Although the history of crowds in modern European history has been one of the most hotly debated subjects since E.P. Thompson's pioneering work of the 1960s, the crowd in Irish history has been largely neglected. This is the first study of the subject during the most turbulent period of Ireland's history. The introduction proposes an outline history of the crowd in Ireland and is followed by eight specialist studies of crowd activity by new and innovative scholars in the field. A special feature of the volume is that it incorporates discussions from a Colloquium held in Belfast in 1998 which was attended by the contributors and senior Irish and British historians.