Dublin

Dublin (; locally or ; Irish: Baile Átha Cliath, or Áth Cliath, ) is the largest and capital city of Ireland.^[2] The English name is derived from the Irish name Dubh Linn, meaning "black pool". It is a primate city with an urban population of over 1 million, containing almost 25% of the country's population.^[3] Dublin is situated near the midpoint of Ireland's east coast, at the mouth of the River Liffey, and at the centre of the Dublin Region.

Originally founded as a Viking settlement, it evolved into the Kingdom of Dublin and became the island's primary city following the Norman invasion. The city expanded rapidly from the 17th century, and for a brief period was the second largest city within the British Empire and the fifth largest in Europe. After the Act of Union in 1800, Dublin entered a period of stagnation, but remained the economic centre for most of the island. Following the partition of Ireland in 1922, the Executive Council of the Irish Free State located the new parliament, the Oireachtas, in Leinster House. Dublin became the capital of the Irish Free State until the Ireland Act of 1949, by which Britain officially recognised the new republic, when it then became the capital of the Republic of Ireland.

Similar to the other cities of Cork, Limerick, Galway, and Waterford, Dublin is administered separately from its respective county and has its own city council. The city is currently ranked 29th in the Global Financial Centres Index and is listed by the GaWC as a global city, with a ranking of Alpha, placing Dublin among the top 30 cities in the world.^[4][5] It is a historical and contemporary cultural centre for the country, as well as a modern centre of education, the arts, administration, economy and industry.

Etymology

The name Dublin is derived from the Irish name Dubh Linn, meaning "black pool". The common name for the city in modern Irish is Baile Átha Cliath, meaning "town of the hurdled ford". Áth Cliath is a place name referring to a fording point of the River Liffey in the vicinity of Father Mathew Bridge (Church Street).^[6] Baile Átha Cliath was an early Christian monastery which is believed to have been situated in the area of Aungier Street currently occupied by Whitefriar Street Carmelite Church.

The subsequent Scandinavian settlement was on the River Poddle, a tributary of the Liffey, to the east of Christchurch, in an area now known as Wood Quay. The Dubh Linn was a lake used by the Scandinavians to moor their ships and was connected to the Liffey by the Poddle. These lakes were covered during the early 18th century, and as the city expanded they were largely forgotten about. The Dubh Linn was situated where the Castle Garden is now located, opposite the Chester Beatty Library in Dublin Castle. Táin Bó Cuailgne also known as The Cattle Raid of Cooley refers to Dublind rissa ratter Áth Cliath, meaning Dublin, which is called Ath Cliath. In Irish (except in Ulster Irish), Dubh is correctly pronounced as Duv or Duf. The city's original pronunciation is preserved in Old Norse as Dyflin, Old English as Difelin, and modern Manx as Divlyn. Historically, in the Gaelic script, bh was written with a dot over the b, rendering 'Duḃ Linn' or 'Duḃlinn'. Those without a knowledge of Irish omitted the dot and spelled the name as Dublin.

History

The writings of the Greek astronomer and cartographer Ptolemy provide perhaps the earliest reference to human habitation in the area now known as Dublin. In around AD 140 he referred to a settlement he called Eblana Civitas. The settlement 'Dubh Linn' dates perhaps as far back as the 1st century BC and later a monastery was built there, though the town was established in about 841^[7] by the Norse. The modern city retains the Anglicised Irish name of the former and the original Irish name of the latter.

Dublin was ruled by the Norse for most of the time between 841 and 999, when it was sacked by Brian Boru, the King of Cashel.^[8] Although Dublin still had a Norse king after the Battle of Clontarf in 1014, Norse influence waned under a growing Celtic supremacy until the Norman invasion of Ireland which was launched from Wales in 1169-1172.^[8] The last high king (Ard Rí) of Dublin also had local city administration via its Corporation from the Middle Ages. This represented the city's guild-based oligarchy until it was reformed in the 1840s on increasingly democratic lines. In 1348, the city was hit by the Black Death,^[9] a lethal plague that ravaged Europe in the mid-14th century.^[10]

From the 17th century the city expanded rapidly, helped by the Wide Streets Commission. The population grew from about 10,000 in 1600 to over 50,000 in 1700, and this in spite of another plague epidemic in 1649-51.^[11] Georgian Dublin was, for a short time, the second city of the British Empire after London and the fifth largest European city. Much of Dublin's most notable architecture dates from this time. In 1759, the founding of the Guinness brewery at St. James's Gate resulted in a considerable economic impact for the city. For much of the time since its foundation, the Guinness brewery was the largest employer in the city but Catholics were confined to the lower echelons of employment at Guinness and only entered management level in the 1960s. After Irish independence the Guinness Corporate headquarters were moved to London in the 1930s to avoid Irish taxation and a rival brewery to Dublin was opened in London at Park Royal to supply the UK. In 1742 Handel's "Messiah" was performed for the first time in New Musick Hall in Fishamble Street with 26 boys and five men from the combined choirs of St.Patrick's and Christ Church cathedrals participating.

After the Act of Union, 1800, the seat of government moved to the Parliament of the United Kingdom in London. Dublin entered a period of decline, but remained the centre of administration and a transport hub for much of Ireland. Dublin played no major role in the Industrial Revolution. Ireland had no significant sources of coal, the fuel of the time, and Dublin was not a centre of ship manufacture, the other main driver of industrial development in Britain and Ireland.^[8] Belfast developed faster than Dublin during this period on a mixture of international trade, factory-based linen cloth production and shipbuilding.^[12]

The Easter Rising of 1916, the War of Independence (Anglo-Irish War), and Irish Civil War resulted in a significant amount of physical destruction in the city centre. The Government of the Irish Free State rebuilt the city centre and located the new Oireachtas (Parliament) in Leinster House. Since the beginning of Anglo-Norman rule in the 12th century, the city has functioned as the capital in varying geopolitical entities: Lordship of Ireland (1171–1541), Kingdom of Ireland (1541–1800), island as part of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland (1801–1922), and the Irish Republic (1919–1922).^[13] From 1922, following the partition of Ireland, it became the capital of the Irish Free State (1922–1949) and now is the capital of the Republic of Ireland. One of the memorials to commemorate that time is the Garden of Remembrance.

Since 1997, the landscape of Dublin has changed immensely, with enormous private sector and state development of housing, transport, and business. (see also Development and Preservation in Dublin). Some well-known Dublin street corners are still named for the pub or business which used to occupy the site before closure or redevelopment.

Local

Dublin City Council is presided over by the Lord Mayor, who is elected for a yearly term. Council meetings occur at Dublin City Hall, while most of its administrative activities are based in the Civic Offices on Wood Quay. The council is a unicameral assembly of 52 members, elected every five years from Local Election Areas. The party, or coalition of parties, with the majority of seats adjudicates committee members, introduces policies, and appoints the Lord Mayor. Chaired by the Lord Mayor, the Council passes an annual budget for spending on housing, traffic management, refuse, drainage, planning, etc. The Dublin City Manager is responsible for implementing City Council decisions.

The current Lord Mayor is Gerry Breen.^[14] In 2008, the Government announced plans for local government reform, involving plans for an elected Mayor of Dublin with executive powers. The Environment Minister John Gormley said that the new mayor would make local government services more efficient for the capital's inhabitants.^[15] The plan also included local plebiscites, petition rights, participatory budgeting and city meetings.^[16] Although a bill to bring about the changes was published in October 2010,^[17] the proposals were abandoned in the following month when it was announced that the Green Party were to leave the government, leading to a general election in early 2011.^[18]