Pre-Norman divisions of Ireland The
political geography of Ireland can be traced with some accuracy from the 6th century. At that time Ireland was divided into a patchwork of
petty kingdoms with a fluid political hierarchy which, in general, had three traditional grades of king. The lowest level of political control existed at the level of the (pl. ). A was an autonomous group of people of independent political jurisdiction under a rí túaithe, that is, a local petty king. About 150 such units of government existed. Each
rí túaithe was in turn subject to a regional or "over-king" (). There may have been as many as 20 genuine
ruiri in Ireland at any time. A "king of over-kings" () was often a provincial () or semi-provincial king to whom several ruiri were subordinate. No more than six genuine
rí ruirech were ever contemporary. Usually, only five such "king of over-kings" existed contemporaneously and so are described in the
Irish annals as
fifths (). The areas under the control of these kings were:
Ulster (),
Leinster (),
Connacht (),
Munster () and
Mide (). Later record-makers dubbed them
provinces, in imitation of
Roman provinces. In the Norman period, the historic fifths of Leinster and Meath gradually merged, mainly due to the impact of
the Pale, which straddled both, thereby forming the present-day province of Leinster. The use of
provinces as divisions of political power was supplanted by the system of counties after the Norman invasion. In modern times clusters of counties have been attributed to certain provinces but these clusters have no legal status. They are today seen mainly in a sporting context, as Ireland's four professional rugby teams play under the names of the provinces, and the
Gaelic Athletic Association has separate
Provincial councils and
Provincial championships.
Plantagenet era Lordships With the arrival of
Cambro-Norman knights in 1169, the
Anglo-Norman invasion of Ireland commenced. This was followed in 1172 by the invasion of King
Henry II of England, commencing English royal involvement. After his intervention in Ireland, Henry II effectively divided the English colony into liberties also known as lordships. These were effectively
palatine counties and differed from ordinary counties in that they were disjoined from the crown and that whoever they were granted to essentially had the same authority as the king and that the king's writ had no effect except a writ of error. This covered all land within the county that was not church land. In Ireland this meant that the land was divided and granted to
Richard de Clare and his followers who became lords (and sometimes called earls), with the only land which the English crown had any direct control over being the sea-coast towns and territories immediately adjacent. Of Henry II's grants, at least three of them—
Leinster to Richard de Clare;
Meath to
Walter de Lacy;
Ulster to
John de Courcy—were equivalent to palatine counties in their bestowing of royal jurisdiction to the grantees.
Division of lordships These initial lordships were later subdivided into smaller "liberties", which appear to have enjoyed the same privileges as their predecessors. These counties were: in Leinster: Carlow (also known as Catherlogh), Dublin, Kildare, Kilkenny, Louth (also known as Uriel), Meath, Wexford, Waterford; in Munster: Cork, Limerick, Kerry and Tipperary. It is thought that these counties did not have the administrative purpose later attached to them until late in the reign of King John and that no new counties were created until the Tudor dynasty. The most important office in those that were
palatine was that of
seneschal. The exact boundaries of the liberties and shrievalties appear to have been in constant flux throughout the
Plantagenet period, seemingly in line with the extent of English control. For example, in 1297 it is recorded that Kildare had extended to include the lands that now comprise the modern-day counties of Offaly, Laois (Leix) and Wicklow (Arklow). Some attempts had also been made to extend the county system to Ulster. The
Bruce Invasion of Ireland in 1315 resulted in the collapse of effective English rule in Ireland, with the land controlled by the crown continually shrinking to encompass Dublin, and parts of Meath, Louth and Kildare.
Passage to the Crown Of the original lordships or palatine counties: • Leinster had passed from Richard de Clare to his daughter,
Isabel de Clare, who had married
William Marshal, 1st Earl of Pembroke (second creation of title). This marriage was confirmed by
King John, with Isabel's lands given to William as consort. The liberty was afterwards divided into five—Carlow, Kildare, Kilkenny, Leix and Wexford—one for each of Marshal's co-heiresses. With the passing of liberties to the Crown, the number of Counties of the Cross declined, and only one, Tipperary, survived into the Stuart era; the others had ceased to exist by the reign of Henry VIII. Having declared himself
King of Ireland in 1541, Henry VIII went about converting Irish chiefs into feudal subjects of the crown with land divided into districts, which were eventually amalgamated into the modern counties. Mary's reign saw the first addition of actual new counties since the reign of King John. Radclyffe had conquered the districts of Glenmaliry, Irry, Leix, Offaly, and Slewmargy from the O'Moores and O'Connors, and in 1556 a statute decreed that Offaly and part of Glenmaliry would be made into the county of
King's County, whilst the rest of Glenmarliry along with Irry, Leix and Slewmargy was formed into
Queen's County. In 1565, the territory of the O'Rourkes within Roscommon was made into the county of Leitrim. In 1569, in an attempt to reduce the importance of the province of Munster, Sydney, using the
River Shannon as a natural boundary took the former kingdom of Thomond (North Munster) and made it into the county of Clare as part of the presidency of Connaught. In 1569, the Irish Parliament passed "An Act for turning of Countries that be not yet Shire Grounds into Shire Grounds". In 1571, a commission headed by Perrot and others declared that the territory of Desmond in Munster was to be made a county of itself, and it had its own sheriff appointed. In 1606, it was merged with the county of Kerry. In 1575, Sydney made an expedition to Ulster to plan its shiring. Nothing came of the plans. The
Desmond rebellion (1579–83) that was taking place in Munster stopped Sydney's work. By the time it had been defeated, Sir John Perrot was Lord Deputy, being appointed in 1584. After O'Neill and his allies fled Ireland in 1607 in the
Flight of the Earls, their lands became escheated to the Crown. The county divisions designed by Perrot were used as the basis for the grants of the 1609
Plantation of Ulster effected by King
James I.. baronies in Ireland, and more than a thousand
civil parishes, there are around sixty thousand townlands that range in size from one to several thousand hectares. Townlands were often traditionally divided into smaller units called
quarters, but these subdivisions are not legally defined.
Counties corporate The following towns/cities had charters specifically granting them the status of a
county corporate: • County of the Town of
Carrickfergus (by 1325) • County of the City of
Cork (
1608) • County of the Town of
Drogheda (
1412) • County of the City of
Dublin (
1548) • County of the Town of
Galway (
1610) • County of the City of
Kilkenny (1610) • County of the City of
Limerick (
1609) • County of the City of
Waterford (
1574) The only entirely new counties created in 1898 were the county boroughs of Londonderry and Belfast. Carrickfergus, Drogheda and Kilkenny were abolished. Galway was also abolished, but recreated in 1986.
Exceptions to the county system of control Regional presidencies of Connacht and Munster remained in existence until 1672, with special powers over their subsidiary counties. Tipperary remained a
county palatine until the passing of the
County Palatine of Tipperary Act 1715, with different officials and procedures from other counties. At the same time, Dublin, until the 19th century, had ecclesiastical liberties with rules outside those applying to the rest of Dublin city and county.
Exclaves of the county of Dublin existed in counties Kildare and Wicklow. At least eight other enclaves of one county inside another, or between two others, existed. The enclaves and exclaves were merged into neighbouring and surrounding counties, primarily in the mid-19th century under a series of Orders in Council.
Evolution of functions The
Church of Ireland exercised functions at the level of a civil parish that were later exercised by county authorities. Vestigial feudal power structures of major old estates remained well into the 18th century. Urban corporations operated individual royal charters. Management of counties came to be exercised by
grand juries. Members of grand juries were the local payers of
rates who historically held judicial functions, taking maintenance roles in regard to roads and bridges, and the collection of "county cess" taxes. They were usually composed of wealthy "country gentlemen" (i.e. landowners, farmers and merchants):A country gentleman as a member of a Grand Jury...levied the local taxes, appointed the nephews of his old friends to collect them, and spent them when they were gathered in. He controlled the boards of guardians and appointed the dispensary doctors, regulated the diet of paupers, inflicted fines and administered the law at petty sessions. The counties were initially used for judicial purposes, but began to take on some governmental functions in the 17th century, notably with grand juries.
19th and 20th centuries In 1836, the use of counties as local government units was further developed, with grand-jury powers extended under the
Grand Jury (Ireland) Act 1836. The traditional county of
Tipperary was split into two judicial counties (or
ridings) following the establishment of
assize courts in 1838. Also in 1838, local poor law boards, with a mix of magistrates and elected "guardians" took over the health and social welfare functions of the grand juries. In 1898, a more radical reorganisation of local government took place with the passage of the
Local Government (Ireland) Act 1898. This Act established a county council for each of the thirty-three Irish administrative counties. Elected county councils took over the powers of the
grand juries. The boundaries of the traditional counties changed on a number of occasions. The 1898 Act changed the boundaries of Counties
Galway,
Clare,
Mayo,
Roscommon,
Sligo,
Waterford,
Kilkenny,
Meath and
Louth, and others. County Tipperary was divided into two regions:
North Riding and
South Riding. Areas of the cities of Belfast, Cork, Dublin, Limerick, Derry and Waterford were carved from their surrounding counties to become
county boroughs in their own right and given powers equivalent to those of administrative counties. Under the
Government of Ireland Act 1920, the island was partitioned between
Southern Ireland and
Northern Ireland. For the purposes of the Act, ... Northern Ireland shall consist of the parliamentary counties of Antrim, Armagh, Down, Fermanagh, Londonderry and Tyrone, and the parliamentary boroughs of Belfast and Londonderry, and Southern Ireland shall consist of so much of Ireland as is not comprised within the said parliamentary counties and boroughs. The county and county borough borders were used to determine the line of partition. Southern Ireland shortly afterwards became the
Irish Free State. This partition was entrenched in the
Anglo-Irish Treaty, which was ratified in 1922, by which the Irish Free State left the United Kingdom with
Northern Ireland making the decision to not separate two days later.
Historic and traditional counties Areas that were shired by 1607 and continued as counties until the local government reforms of 1836, 1898 and 2001 are sometimes referred to as "traditional" or "historic" counties. These were distinct from the
counties corporate that existed in some of the larger towns and cities, although linked to the county at large for other purposes. From 1898 to 2001, areas with county councils were known as
administrative counties. The counties corporate were designated as
county boroughs. From 2001, local government areas were divided between counties and cities. From 2014, they were divided into counties, cities, and cities and counties. ==Current usage==