The Big House in Ireland

by Valerie Pakenham, with special photography by Thomas Pakenham

• ISBN13: 9781841881591
• ISBN10: 1841881597
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2001-01-01
• Publisher: WN

Summary

The big Irish House has haunted the Irish landscape and Irish imagination for nearly four hundred years. Gaelic poets cursed or celebrated its power. Irish historians have debated its role for good or ill in the countryside. And generations of Irish novelists have made it a central presence in their books. In this anthology the idiosyncratic life in the Big House is portrayed in a chronological structure creating a documentary history full of splendour and tragedy.This fascinating book is illustrated with contemporary drawings, engravings, maps and paintings and by Thomas Pakenham s evocative photographs.

Table of Contents

Introduction	6	(6)
Places
Builders	12	(10)
Parks and Planting	22	(10)
Gardens and Follies	32	(10)
Interiors	42	(12)
Plumbing, Heating and the Lack of Them	54	(10)
People
Grandees, Squires and Squireens	64	(12)
Alliances and Misalliances	76	(10)
Family Life	86	(10)
Hospitality	96	(10)
Retainers	106	(10)
The ills of the Flesh	116	(10)
Outside the Walls
Wild Sports of the West	126	(10)
Landlords and Tenants	136	(10)
The Famine and After	146	(10)
Land Wars	156	(10)
Troubles	166	(12)
Staying On	178	(10)
Further Reading	188	(1)
Index	189