DID YOU KNOW 1300 - 1600 The fourteenth century would prove to be a difficult one for the city of Dublin. It remained a relatively small walled medieval town and was under constant threat of raids from the surrounding native clans. In addition the Scottish King Robert DeBruce made an abortive but extremely destructive effort to capture the city in 1317. In 1348 the Black Death which had ravaged Europe took hold in Dublin killing thousands over the coming decades. The Tudor conquest of Ireland in the sixteenth century would spell a new era for Dublin with the city enjoying a renewed prominence as the centre of administrative rule on the island. However the Tudors were also determined to make Dublin a protestant city which would be at the expense of the Catholic ruling class. Queen Elizabeth I established Trinity College in 1592 as a Protestant university and also ordered that St. Patrick’s and Christchurch be converted from Catholic to Protestant cathedrals. 1600 - 1800 The seventeenth and eighteenth century was a remarkable period of growth for the city, with the population increasing from 26,000 to over 130,000 making it the second largest city in the British Empire. The period also saw a major reconstruction of the city making the period a golden age for Dublin’s architecture. When the Earl of Kildare - the city’s premier nobleman – decided to move his residence from the traditionally more fashionable North of the city to the Southside, a major wave of fine Georgian buildings were constructed as the city’s wealthy inhabitants relocated to the South. Much of these buildings remain today being centred around St Stephen’s Green and Fitzwilliam and Merrion Squares. Many of Dublin’s most famous buildings were also constructed during this period including, the Four Courts and Customs House. The late eighteenth century also saw the laying of the wide boulevard of Sackville’s Street which remains the centrepiece of the city (now known as O’Connell Street). In fact Temple Bar and Grafton Street (both popular tourists attractions for their nightlife and shopping respectively) are the few remaining parts of the city which escaped this Georgian reconstruction and maintained their medieval charm
Posted on: Thu, 21 Nov 2013 10:58:16 +0000
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