Originally published in 2007, this collection of articles is the outcome of two conferences held in 2002 and 2004. Its republication as a paperback by Four Courts Press is nicely timed to coincide with the launch in late 2010 of the digital edition of the archive known as the 1641 Depositions (http://www.1641.tcd.ie). While the 1641 rebellion is only one event in what can only be called an extremely violent epoch, its shadow has been long, partly because of the wealth of material that is now part of the 1641 Deposition archive and originally collected by Protestant commissioners to prove Irish Catholic guilt of rebellion. The editors’ introduction, “Early Modern Ireland: A History of Violence,” is particularly useful as it analyzes the roles of violence itself rather than the political consequences of violent events. Many of the contributors advance arguments that are part of important historiographical exchanges about the nature and importance of violence, particularly against noncombatants in the early modern period. These contributions mean that this collection is an important addition to scholarship on early modern Ireland and Europe more generally.

The contributions are arranged chronologically, starting with an overview of violence in sixteenth-century Ireland by David Edwards. Here, he weighs into the debates over interpretations of Tudor policy in Ireland. Edwards argues strongly that whatever might have been the Tudor objectives, the reality of policy implementation in Ireland was “very bloody” (78). The next five articles examine specific events and people in this “very bloody” century. Vincent P. Carey focuses on the way that Spenser and others made sense of the actions of his employer Lord Grey at the massacre at Smerwick in 1580. Hiram Morgan continues with the late sixteenth century with his exploration of the murders ordered by Hugh O’Neill. His article is an interesting analysis of the way that politically expedient killings were understood by both the Gaelic Irish and the English. John McGurk analyzes the justifications for killing civilians in Ulster put forward by the notorious English commanders Sir Humphrey Gilbert, Sir Arthur Chichester, and Sir Henry Docwra. His analysis extends the important work of Nicholas Canny and D. B. Quinn in linking these colonial military commanders with the expansion of Europeans in the Americas. Clodaigh Tait’s contribution analyzes how perpetrators of these sorts of massacres of noncombatants were themselves understood to have been recipients of divine justice by civilians. She has used diverse material, including that of the Folklore Commission, to analyze reactions to the deaths of four government officials that were ascribed to divine vengeance—William Drury, Henry Ireton, Charles Coote, and Henry Brouncker. Kevin Forkan’s article examines the death of one of these men, Charles Coote, from the perspective of the English rather than the Irish.

The next group of articles focuses on the 1641 rebellion itself. Brian Mac Cuarta begins the section by examining religious motivations for violence in the southern Ulster counties. As he points out, most recent historians have concentrated more on the nonreligious elements of the violence—personal indebtedness, local animosities, as well as generalized anti-English sentiments. Mac Cuarta, while not denying these aspects, has found within the Depositions evidence for specific anti-Protestant inspired violence, some of which was fueled by resentment of the imposts of the established church as well as identification of Protestantism with demonic pollution. Kenneth Nicholls’s important article on English killings of the Irish needs to be required reading for any analysis of the rebellion and its victims. While scholars now understand the extent of the exaggeration of the Protestant death toll, it remains true that the sheer quantity of witness statements in the Deposition archive means that much scholarly attention has and still is focused on the sufferings of Protestants. Nicholls has combed a vast array of sources for evidence of killings of Irish Catholics by Protestants, either in retaliation or as a result of the war that engulfed Ireland after the initial rebellion in October 1641. His findings need to be set against the numerous reports of violence perpetrated against Protestants. An interesting and very welcome addition to scholarship on violence in the seventeenth century is the report by a team of archaeologists on the site of the mass grave from the 1642 siege of Carrickmines Castle, County Dublin. Their finds support the documentary evidence that there were a large number of combatants as well as women and children killed at the siege. The fate of many of the Protestants who fled Ireland is taken up by John R. Young in his article on the refugees who arrived in Scotland. He analyzes the form and extent of official relief ordered in Scotland. This relief was administered by local churches, and it is in their records that many refugee women in particular are found.

The Cromwellian period in Irish history is the focus of the next two articles, with Micheál Ó Siochrú and John Morrill examining the infamous massacre at Drogheda. Morrill supports the arguments made by Jason McElligott against those of Tom Reilly’s 1999 controversial book on Cromwell. However, he cautions against charging Cromwell with blind anti-Irishness, arguing that his actions at Drogheda, while exceptional, can be understood in the context of Cromwell’s plans in Ireland. Ó Siochrú then analyzes how the events at Drogheda were related both within and outside of Ireland. Having two analyses of the same event is a strength of this collection, demonstrating the importance of different perspectives on the same material. Military historian John Child’s article on the Jacobite wars of 1688–91 concludes the book with an interesting investigation of the ways that the “laws of war” or the customs of war, some written and some not, were actually applied to conflicts. His conclusion that the wars of 1688–91 were not out of the ordinary in terms of violence or property damage is set within the context of seventeenth-century European wars in general.

As with any collection of articles, there are disparate points of view expressed in this book, which the editors wisely have not attempted to harness into a completely coherent whole. Rather, the range of interpretations offered gives a particularly useful guide to the state of research in the field that will continue to be transformed over the next few years as scholars harness the research possibilities of the digital publication of the 1641 Depositions and other collections.