Lecture 7: The New Nationalism,
1890-1916
Gaelic League poster contrasting a proud,
independent Ireland with a dejected Ireland under
British control
• 1884: 1 November: Foundation of the
Gaelic Athletic Association
• 1891: 28 December: Irish Literary
Society founded in London by W.B. Yeats
and others
• 1892: 16 August: Foundation of the
National Literary Society
• 25 November: Douglas Hyde speaks on
‘The Necessity for De-Anglicising Ireland’
• 1893: 31 July: Formation of the Gaelic
League
• 1896: 29 May: Foundation of the Irish
Socialist Republican Party
• 1900: 30 September: Foundation of
Cumann na nGaedheal by Arthur Griffith
• 1905: 8 March: Formation of the
Dungannon Clubs (Belfast)
• 1907: 21 April: Sinn Féin formed from
Cumann na nGaedheal and Dungannon
Clubs
• 5 September: Sinn Féin formed from the
union of the National Council with the Sinn
Féin League
The Fall of Parnell
• Left a political vacuum in Ireland
• Traditional view – culture became
a surrogate for politics in this
period
• ‘We don’t hear much of
Parliament now since Parnell
died.’
• Parnell’s death was an important
but not pre-eminent event in the
history of the revival.
• There were other dates of equal significance
to 1891 (the year of Parnell’s death)
• Revivalists drew inspiration from a number of
precursors in the eighteenth and nineteenth
centuries
• After the defeat of the second Home Rule Bill
in 1893 - no longer a convincing reason to
postpone all other activities – cultural,
literary, artistic – until self-government was
granted
• Weberian ‘blocked mobility’ thesis
• Other catalysts for the new
nationalism include:
The centenary of the 1798 rising
The outbreak of the Boer war
Queen Victoria’s visit to Ireland in 1900,
which was accompanied by counter
demonstrations.
These events led to a heightened sense
of nationalism in Ireland.
The term ‘new nationalism’ came
to describe the rise, in the
quarter century before 1914, of a
more uncompromising
nationalist spirit in Ireland.
Game in progress, G.A.A. pitch, Letterkenny, Co. Donegal
between 1930 and1950.
Gaelic Athletic Association (G.A.A.)
• Formed in November 1884 in Thurles, Co.
Tipperary by a teacher, Michael Cusack.
• Cusack believed that the spread of English games
was undermining Ireland’s national identity.
• Gaelic version of football was codified in 1885.
• The GAA attracted substantial support from the
IRB
• In 1887 the GAA leadership was annexed by the
IRB.
• By 1901 the executive of the GAA numbered
several Fenians among its members.
Tailteann Games opening parade, 1924
Men in Irish costume with wolfhounds
Tailteann Games, 1924
Captains of Irish and American hurling teams shake hands
Conradh na Gaeilge (Gaelic League) membership card.
Gaelic League
Conradh na Gaeilge
• The Gaelic League was formed in 1893
• Founders: Eoin MacNeill, Douglas Hyde,
Fr. Eugene O’Growney
• Hyde delivered key lecture to the
National Literary Society in November
1892 entitled ‘The necessity for deAnglicising Ireland’
• ‘Let us set our faces against this aping of
English dress, and encourage our women to
spin and our men to wear comfortable free suits
of their own.’
• ‘Perhaps the principal point of all is the necessity
for encouraging the use of Anglo-Irish literature
instead of English books, especially instead of
English periodicals. We must set our face sternly
against penny dreadfuls, shilling shockers, and
still more the garbage of vulgar English weeklies
like Bow Bells and the Police Intelligence. Every
house should have a copy of Moore and Davis.’
•
Hyde, lecture delivered to the National Literary Society
November 1892
Only 13% of those born in
Ireland between 1861 and 1871
were native Irish speakers.
By 1901 a bare 0.5 % were
monolingual Gaelic speakers
and 14% could speak it.
Douglas Hyde
Gaelic League Achievements
• By 1908, the Gaelic League had 600 branches
nationwide.
• Founded a popular Irish language newspaper
called An Claidheamh Soluis
• In 1897 the League was successful in expanding
the rights of Irish speakers giving testimony in the
law courts.
• In 1905 the League launched a campaign to force
the Post Office to accept mail that was addressed
only in Irish.
• By 1909 about 3000 of the 9000 primary schools
were teaching Irish, compared with fewer than a
hundred a decade earlier.
ANGLO-IRISH
LITERARY REVIVAL
• The term refers to a group of
poets, prose-writers and
playwrights who for inspiration
looked to Irish myths, folklore
and popular culture
• In December 1891 Yeats, with
T.W. Rolleston founded the
Irish Literary Society of
London.
• In August 1892 the National
Literary Society began in
Dublin, with the assistance of
John O’Leary.
National Literary Theatre
• Aimed to build a Celtic and Irish school of
dramatic literature which would present to an
‘uncorrupted and imaginative audience’ the
‘deeper thoughts and emotions of Ireland’.
• Such a drama would ignore divisive political
questions and would show that Ireland was
‘not the home of buffoonery and of easy
sentiment…but the home of an ancient
idealisms’.
The logo of the Abbey Theatre, Dublin, which
was at the centre of the literary revival
The Abbey Theatre, Dublin
Battle of Civilisations
• The Gaelic league idea of an Irish Ireland v
the Anglo-Irish idea of Celtic literature.
• To many Gaelic Leaguers, Irish literature in
the English language was Protestant and
anti-national
• Patriotism was Gaelicist and spiritually
Catholic.
• D.P. Moran – journalist and editor of the
Leader coined the term ‘Irish Ireland’
The IRB
• Weakened and divided in the 1890s following the
Parnell divorced scandal.
• At the turn of the century, with a new generation and
new organisations such as Sinn Fein the
revolutionary tradition revived.
• Reinvigorated by Tom Clarke, who returned to
Ireland in 1907.
• Clarke was a committed revolutionary and has
spent 15 years in English prisons.
• In 1910 Irish Freedom, a militantly separatist
newspaper was launched.
Thomas Clarke, 1857-1916, after a charcoal
sketch by Seán O’Sullivan.
Arthur Griffith formed the National Council in 1903
to organise opposition to Edward VII’s visit to
Ireland
Continued as an advanced nationalist forum
Griffith first set out the policy that became known as
Sinn Féin ‘ourselves’ in November 1905
Cumann na nGaedheal united with the northern
and Fenian linked Dungannon Clubs to form the
Sinn Féin League in April 1907
Sept 1908 the Sinn Féin League amalgamated with
the National Council to form the organisation called
Sinn Féin
Inghinidhe na hEireann (‘Daughters of Ireland’) founded by Maud Gonne in
1900
Members of the group had to be of Irish birth or descent and were dedicated
to complete independence.
Cumann na mBan was founded in April 1914.
It was a women’s auxiliary to the Irish Volunteers, a combination of
nationalism and feminism
Man selling badges and rosettes at stand,
Heuston Station, Dublin, 1969