Ireland history ...

.3000BC Megalithic tombs first constructed.
c.700BC Celts arrive from parts of Gaul and Britain. Ireland divided
into provinces. (This according to a contributor is reconstructed
folk history and not based on the archaeology.)
c.AD350 Christianity reaches Ireland.
432 Traditional date for the arrival of St. Patrick in Ireland.
700-800 Irish monasticism reaches its zenith.
795 Full-scale Viking invasion.
1014 Brian Boru/ defeats Vikings at Clontarf, but is murdered.
1169 Dermot MacMurrough, exiled king of Leinster, invites help
from 'Strongbow'.
1172 Pope decrees that Hery II of England is feudal lord of Ireland.
1366 Statues of Kilkenny belatedly forbid intermarriage of English and
Irish. Gaelic culture unsuccessfully suppressed.
1534-40 Failed insurrection by Lord Offaly.
1541 Herny VII proclaimed king (rather than feudal lord) of Ireland
1558-1603 Reign of Elizabeth I. Policy of Plantation begins. System of
counties adopted.
1595-1603 Failed uprising of Hugh O'Neil.
1607 Flight of the Earls; leading Ulster families go into exile.
1641 Charles I's policies cause insurrection in Ulster and Civil War in
England.
1649 Cromwell invades Ireland.
1653 Under the Act of Settlement Cromwell's opponents stripped of land.
1689-90 Deposed James II flees to Ireland; defeated at the Battle of the
Boyne.
1704 Penal Code enacted; Catholics barred from voting, education and the
military.
1775 American War of Independence forments Irish unrest.
1782 Grattan's Parliament persuades British to declare Irish
independence, but in name only.
1795 Foundation of the Orange Order.
1798 Wolfe Tone's uprising crushed.
1801 Ireland becomes part of Britain under the Act of Union.
1829 Catholic Emancipation Act passed after Daniel O'Connell elected
as MP.
1845-48 The Great Famine.
1879-82 The Land War; Parnell encourages boycott of repressive landlords.
1914 Implementation of Home Rule postponed because of outbreak of World
War I.
1916 Easter Rising. After the leaders are executed public opinion backs
independence.
1920-21 War between Britain and Ireland; Irish Free State and Northern
Ireland created.
1922 Civil war breaks out.
1932 De Valera elected.
1969 Rioting between Catholics and Protestants. British troops called in.
1971 Provisional IRA begins campaign to oust British troops from Ireland.
1972 UK and Republic of Ireland join European Community. 'Bloody Sunday'
in Derry.
1985 Anglo-Irish Agreement signed.

Detailed 19th-20th century


1800-Act Of Union-Free Trade

1807-Daniel O’Connell Emancipation 29

1845-Sept.9 Famine Begins

1867-Fenian Rising

1877-Parnell Joins Home Rule/Michael Davitt
Gladstone.

1893-Gaelic League

1899-Sinn Fein ,Griffith /Socialists Connolly

1916-REVOLUTION
1919-CIVIL WAR
1922-Anglo Irish Treaty /Devolution
1949-INDEPENDENCE
1956-TERRORISM/N.I.

1994 - IRA announces ceasefire in September. Pro-British "Loyalist" guerrillas

follow weeks later.



1996 - IRA abandons ceasefire in February by detonating a bomb in east

London's Docklands district, killing two people and wounding 100.



Multi-party talks on the future of Northern Ireland begin in Belfast in June but

Sinn Fein is excluded.



1997 - IRA announces "unequivocal" ceasefire in July, two months after Tony

Blair's Labour Party sweeps John Major's Conservatives from office. Six weeks later

Sinn Fein joins peace talks for first time.



1998: April 10 - Good Friday, a deal is struck at talks between the British and Irish

governments and eight political parties.



May 22 - Voters flock to polling stations north and south of the Irish border in a

referendum which endorses the peace deal.



Jun 25 - Elections to the new Northern Ireland assembly take place; final results

on June 27 show supporters of the Good Friday peace deal won 80 seats and

those opposed to it 28.



Aug 15 - A car bomb blast in Omagh, Northern Ireland, kills 29 people in the worst

single attack in nearly 30 years of violence. The Real IRA splinter group claims

responsibility on August 18, then declares an immediate ceasefire a day later.



Sept 14 - Northern Ireland's new power-sharing parliament starts work.



Dec 18 - Pro-British Loyalist Volunteer Force becomes first paramilitary

organisation in Northern Ireland to start to hand over its weapons for

decommissioning.



1999: July 2 - Britain and Ireland announce a plan - but not a formal agreement -

to set up a coalition Northern Ireland government and start aguerrilla arms

handover.



July 15 - Plan founders when First Minister David Trimble leads his Ulster

Unionists in a boycott of the assembly and Seamus Mallon resigns as deputy first

minister.



Sept 6 - U.S. peace mediator George Mitchell begins review of peace process.



Nov 17 - IRA says it ready to discuss disarmament once power-sharing government

for Northern Ireland created.



Nov 18 - Mitchell says basis exists for disarming guerrillas and creating coalition

government for the province.



Dec 1 - Northern Ireland gets its own government, a coalition of Protestants and

Roman Catholics, ending 27 years of direct rule from London.



2000: Feb 11 - Britain's Northern Ireland Secretary Peter Mandelson suspends

Northern Ireland assembly over Protestant dissatisfaction with progress on IRA

disarmament.



Feb 15 - IRA announces it intends to end its involvement with the commission

overseeing guerrilla disarmament.



March 18 - U.S. President Bill Clinton holds St Patrick's Day talks with Northern

Ireland leaders.



March 21 - Mandelson says he is keen to restore power-sharing administration in

Belfast.



March 25 - Ulster Unionist leader Trimble fights off a leadership challenge, but

the party adds fresh conditions for rejoining the fledgling Belfast executive.



April 12 - Queen Elizabeth honours the controversial Royal Ulster Constabulary

with the George Cross - Britain's highest civilian award for gallantry.



April 18 - British Prime Minister Blair begins fresh round of talks with his Irish

counterpart Bertie Ahern to try to restart the Northern Ireland peace process.



April 19 - IRA in an Easter statement says it wants to see permanent peace in

Northern Ireland but blames British rule of the province as the root cause of the

conflict.



May 2 - Intensive talks in London between the parties to the conflict end without a

breakthrough, but the leaders agree to try again.



May 5 - Blair and Ahern announce that Britain will reinstate the Belfast

power-sharing executive if political parties and guerrilla groups embrace fresh

proposals.



May 6 - Britain pushes back a May 22 deadline for IRA disarmament until June

2001.



May 6 - IRA in a statement announces it is ready to put its weapons into storage

dumps and allow them to be inspected.



May 6 - British and Irish governments say two international statesmen, former

Finnish President Martti Ahtisaari and former South African union leader Cyril

Ramaphosa, will lead the inspections.







1981: Ten IRA prisoners starve to death in hunger strike designed to secure political

prisoner status.



1982: Irish National Liberation Army (INLA) republican guerrillas bomb Ballykelly

pub, killing 17 people. New Northern Ireland assembly elected but boycotted by

Catholics.



1984: IRA bomb at British Conservative party conference kills five. Prime Minister

Margaret Thatcher escapes injury.



1985: Anglo-Irish agreement gives Dublin government consultative voice in daily

running of Northern Ireland, prompting Protestant demonstrations.



1987: Eight IRA gunmen killed in ambush by British Special Air Service commandos.

IRA bomb kills 11 at Enniskillen war memorial ceremony.



1989: Eleven killed in IRA bomb at marines music school in southern England.



1991: IRA mortar attack on 10 Downing Street. No one injured.



1992: IRA car bomb in City of London financial district kills three and injures 91.



1993: IRA bombs busy shopping street in Protestant part of Belfast, killing 10.

Protestant extremists kill seven Halloween revellers in revenge.



In peace-seeking Anglo-Irish Downing Street Declaration in December, Britain says it

would not block an end to British rule if a majority wanted it, and offers Sinn Fein

republicans a seat at peace talks if IRA violence ends.



1994: IRA announces ceasefire in September, with pro-British ``Loyalist'' guerrillas

following suit weeks later. British officials hold first open meeting with Sinn Fein in

more than 70 years.



1995: Britain ends 23-year ban on ministerial talks with Sinn Fein, but within weeks

Sinn Fein breaks off discussions. In November, British and Irish governments set

February 1996 as target date for start of all-party talks and establishing commission to

study handover of all guerrilla weapons.



1996: Former U.S. senator George Mitchell proposes talks alongside phased surrender

of guerrilla weapons. Major, enraging republicans, proposes elections in Northern

Ireland to pave way for talks.



The IRA abandons its ceasefire in February by exploding a bomb in east London's

Docklands district, killing two people and injuring 100.



Multi-party talks on the future of Northern Ireland begin in Belfast in June, but Sinn

Fein is excluded because of IRA violence. IRA detonates bomb in Manchester

shopping centre, injuring 200.



1997: IRA announces ``unequivocal'' ceasefire in July, two months after Tony Blair's

Labour party sweeps John Major's Conservatives from office. Six weeks later Sinn Fein

joins peace talks for first time.



1998: British government announces independent judicial inquiry into Bloody Sunday

killings of 1972.



Eighteen people killed over three months in spate of tit-for-tat violence between

Protestant and Republican splinter guerrilla groups outside the ceasefires. Sinn Fein

and pro-British UDP political party briefly suspended from peace talks because of

attacks allegedly involving their guerrilla allies.



On April 10, Good Friday, a deal is struck at talks between the British and Irish

governments and eight political parties.



Extremist splinter groups persist with sporadic killings and several bombs are defused

on both sides of the border in the run-up to referendums on the accord on May 22.