Frontiers of the Archaeological Imagination: Rethinking Landscape and Identity in Thirteenth-century Roscommon, Ireland

Abstract

Ireland was invaded by Anglo-Normans (hereafter ‘English’) in 1169. Conquest and colonisation proceeded quickly in eastern Ireland, but the invaders struggled for decades to annexe Connacht, Ireland’s western province. Despite this, they managed to forge a central role for themselves in the region’s politics, exploiting rivalries whenever there was both opportunity and potential gain, and even helping in the construction of native castles. From 1227 the province’s ancient territorial units were reimagined as cantreds under the lordship of Richard de Burgh, but Henry III retained five cantreds for himself. These five contiguous territories, collectively known as the king’s cantreds, were located mainly in what is now County Roscommon (Figure 1). Although the history of the five cantreds is fairly well known and their importance well established, they have not been the subject of a book until now. That fact alone makes Thomas Finan’s new book worthy of attention. The story of these cantreds features kings of both the Angevin and Gaelic-Irish lineages, so this book will be of interest to all specialists in the history of these two islands and of the relations between their rival kings during the thirteenth century. Its title will also attract the attention of scholars who are interested in political and cultural interactions around the fringes – the frontiers – of the territories controlled by Henry III and Edward I. And, as the inaugural volume in a new series of monographs on north Atlantic environmental history, scholars who are generally interested in environmental change through time, not to mention landscape change, will also be keen to inspect it.