Seventeenth century was the period of invasion, plundering and insulting incidents for the people of Ireland which were so drastic in nature. Everyone in the Irish soil will tell such stories about the true past of Ireland that will make our hairs stand on end. Many have died and many have survived this brutal period just long enough to tell the tale to their children and grandchildren. The small groups of rebels in the Irish lands were brutally suppressed by forcing them to follow the ideals of their religion and culture; this was a dark period in the Irish history.
In the early parts of the eighteenth century, the English and the Irish had made the Act of Union and this enabled the differences between the two regions to subdue greatly. North and South parts of the Irish lands were facing internal conflicts which were mainly on whether to follow their old customs or to follow new principles in governing the region better.
The northern part of Ireland grew steadily into a prosperous region, under the blanket of industrial and manufacturing processes in various fields. But the people of the southern Ireland had to endure more diminishing standards due to uneven distribution of fertile lands among the native and the Anglo Protestants living there. This brought more bloody riots and clashes which did not help the growth of Ireland much. Britain was blamed for this and they were forced into solving this issue by dividing Ireland into northern and southern regions permanently.
The Catholics wanted complete independence in this division and there was huge political unrest in the Irish lands for a good part of the early twentieth century. In 1920, the Government of Ireland act was passed in an effort to pacify all of the Irish community which however did not serve its purpose well. British forces stationed in the Irish lands had to face countless attacks from the Irish Republican Army or the IRA with the use of guerrilla warfare style.
Then came the era of the legendary treaty of peace in the 1921; the treaty was signed with the agreement of combining six counties under the region of the Northern Ireland and the remaining twenty three counties in the south along with the three counties from Ulster were brought under the region of southern Ireland. The independent republic of Ireland was formed and things seemed to have come under peaceful times from then onwards.
From the period of 1960 to 1990, violence broke again between the Catholics and the Protestants in the land which were even bloodier that the previous riots of Ireland. Armed attacks by the Independent Republican Army and the Protestant paramilitary forces intensified and the British troop were brought in to help resolve matters. Then the Anglo-Irish Agreement was signed between the British and the Irish Prime ministers and with the cease fire from the IRA, the implementation of this treaty was successful in 1994. Finally in 2010, all powers regarding Irish lands have been handed over to the Irish government, but still the echoes of the past will die down only a long time.
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