Champagne & Silver Buckles: The Viceregal Court at Dublin Castle 1700-1922 by Jim Robins

Dublin Castle was the headquarters of British rule in Ireland, both literal and symbolic. There, the Viceroy, chief representative of the Crown in Ireland, presided, a conduit and image of power. Around him gathered a privileged elite who represented the apex of Irish high society for over two hundred years. Their colourful lives, roles and rituals lent shape to what became known as the Viceregal Court.

Champagne & Silver Buckles examines the social and ceremonial life of that court, and looks at the individuals who performed at the Castle from the onset of English administration after the Williamite wars, up until the transfer of power to Michael Collins and the government of the Irish Free State in 1922: ‘No trumpets, no liveried courtiers, no drinks on the sideboard: having withstood the attacks of successive generations of Irish rebels over seven centuries, Dublin Castle was quietly handed over to eight gentlemen in three taxicabs.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Joseph Robins is a lecturer and social historian. He is the author of The Lost Children: A Study of Charity Children in Ireland 1700-1900 (1980), Fools and Mad: A History of the Insane in Ireland (1983) and The Miasma: Epidemic and Panic in Eighteenth-Century Ireland (1995).

Joseph Robins’ fascinating narrative deriving largely from primary and secondary sources – diaries and newspapers of the period, genealogical, architectural and domestic records – documents a lively, little-known aspect of Irish social history.