... Ireland ...

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September 1, 2001

Ireland (Gaelic Éire), republic comprising about five-sixths of the island of Ireland. The country consists of the  provinces of Leinster,  Munster, and Connacht and part of the province of Ulster. The rest of Ulster, which occupies the northeastern part of the island, constitutes Northern Ireland, a constituent part of the United Kingdom. The republic has an  area of 70,273 sq. km (27,133 sq. mi)

Land and Resources
The eastern coast of Ireland is fairly regular  with few deep indentations; the western coast is fringed by drowned or submerged valleys, steep cliffs, and hundreds of small  islands torn from the mainland mass by the  powerful forces of the Atlantic. The chief  physiographic features are a region of  lowlands, occupying the central and east  central sections, and a complex system of  low mountain ranges, lying between the  lowlands and the periphery of the island. Among the principal ranges are the Nephin  Beg Range in the west, containing Mount Nephin, 719 m (2,359 ft); the Caha Mountains in the southwest, containing  Mount Knockboy, about 707 m (about 2,321  ft); the Boggeragh Mountains in the south,  rising to 640 m (2,100 ft); and the Wicklow  Mountains in the east, rising to more than 915 m (3,000 ft). Carrauntoohil, located in  the southwestern section of the island, is  the highest point in Ireland (1,041 m/3,415 ft above sea level). Numerous bogs and lakes are found in the lowlands region. The  principal rivers of Ireland are the Erne and  the Shannon, which are actually chains of  lakes joined by stretches of river. The middle section of the central plain is drained by the Shannon, which empties into the Atlantic Ocean through a wide, lengthy estuary. Nearly half of the Shannon, above the estuary, comprises the Allen, Ree, and Derg  lakes. All of Ireland's principal rivers flow from the plain, and an interior canal system  facilitates transportation.

Climate
The climate of Ireland is like that of other  islands. Because of the moderating influence of prevailing warm, moist winds from the Atlantic Ocean, the mean winter temperature  ranges from 4° to 7°C (40° to 45°F), approximately 14 Celsius degrees (25 Fahrenheit degrees) higher than that of any other places in the same latitude in the  interior of Europe or on the eastern coast of North America. The oceanic influence is also  pronounced in the summer; the mean summer  temperature of Ireland ranges from 15° to 17°C (59° to 62°F), about 4 Celsius degrees  (7 Fahrenheit degrees) lower than that of other places in the same latitudes. Rainfall averages 1,000 mm (40 in) annually.

Plants and Animals
Ireland's fauna does not differ markedly from that of England or France. The great Irish deer and the great auk, or garefowl, were exterminated in prehistoric times. Since the  island became developed, species such as the bear, wolf, wildcat, beaver, and native cattle have disappeared. Small rodents living in the woods and fields remain, as do small  shore birds and field birds. No serpents are found in Ireland, and the only reptile is the  lizard. Sedges, rushes, ferns, and grass are the principal flora.

Population
The population of Ireland is predominantly of Celtic origin (see Celtic Languages; Celts).  No significant ethnic minorities exist. The population of the Irish Republic in 2000 was estimated at 3,647,348, giving the  country an overall population density of 52  persons per sq. km (134 per sq. mi). The  population decreased from the 1840s, when about 6.5 million people lived in the area  included in the republic, until about 1970,  largely because of a high emigration rate. During the 1980s the population increased at an annual rate of only about 0.5 percent,  and by 2000 the rate had slowed to 0.41  percent. Some 58 percent of the population lived in urban areas in 1998.

Political Divisions and Principal Cities
For administrative purposes, the Irish Republic is divided into 26 counties and 5 county boroughs, which are coextensive with  the cities of Dublin, Cork, Galway, Limerick,  and Waterford. The counties are Carlow, Dublin, Kildare, Kilkenny, Laois (Laoighis), Longford, Louth, Meath, Offaly, Westmeath, Wexford, and Wicklow, in Leinster Province; Clare, Cork, Kerry, Limerick, Tipperary, and Waterford, in Munster Province; Galway,  Leitrim, Mayo, Roscommon, and Sligo, in Connacht Province; and Cavan, Donegal, and  Monaghan, in Ulster Province. The county of Tipperary is divided and administered as two  subsections, Tipperary North Riding and Tipperary South Riding. The capital and largest city is Dublin, with a population (1996) of 953,000. Cork is the  second largest city and a major port, with a  population of 180,000. Other cities and  towns include Limerick (79,000), Galway (57,000), and Waterford (44,000).

Religion and Language
Roman Catholics are 93 percent of the  people of Ireland, and 4 percent of the  people are Protestants. Protestant groups  include the Church of Ireland (Anglican) and  the Presbyterian and Methodist denominations. Freedom of worship is  guaranteed by the constitution. Almost all the people speak English, and about one-fourth also speak Irish, a Gaelic language that is the traditional tongue of Ireland. Irish is spoken as the vernacular by a relatively small number of people, however, mostly in areas of the west. The constitution  provides for both Irish and English as official  languages. The Irish language has been taught in all government-subsidized schools since 1922, but fewer than 10,000 pupils speak it as their first language.

Education
Irish influence on Western education began 14 centuries ago. From the 6th to the 8th century, when western Europe was largely illiterate, nearly 1,000 Irish missionaries traveled to England and the Continent to teach Christianity. During the early Middle Ages, Irish missionaries founded monasteries  that achieved extensive cultural influence;  the monastery at Sankt Gallen (Saint Gall), Switzerland, is especially well known for its contributions to education and literature.

Classical studies flowered in ancient Ireland. Distinctive also at the time were the bardic schools of writers and other learned men who traveled from town to town, teaching their arts to students. The bardic schools, a  important part of Irish education, were suppressed in the 16th century by Henry VIII, king of England.

University education in Ireland began with the founding of the University of Dublin, or Trinity College, in 1592. The National University of Ireland, established in 1908 in Dublin, has constituent university colleges in Cork, Dublin, and Galway. Other leading colleges are Saint Patrick's College (1795), in Maynooth, affiliated with the National University; Dublin City University, founded in 1975; and the University of Limerick, founded in 1970.

Ireland has a free public school system, with  attendance compulsory for all children between 6 and 15 years of age. In the 1995 school year 367,700 pupils were enrolled in 3,391 elementary schools. Secondary schools, primarily operated by religious orders and largely subsidized by the state, enrolled 389,400. Enrollment at universities and colleges totaled 134,600. Ireland also has  several state-subsidized training colleges, various technical colleges in the larger communities, and a network of winter classes  that provide agricultural instruction for rural  inhabitants.

Culture
Ireland was first inhabited around 7500 BC by  Mesolithic hunter-fishers, probably from Scotland. They were followed by Neolithic  people, who used flint tools, and then by  people from the Mediterranean, known in  legend as the Firbolgs, who used bronze implements. Later came the Picts, also an  immigrant people of the Bronze Age.  Extensive traces of the culture of this early  period survive in the form of stone  monuments (menhirs, dolmens, and cromlechs) and stone forts, dating from 2000  to 1000 BC. During the Iron Age, the Celtic  invasion (about 350 BC) introduced a new  cultural strain into Ireland, one that was to predominate. The oldest relics of the Celtic (Gaelic) language can be seen in the  5th-century Ogham stone inscriptions in  County Kerry. Ireland was Christianized by Saint Patrick in the 5th century. The churches and monasteries founded by him  and his successors became the fountainhead  from which Christian art and refinement  permeated the crude and warlike Celtic way of life.

Ireland is famous for its contributions to world literature (see Gaelic Literature; Irish  Literature). Two great mythological cycles in  Gaelic- the Ulster (Red Branch) and the Fenian (Ossianic) tell the stories of  legendary heroes such as Cú Chulainn  (Cuchulain), Maeve (Medb), Fionn mac Cumhaill (Finn MacCool), and Deirdre. After a long and bitter colonization by England,  Ireland gave the world some of the greatest  writers in the English language, including  Jonathan Swift, Oliver Goldsmith, and George Bernard Shaw. Associated with the struggle  for independence in the 20th century is the Irish literary revival, which produced the works of William Butler Yeats and Sean O'Casey. James Joyce was a formative  influence on much of later 20th century European literature.

Saint Patrick's Day, March 17, is the most important national holiday in Ireland. The national sports are hurling, a strenuous game similar to field hockey, and Gaelic football, which resembles soccer. Horse racing is a highly popular spectator sport throughout the republic.

Art
From the 5th to the 9th century the Irish monasteries produced artworks of world  renown, primarily in the form of illuminated  manuscripts. The greatest such work is the Book of Kells, which has some of the most  beautiful calligraphy of the Middle Ages Native art seems to have disappeared during the period of English  domination, but after the 17th century a  number of Irish painters and sculptors achieved fame. Irish painters George Barret,  James Barry, and Nathaniel Hone were cofounders, with Sir Joshua Reynolds, of the Royal Academy in 1768. James Arthur  O'Connor was a noted landscape artist of his  period, and Daniel Maclise painted the magnificent frescoes in the Royal Gallery of  the House of Lords. Notable among Irish  painters of the 19th century were Nathaniel  Hone, Jr., and Walter F. Osborne. More recently, expressionist painter Jack B.Yeats, cubist painter Mainie Jellett, and  stained-glass artist Evie Hone have achieved  widespread recognition and acclaim for their work.

Music
Irish harpers were known throughout Europe as early as the 12th century. The most celebrated of these was the blind harper Torlogh O'Carolan, or Carolan, who composed  about 200 songs on varied themes, many of which were published in Dublin in 1720. About the same time, an annual folk festival called the feis was instituted, devoted to the preservation & encouragement of harping. Irish folk music ranges from lullabies to drinking songs, and many variations and nuances of tempo, rhythm, and tonality are used. At the Belfast Harpers' Festival in 1792, Edward Bunting made a collection of  traditional Irish songs and melodies, which he published in 1796. Thomas Moore, the great  Irish poet, made extensive use of Bunting's work in his well-known Irish Melodies, first published in 1807. Classical forms of music were not widely known in Ireland until the 18th century. Pianist John Field was the first Irish composer to win international renown, with his nocturnes. Michael William Balfe is well known for his opera The Bohemian Girl. Among the most prominent of Irish performing  artists was concert and operatic tenor John  McCormack. PBS television in the US has also featured John McDermott , Frank Patterson and the "Irish Tenors" in recent years.

Cultural Institutions
The most important Irish libraries and museums are in Dublin. The National Library of Ireland, with more than 500,000 volumes, is the largest public library in the country. Trinity College Library, founded in 1601, contains about 2.8 million volumes, including  the Book of Kells. Together with exhibits in the fields of art, industry, and natural  history, and representative collections of  Irish silver, glass, textiles and lace, the National Museum houses outstanding specimens of the remarkable metal craftsmanship of the early Christian period in Ireland, including the Tara Brooch, the Ardagh Chalice, and the Moylough Bell Shrine (all dating from the 8th century), as well as the Lismore Crozier and the Cross of Cong (both 12th century). The National Gallery in Dublin has an admirable collection of paintings of all schools. Most cities have public libraries and small museums.

Interest in the theater is strong in Ireland. The famed Abbey Theatre and the Gale Theatre, both in Dublin, receive government  grants. The Arts Council, a body appointed by the prime minister, gives grants to arts organizations and publishers; the Gael-Linn promotes the Irish language and culture.

Economy
The economy of Ireland has been traditionally agricultural. Since the mid-1950s, however, the country's industrial  base has expanded, and now mining, manufacturing, construction, and public utilities account for approximately 36 percent of the gross domestic product, while agriculture accounts for only about 10  percent. Private enterprise operates in most  sectors of the economy. The gross domestic  product in 1998 was $81.9 bil. Forestry and fishing are also part of the Irish economy.

Manufacturing
Ireland has diversified manufacturing, most of  it developed since 1930. Among the  food-processing industries, the most  important are meat packing, brewing and distilling, grain milling, sugar refining, the manufacture of dairy products, margarine, confections, and jam. Other important manufactured articles include office machinery ,data processing equipment; electrical machinery; tobacco products; woolen and worsted goods; clothing; cement; furniture; soap; candles; building  materials; footwear; cotton, rayon, and linen textiles; hosiery; paper; leather; machinery; refined petroleum; and chemicals.

Currency and Banking
The Irish pound (0.700 pounds equal U.S.$1; 1998 average) is the basic unit of currency. Before March 1979, the Irish pound was exchangeable at a par with the British pound sterling. Ireland and 11 other members of the  European Union  are in the process of changing over from their national currencies to the single currency of the EU, the euro. The euro began to be used on January 1,1999, for electronic transfers and for accounting purposes. Euro coins and bills will  be issued in 2002, at which time Irish currency will cease to be legal tender.

On January 1,1999, control over Irish  monetary policy, including setting interest rates and regulating the money supply, was  transferred from the Central Bank of Ireland to the European Central Bank.. The ECB  is located in Frankfurt, Germany, and is  responsible for all monetary policies of the  European Union. After the changeover, the Central Bank of Ireland joined the national  banks of the other EU countries that adopted  the euro as part of the European System of  Central Banks

Government Under the constitution of 1937, Ireland is a sovereign, independent, democratic state. It  became a republic in 1949 when  Commonwealth ties with Britain were severed.

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When most people think of Ireland they think of Leprechauns and thatched roofed cottages, like the one below.

This house sits on the water in Inishmaan, one of the Aran Islands located off the western coast of Ireland. Known for the      maintenance of their Gaelic traditions, the rugged fishing villages of the Aran Islands have remained, in many ways, unchanged over the centuries Many inhabitants still speak Gaelic, adhere to their folk culture, and  fish using the traditional methods of
their ancestors.

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One symbol recognized as truly Irish is the Claddagh Ring .. here is what it symbolizes  :

The Claddagh is a visual portrayal of the  eternal bond of friendship, loyalty  and love.

The HEART symbolizes love, life's finest impulse. From it, generosity  and compassion flow.

The HANDS of friendship are clasps around the heart in a gesture of giving. As they cradle the heart gently, the hands are both protective  and strong, like true friendship

The CROWN is symbolic of loyalty. It represents the reward of love the highest achievement the human spirit has yet accomplished.

To give the Claddagh is to forge the hands of love, friendship and loyalty forever!
 

According to legend, whoever kisses the Blarney Stone is gifted with eloquence and persuasiveness. The stone is is a castle near the town of Blarney in Ireland. Shown here is a man helping another to kiss the ancient rock slab.