Tuesday 8 June 2010

King Billy


There is perhaps no better illustration of the process by which history is, and can be, turned into mythology than William of Orange's sojourn in Ireland. For the Protestants he became an iconic figure, mounted on his white horse with sword raised, a detail taken from Benjamin West's painting of the Battle of the Boyne, and once reproduced on a thousand gable-ends! For Catholics he was also an icon, one of an unwelcome Protestant ascendency, expressed, at its worst, in the Penal laws. But William came to Ireland not as a crusader but to fight a campaign that was part of his more general struggle against Louis XIV.

It is crucial to understand here that the French king offered his support to James II, the exiled Catholic king of England, not out of a sense of dynastic and confessional solidarity, but simply as a useful way of opening up a fresh theatre against William, his great Continental rival. In this regard the Irish campaign of 1689-90 was merely a small part of a more general European war, in which religion played only a minor part. As such William was a representative of a more general alliance against Louis and his imperial ambitions, an alliance that included Pope Innocent XI. After his famous victory on the Boyne the bells of Rome were rung out in celebration!

It seems likely that William, if the matter had been left to him alone, would have favoured a large measure of religious toleration throughout his lands. But the matter was not left to him alone; he was dependant on the ruling aristocracy in both England and Ireland. After the final victory in 1691, and the Treaty of Limerick, the ruling Protestant minority in Ireland were in no mood for any form of compromise. For them William, living and dead, was the expression of their power, depicted in statue and paint. The divisions between the communities became even more acute in the nineteenth century, with the emergence of the Orange Order, committed to the Protestant cause by constant reminders and celebrations of the past.

13 comments:

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  3. Thanks, Adam. You are a man of clear and obvious passions. I’m such a bossy boots but I hope you don’t mind be saying that there are some in that other place who will play to that deliberately. :-)

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  5. You love it, I feel sure. :-))

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  7. A factual blog, conaining nothing contentious, I would have thought. I think it's generally realized now that Ireland at the time was just one theatre of the European war, at the end of a disastrously turbulent century here.

    I don't think William has ever been a figure of hatred for Irish nationalists/republicans. He has been coopted into unionist/Orange triumphalism and sectarianism, which has mainly been seen, I think, as rather silly and pathetic. William himself was quite tolerant and reasonable.

    Incidentally, you will break help ma boab's heart if you draw an analogy between the Israelis and the Irish. He sees the Israelis and Ulster unionists as Chosen Peoples and the Palestinians and Irish as Untermenschen. :-)

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  8. Adam, that would be too gay. :-))

    Brendano, I do not always reach for contention. :-))

    Is that true in the north as well? I would have thought William would have been a symbol of everything that the Nationalist community hated. I might write a longer piece on the Jacobite War in Ireland. People here generally have heard of the Battle of the Boyne but have never heard of the Siege of Limerick or the far more decisive Battle of Aughrim

    Actually what I was thinking of doing for My T was a spoof along the lines of the North as Gaza and the Republic as Israel. If I get the time I'll try to put something together and post it this evening, with Ourselves Alone as a possible title. And before you rush to tell me I know that is not an accurate translation of Sein Fein. :-))

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  10. Rush? Doesn't sound like me. :-) Yes, 'Ourselves' is more accurate.

    I don't think Northern nationalists (of whom I have known many very well) have any hatred of King Billy. They see him (if at all) as a figure in the dim, distant past, where many unionists still seem to wish to live ... they find that mentality somewhat bizarre. Some Unionists still need to be dragged kicking and screaming into the eighteenth century, never mind the twenty-first.

    Yes, you're right about Aughrim.

    Commenting on your blog is a hassle ... various hoops have to be jumped through.

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  11. Sorry, Adam. :-)

    Brendano, why is it a hassle? Anyway the dreaded blog has been added, a spot of fun.
    :-))

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  12. Well, I have to log in under my WordPress ID, copy a word into a box, then be told, as likely as not, that my OpenID credentials couldn't be verified (although I didn't use OpenID), then do it once or twice more.

    Yes, it was a spot of fun, as blogging ought to be. Not as many comments as your blog of last night, though. People are bored by the idea of Ireland ... perhaps your Calais notion would have provoked more of a response.

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  13. It's impossible to anticipate what will or will not engage the passions of the masses. :-) I'll check when I've finished here.

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