The later medieval period in Ireland was dominated by the Norman invasion of the country starting around 1170. Previously, Ireland had seen intermittent warfare between provincial kingdoms over the position of High King. This situation was transformed by the intervention in these conflicts of Norman mercenaries and later the King of England. Ireland was made a Lordship of the King of England and much of its land was seized by Norman barons. However, with time the Norman rule shrank to a territory known as "the Pale" stretching from Dublin to Dundalk. The Norman lords elsewhere in the country became Gaelicized and integrated in Gaelic Irish society.
By the 12th century, Ireland was divided politically into a shifting hierarchy of petty kingdoms and over-kingdoms. Power was concentrated into the hands of a few regional dynasties contending against each other for control of the whole island. The Northern Uí Néill ruled much of what is now Ulster. Their kinsmen, the Southern Uí Néill, were Kings of Brega. The kingship of Leinster was held by the dynamic Uí Cheinnselaigh dynasty. A new kingdom rose between Leinster and Munster, Osraige, ruled by the family of Mac Giolla Phádraig. Munster was nominally controlled by the Mac Cartaig, who were however in reality often subject to the Uí Bhriain of Thomond. North of Thomond, Connacht's supreme rulers were the Uí Chonchubhair.
In 1166 Diarmait MacMurchada (Irish/Obrian), the King of Leinster, was forcibly exiled by a confederation of Irish forces under the new High King, Ruairí O'Connor. Diarmait fled first to Bristol and then to Normandy, where he sought the help of Henry II (Europe/Plantagenet) of England to regain his kingdom. By 1167 Diarmait had obtained the services of Maurice FitzGerald and Rhys ap Gruffydd Prince of Deheubarth. Most importantly he obtained the support of the Earl of Pembroke Richard de Clare (English/de Clare), known as Strongbow.
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The first Norman knight to land in Ireland was Richard fitz Godbert de Roche in 1167, but it was not until 1169 that the main forces of Normans, Welsh and Flemings landed in Wexford. Within a short time Leinster was regained, Waterford and Dublin were under Diarmait's control, and he had Strongbow as a son-in-law, and named him as heir to his kingdom. This latter development caused consternation to King Henry II of England, who feared the establishment of a rival Norman state in Ireland. Accordingly, he resolved to visit Leinster to establish his authority.
Henry landed with a large fleet at Waterford in 1171, becoming the first King of England to set foot on Irish soil. He awarded his Irish territories to his younger son John with the title Dominus Hiberniae ("Lord of Ireland"). When John unexpectedly succeeded his brother as King John, the "Kingdom of Ireland" fell directly under the English Crown.
Henry was happily acknowledged by most of the Irish Kings, who saw in him a chance to curb the expansion of both Leinster and the Normans. This led to the ratification of the Treaty of Windsor (1175) between Henry and Ruaidhrí. However, with both Diarmait and Strongbow dead (in 1171 and 1176), Henry back in England and Ruaidhrí unable to curb his nominal vassals, within two years the Treaty was not worth the vellum it was inscribed upon. John de Courcy invaded and gained much of east Ulster in 1177, Raymond le Gros had already captured Limerick and much of north Munster, while the other Norman families such as Prendergast, fitz Stephen, fitz Gerald, fitz Henry and le Poer were actively carving out virtual kingdoms for themselves.
The Normans also were lucky to have leaders of the calibre of the Butler, Marshall, de Burgh, de Lacy and de Broase families (English/Butler,Marshall,de Broase), as well as having the dynamic heads of the first families. Another factor was that after the loss of Normandy in 1204, John had a lot more time to devote to Irish affairs, and did so effectively even from afar. However, the Irish-Normans suffered from a series of events that slowed, and eventually ceased, the spread of their settlement and power.
Firstly, numerous rebellious attacks were launched by Gaelic lords upon the Norman lordships. They started to rely on raids against resources, and surprise attacks and were successful in regaining some of their territory. Henry III and his successor, Edward I (Europe/ Plantagenet) were more concerned with events in England, Wales, Scotland and their continental domains with the result that the Norman colonists in Ireland were deprived of support from the English monarchy. Furthermore, the Norman's position deteriorated due to divisions within their own ranks. These caused outright war between leading lords such as the de Burghs, FitzGeralds, Butlers and de Berminghams. Politics and events in Gaelic Ireland served to draw the settlers deeper into the orbit of the Irish, which on occasion had the effect of allying them with one or more native rulers against other Normans.
Norman Ireland was deeply shaken by three events of the 14th century. The first was the invasion of Ireland by Edward Bruce of Scotland who, in 1315, rallied many of the Irish lords against the English presence in Ireland. Although Bruce was eventually defeated in Ireland at the Battle of Faughart, his troops caused a great deal of destruction, especially in the densely settled area around Dublin. In this chaotic situation, local Irish lords won back large amounts of land that their families had lost since the conquest and held them after the war was over.
The second was the murder of William Donn de Burgh, 3rd Earl of Ulster, in June 1333. This resulted in his lands being split in three among his relations, with the ones in Connacht swiftly rebelling against the Crown and openly siding with the Irish. This meant that virtually all of Ireland west of the Shannon was lost to the Normans.
The third calamity for the medieval English presence in Ireland was the Black Death, which arrived in Ireland in 1348. Because most of the English and Norman inhabitants of Ireland lived in towns and villages, the plague hit them far harder than it did the native Irish, who lived in more dispersed rural settlements. A celebrated account from a monastery in Kilkenny chronicles the plague as the beginning of the extinction of humanity and the end of the world. The plague was a catastrophe for the English inhabitations around the country and, after it had passed, Gaelic Irish language and customs came to dominate the country again. The English-controlled area shrunk back to the Pale, a fortified area around Dublin.
Outside the Pale, the Irish-Norman lords adopted the Irish language and customs, becoming known as the Old English, and in the words of a contemporary English commentator, became "more Irish than the Irish themselves." Over the following centuries they sided with the indigenous Irish in political and military conflicts with England and generally stayed Catholic after the Reformation. The authorities in the Pale grew so worried about the "Gaelicisation" of Ireland that, in 1367 at a parliament in Kilkenny, they passed special legislation (known as the Statutes of Kilkenny) banning those of English descent from speaking the Irish language, wearing Irish clothes or inter-marrying with the Irish. Since the government in Dublin had little real authority, however, the Statutes did not have much effect.
Throughout the 15th century, these trends proceeded apace and central government authority steadily diminished. The monarchy of England was itself thrown into turmoil during the Wars of the Roses, and as a result English involvement in Ireland was greatly reduced. Successive kings of England delegated their constitutional authority over the lordship to the powerful Fitzgerald earls of Kildare, who held the balance of power by means of military force and widespread alliances with lords and clans. This in effect made the English Crown even more remote to the realities of Irish politics. At the same time, local Gaelic and Gaelicised lords expanded their powers at the expense of the central government in Dublin, creating a polity quite alien to English ways and which was not overthrown until the successful conclusion of the Tudor reconquest.