| Regions with significant populations | |
|---|---|
| Northern Ireland | |
| Republic of Ireland | |
| United States |
|
| Languages | |
| Majority: Ulster English Minority: Ulster Scots,Ulster Irish | |
| Religion | |
| MainlyPresbyterianism, someAnglican andCatholic | |
| Related ethnic groups | |
Ulster Scots, also known as theUlster-Scots people orScots-Irish, are anethnic group[6][7][8][9] descended largely from LowlandScottish and NorthernEnglish settlers who moved to the northern province ofUlster inIreland mainly during the 17th century.[10][11][12] There is anUlster Scots dialect of theScots language.
Historically, there have been considerable population exchanges between Ireland and Scotland over the millennia. This group are found mostly in the province of Ulster; their ancestors wereProtestant settlers who migrated from theScottish Lowlands andNorthern England during thePlantation of Ulster, which was aplanned process of colonisation following theTudor conquest of Ireland.[13] The largest numbers came fromAyrshire,Cumbria,Dumfries and Galloway,Durham,Lanarkshire,Northumberland,Renfrewshire,Scottish Borders,Yorkshire and, to a lesser extent, from theScottish Highlands.[14]
Ulster Scots people, displaced through hardship, emigrated in significant numbers around in theBritish Empire and especially to theAmerican colonies, later Canada and the United States. InNorth America, they are sometimes called "Scotch-Irish", though this term is not used in theBritish Isles.
After some minor settling during the lateTudor and earlyStuart periods, the first major influx of Lowland Scots and Border English Protestant settlers into Ulster came in the first two decades of the 17th century.
Before thePlantation of Ulster (and even before theFlight of the Earls), there was the 1606 independent Scottish settlement in eastDown andAntrim. It was led by adventurersJames Hamilton andSir Hugh Montgomery, two Ayrshirelairds. Montgomery was granted half ofLord of Upper Clandeboye Conn McNeill O'Neill's land, a significant Gaelic lordship in Ulster, as a reward for helping him escape from English captivity. Hamilton forced himself in on this deal when he discovered it and, after three years of bickering, the final settlement gave Hamilton and Montgomery each one-third of the land.[15][failed verification]
Starting in 1609, Scots began arriving into state-sponsored settlements as part of thePlantation of Ulster. This scheme was intended to confiscate all the lands of theGaelic Irish nobility in Ulster and to settle the province with Protestant Scottish and English colonists. Under this scheme, a substantial number of Scots were settled, mostly in the south and west of Ulster, on confiscated land.[citation needed]
While many of the Scottish planters in Ulster came from southwest Scotland, a large number came from the southeast, including the unstable regions right along the border with England (theScottish Borders andNorthumberland). These groups were from the Borderers orBorder Reivers culture, which had familial links on both sides of the Anglo-Scottish border. The plan was that moving these Borderers to Ireland would both solve the Borders problem and tie down Ulster. This was of particular concern toJames VI of Scotland when he became King of England, since he knew Scottish instability could jeopardise his chances of ruling both kingdoms effectively.[16]
During theIrish Rebellion of 1641, the native Irishgentry attempted to extirpate the English and Scottish settlers in revenge for being driven off their ancestral land, resulting in severe violence, massacres and ultimately leading to the deaths of between four and six thousand settlers over the winter of 1641–42.[17] Native Irish civilians were massacred in return.[18] By 1642, native Irish were inde facto control of much of the island under aConfederate Ireland, with about a third under the control of the opposition. However, many Ulster-Scots Presbyterians joined with the Irish in rebellion and aided them in driving the English out.[19][20][failed verification]
The Ulster Scots population in Ireland was probably preserved from destruction during the subsequentIrish Confederate Wars, when a ScottishCovenanter army was landed in the province to protect the Ulster-Scottish settlers from native Irish landowners.[citation needed] The war itself, part of theWars of the Three Kingdoms, ended in the 1650s, with theCromwellian conquest of Ireland. At the head of the army,Oliver Cromwell conquered all of Ireland. Defeating the Irish Confederates andEnglish Royalists on behalf of theEnglish Parliamentarians, he and his forces employed methods and inflicted casualties among the civilian Irish population that have long been commonly considered by contemporary sources, historians and the popular culture to be outside of the accepted military ethics of the day (see more on thedebate here). After the Cromwellian war in Ireland was over, many of their soldiers settled permanently in eastern Ulster.[21]
Under theAct of Settlement 1652, all Catholic-owned land was confiscated and theBritish Plantations in Ireland, which had been destroyed by the rebellion of 1641, were restored. However, due to the Scots' enmity to the English Parliament in the final stages of theEnglish Civil War, English settlers rather than Scots were the main beneficiary of this scheme.[citation needed]
There was a generation of calm in Ireland until another war broke out in 1689, again due to political conflict closely aligned with ethnic and religious differences. TheWilliamite war in Ireland (1689–91) was fought betweenJacobites who supported the restoration of the CatholicJames II to the throne of England andWilliamites who supported the ProtestantWilliam of Orange. The majority of theProtestant colonists throughout Ireland but particularly in Ulster, fought on the Williamite side in the war against theJacobites. The fear of a repeat of the massacres of 1641, fear of retribution for religious persecution, as well as their wish to hold on to lands which had been confiscated from Catholic landowners, were all principal motivating factors.[citation needed]
The Williamite forces, composed of British, Dutch,Huguenot and Danish armies, as well as troops raised in Ulster,[22][23] ended Jacobite resistance by 1691, confirming the Protestant minority's monopoly on power in Ireland. Their victories atDerry,the Boyne andAughrim arestill commemorated by theOrange Order into the 21st century.
Finally, another major influx of Scots into northern Ireland occurred in the late 1690s, when tens of thousands of people fled a famine in Scotland to come to Ulster.[24][25]
It was only after the 1690s that Scottish settlers and their descendants, the majority of whom werePresbyterian, gained numeric superiority in Ulster, though still a minority in Ireland as a whole. Along withCatholics, they were legally disadvantaged by thePenal Laws, which gave full rights only to members of theChurch of Ireland (theAnglicanstate church), who were mainlyAnglo-Irish (themselves oftenabsentee landlords), native Irishconverts or the descendants of English settlers. For this reason, up until the 19th century, there was considerable disharmony betweenDissenters and the rulingProtestant Ascendancy in Ireland. With the enforcement ofQueen Anne's 1704Popery Act, which caused further discrimination against all who did not participate in theestablished church, considerable numbers of Ulster-Scots migrated to the colonies inBritish America throughout the 18th and 19th centuries.[26] In fact, these 'Scots-Irish' from Ulster and Lowland Scotland comprised the most numerous group of immigrants from Great Britain and Ireland to the American colonies between 1717 and 1775, with over 100,000 leaving Ulster at the time.[16][27]
Members of the Church of Ireland mostly consisted of theProtestant Ascendancy, Protestant settlers of English descent who formed theelite of 17th and 18th century Ireland. For this reason, up until the 19th century, and despite their common fear of Irish Catholics, there was considerable disharmony between the Presbyterians and the Protestant Ascendancy in Ulster. As a result of this, many Ulster-Scots, along with Catholic native Irish, ignored religious differences to join theUnited Irishmen and participate in theIrish Rebellion of 1798, in support ofAge of Enlightenment-inspiredegalitarian andrepublican goals influenced by theFrench Revolution.[28]
Just a few generations after arriving in Ulster, considerable numbers of Ulster-Scots emigrated tothe North American colonies of Great Britain. Between 1717 and 1775, over 100,000 migrated to what became theUnited States of America.[29] Around the same time, the British took control of the territory ofNew France, allowing many Ulster-Scots to migrate to these areas as well. These people are known as theScotch-Irish Canadians.
In theUnited States census of 2000, 4.3 million Americans (1.5% of the population of the United States) claimedScotch-Irish ancestry. Author and formerUnited States SenatorJim Webb suggests that the true number of people with some Scots-Irish heritage in the United States is higher (over 27 million) likely because contemporary Americans with some Scotch-Irish heritage may regard themselves as either Irish, Scottish, or simplyAmerican instead.[30][31][page needed][32]
Over the centuries, Ulster Scots culture has contributed to the unique character of the counties inUlster. TheUlster Scots Agency points to industry, language, music, sport, religion and myriad traditions brought to Ulster from the Scottish lowlands. In particular, the origin ofcountry and western music was extensively from Ulster Scots folk music, in addition to English, German, and African-American styles.[33][34]
The cultural traditions and aspects of this culture including its links to country music are articulated inDavid Hackett Fischer's book,Albion's Seed: Four British Folkways in America. In 2010's documentaryThe Hamely Tongue, filmmaker Deaglán Ó Mocháin traces back the origins of this culture and language, and relates its manifestations in today's Ireland. The film's title refers to James Fenton's book,The Hamely Tongue: A personal record of Ulster-Scots in County Antrim.[35]
Most Ulster Scots speakUlster English as afirst language.Ulster Scots is the local dialect of theLowland Scots language which has, since the 1980s, also been called "Ullans", aportmanteauneologism popularised by the physician, amateur historian and politicianIan Adamson,[36] mergingUlster andLallans – the Scots for 'Lowlands'[37] – but also said to be abackronym for 'Ulster-Scots language in literature and native speech'.[38]
The North American ancestry of theX-linked form of the genetic disease congenitalnephrogenic diabetes insipidus has been traced to Ulster Scots who travelled toNova Scotia in 1761 on the shipHopewell.[39]
While 33 US Presidents have had ancestral links to Scotland, many of these men have heritage that is classified as Ulster-Scots. This ethnic group has historically been found in the Ulster region of Ireland, and is so-called because of their own historical links to the lowlands of Scotland, where the group's ancestors originated.
The Scots-Irish coming from the towns and countryside of Ulster County, Ireland, constitute a religiously and culturally distinct population from the remainder of Catholic Ireland. ... The section of "Works devoted to Scots-Irish Americans" provides a wide variety of sources and approaches to the study of this ethnic group.
The emergence of an Ulster-Scots ethnicity within the broader transatlantic context is his primary focus, as per the headline of his title.
Before page 1: This famous poem penned by Robert Burns in 1795, and described by James Kinsley (an authority on 'The Bard') as occupying 'a central place in the psalmody of radicalism', encapsulates the values of the French Revolution which inspired the intellectual leadership of the United Irishmen.
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