63. Kilkenny Town - Picture Index

SCENES from IRELAND - County Kilkenny

63a. Kilkenny Castle and Kilkenny Design Centre  *  63c. Kilkenny St Canice Cathedral

63b. Kilkenny Town and Rothe House  *  63d. The 'Black Abbey'

63e. Kilkenny St Mary's Medieval Mile Museum  *  63f. St Mary's RC Cathedral, Kilkenny

* *

A brief history of Kilkenny and allied national events

• In AD 450 the See of Ossory under St Kieran was established.

• In 599 St Canice died, the founder of the first church settlement in Kilkenny.

• The round tower was built in 900 in defence of Viking attacks.

• In 1170 the Normans took over Kilkenny.

• The first buildings of Kilkenny Castle were built by William, Earl Marshall in 1192 who founded the town of Kilkenny in 1204.

• By 1280 the cathedral of St Canice was completed.

• In 1315 Parliament sat in Kilkenny.

• 1324 saw the trial of Dame Alice Kytler for Witchcraft!

• The Black Death 'visited' Kilkenny in 1348-1349 (described by the Franciscan monk Father John Clyn).

• The Statutes of Kilkenny' were drawn up in 1366.

• The castle was bought by James, 3rd Earl of Pembroke in 1391.

• The English King Richard II visited Kilkenny in 1395 and 1399.

• Kilkenny supported York in the English War of the Roses but the Yorkist town was sacked by Piers, 8th Earl of Ormonde.

• In 1540 the monasteries were dissolved and suppressed (Act of Dissolution, England 1538).

• Robert Shee and Walter Archer were Kilkenny's first MPs in 1559.

• Rothe House was built in 1599.

• James I grants Kilkenny its City charter in 1609.

• In 1642 the Catholic Confederation meets in Kilkenny in 1642 and in 1645 Archbishop Rinnucini, the Papal Nuncio, arrives from Rome and in 1650 Cromwell visited Kilkenny!

• James II visits Kilkenny in 1689 and establishes the Royal College of St James but on the visit of William III ('King Billy') in 1690, the college foundation is cancelled.

• A great flood swept all the bridges away in 1763.

• In Ireland the Penal Laws were relaxed and Gratten's Parliament founded in 1782.

• The Market Cross was taken down and removed in 171. Why?

• In 1800 after the Act of Union between England and Ireland, the Irish Parliament was disbanded.

• Kilkenny was not completely exempt from the Great Famine of 1845.

• The death of O Connell, "The Liberator" in 1847 was felt all over Ireland.

• The year 1848, when the railway first came to Kilkenny, was also the year of the 'Young Ireland Rebellion.

• In archaeology institutions, Kilkenny led the way by founding the Kilkenny Archaeology Society in 1849, which later became the Royal society of Antiquaries of Ireland.

• St Mary's cathedral was consecrated in 1857.

• The Irish Fenian rising was in 1867.

• In 1900 the Kilkenny Branch of the Gaelic League was founded.

• The Easter rising of 1916 was followed in 1919 by the War of Independence in which Kilkenny Castle was occupied by republicans but was retaken by Free State Troops.

• The Butler family leaves Kilkenny castle in 1935.

• The Kilkenny Archaeology Society was refounded in 1945 and in 1962 they purchased Rothe House, now open to the public since 1994 as a museum.

• In 1967 Kilkenny Castle is given to the people of Kilkenny by the 6th Marquess of Ormonde.

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