommended Reading List
- This site provides the Institute of Irish Studies 34th International Summer School 1995 recommended reading list. Since 1969 the Institute has provided interdisciplinary courses in Irish Studies. Based in Trinity College, Dublin, two week courses/lecture tours are offered each summer for undergraduates or mature students. Contents include areas such as history, literature, film, drama and folklore, monasticism, the Irish language and music. In the area of Irish history, the emphasis is on the middle ages and the early modern period (through the seventeenth century). Links from this page take you to other of the Institute's Web pages.
- Rough Guides' Further Reading--Ireland
- "Rough Guides" are travel and music publishers. This web site contains an annotated bibliography on Ireland. The section on "History and politics" is well balanced between popular and academic works and provides a good bibliographic introduction to the history of Ireland.
- Ireland and the Irish--Crumb Library Guide
- This site is one of the Crumb Library's History Guides to Library Resources. The Crumb Library is the main catalog for the libraries at SUNY Potsdam. While this guide is specific to individual libraries, it provides titles of standard works and subject headings on Irish history that can be utilized in any library setting.
- The Irish Rebellion of 1798
- A bibliography of over eighty titles in the Rare Books and Special Collections at the University of Notre Dame pertaining to the events preceding, during, and following the Irish Rebellion of 1798. Included are pamphlets, memoirs, biographies, histories, three contemporary newspapers, and a complete set of the Irish Parliamentary Debates as well as court proceedings and parliamentary reports. The collection was acquired by purchase in 1989/90. This collection is but one part of the Irish Studies holdings of the department.
- Labyrinth Online Bibliographies
- Bibliographies maintained at the Labyrinth, an information network providing access to electronic resources in medieval studies through a Web server at Georgetown University. See especially H-Albion History Bibliographies, Medieval Studies: Library Resources, Celtic Bibliography, and Old Irish and Early Christian Ireland: A Basic Bibliography.
- Old Irish and Early Christian Ireland: A Basic Bibliography
- A bibliography by Charles D. Wright, dated 1994. Also appears under Labyrinth Online Bibliographies.
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- H-ALBION WWW Site
- H-ALBION is a member of the H-NET Humanities Online initiative. H-ALBION, an electronic discussion list, encourages scholarly discussion of British and Irish history and makes available bibliographical, research, teaching aids, scholarly reviews of books and monographs central to the field, and to other WWW sites of interest to subscribers and browsers. This is probably the most academically rigorous of Web sites containing information and links related to Irish history. Follow especially the following links: Review Project, Resources, and Internet Links (NOTE: there is a mirror gopher site which may be consulted as well and it appears that the contents of the Web and gopher site may not be exact duplicates of one another; for instance, see the Gopher Bibliographies page and compare it to the main Web Bibliographies page).
- Irish Resources on the Internet--Mail
- What may be a dated (June 1995) list of electronic discussion lists relating to Ireland. The list was collected by Dennis Doyle and is maintained on the Web by John T. McCranie of the Department of Computer Science, San Francisco State University. This list includes H-ALBION as well as a number of others, many concerned Irish art, music, and language.
- LISZT Directory of E-MAIL Discussion Groups
- A searchable directory of over 40,000 electronic mailing lists. A search under the word "Irish" retrieved 25 relevant electronic discussion lists. Depending on the areas of your interests in the Celtic fringe, this is an excellent starting point for discovering relevant electronic discussion lists.
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- An Phoblacht/Republican News Home Page
- An Phoblacht/Republican News is political weekly newspaper published in Dublin and Belfast. On its own web page, Sinn Fein (from the Gaelic expression "Ourselves Alone"), the political party dating from 1905 which is committed to the expulsion of the British from Ireland and the unification of the island, has described An Phoblacht as "an Irish weekly newspaper with a republican perspective....Although supportive of Sinn Fein policy, it is an independent and fully registered newspaper and is not directly affiliated with Sinn Fein." However both Sinn Fein and An Phoblacht's web pages contain links to each other.
- Irish Media
- This index of Irish media sources provides listings of Irish newspapers, news bureaus, selected periodicals, publishers, bookstores, radio and television stations, media on the Internet, publications of the Ulster Society, and recent Irish books from Kennys Bookstore in Galway. The majority of the media sources listed here are not currently on the Web and what is therefore provided is relevant contact information. This index is part of a larger site maintained by John Lovett, who warns that the site is soon to move to http://www.cybercom.net/~jfl.
- Irish News
- A newspaper published in Santa Monica, California, the Irish News is compiling a List of Irish WWW addresses on its cover page. While far from comprehensive, this list is worth keeping an eye on as it develops.
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- Ireland--The WWW Server List (The Pink List)
- This site provides list of Web servers in Ireland, organized primarily by metropolitan areas. A short list of some Irish anonymous FTP sites is also available as is a brief list of off island servers and Irish Library catalogues. Although none of these sites are directly listed as pertaining to "Irish history," some do contain relevant links. Regardless, this is an excellent overview of Web sites in Ireland.
- The IRLNET Database
- Maintained by Joe Desbonnet, this searchable Web database features over 900 Web resources. The History section of the database, unfortunately, currently has only 2 resources listed. More useful for the student of Irish history, however, are the Politics and Genealogy sections.
- Kennys Bookshop and Art Galleries, Galway, Ireland
- This bookstore specializes in new, secondhand and antiquarian books of Irish interest and is cited by several other Irish history Web sites. The bookstore provides a number of online services via its Web pages, including out of print searches, services to libraries, free e-mailing lists of recently published Irish interest publications, and a searchable catalog of their holdings (due to major renovations in the bookstore, their secondhand stock is in storage and their on-line catalogue covers current Irish Interest publications only until May 1996). Try out the bookstore's On-line Catalog.
- Social Science Information Gateway
- The Social Science Information Gateway (SOSIG) at the University of Bristol provides access to information sources in the social sciences over the Web. All of the resources that appear on the Gateway have been described, classified and entered into a keyword searchable database. See UK Resources on SOSIG.
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LIS 190: The Web as a Research Tool
Celtic Fringe Home Page
WWW Sources for British History
WWW Sources for Irish History
WWW Sources for Scottish History
WWW Sources for Welsh History