THE SCOT IN ULSTER
THE GREAT PLANTATION IN ULSTER
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was not true. Ulster is always spoken of as the most savage part of Ireland. At the beginning of James I.'s time, although Elizabeth had waged fierce and devastating wars against the Ulster chiefs during most of her long reign, English authority was scarcely recognised in the north of Ireland. It was represented by the commanders of the ten districts into which Ulster was divided; but their rule was little more than a military one, and scarce extended beyond the buildings which composed their military posts, [1] and by the bishops of the Episcopal Church, who had probably even fewer followers in spiritual things than the district governors had in temporal. The country still enjoyed its native laws and customs--still obeyed its native chiefs. There were no towns in Ireland to play the part which the English and Scottish burghs had done in the middle ages, to be the homes of free institutions, the centres from which civilisation might spread. Belfast scarcely existed even in name, and Derry and Carrickfergus consisted but of small collections of houses round the English forts. The whole country, like our Scottish Highlands, was inhabited by clansmen, obeying tribal laws and usages, and living in some measure on agriculture, but mainly on the produce of their herds and flocks. The land was held by the chiefs nominally for the clans, but really for their own benefit. The tillers of the soil had no sure hold over the lands which they worked, "no certain portion of land...continue reading »
[1] Calendar of State Papers, Ireland, 1608-10, p. xxiv.
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Page 31
The Scot in Ulster:
Sketch of the History of the Scottish Population of Ulster
by John Harrison
1888
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