Ports and Power1,170 CE

Gerard J. Hannan 4 days ago
Ports and Power

Dateline

In 1170 the struggle for Leinster became a contest over Ireland’s principal eastern ports and, increasingly, over the nature of kingship itself. Diarmait Mac Murchada, restored king of Leinster, had already recruited warriors from Wales and the western marches to recover the power lost when he was expelled in 1166. During this year Richard de Clare, known as Strongbow, arrived with a much larger force. Waterford and Dublin fell, Strongbow married Diarmait’s daughter Aífe, and armies ranged through Leinster and Mide. Yet these dramatic events formed only one part of a wider political landscape. Ruaidrí Ua Conchobair remained high-king, war spread along the Shannon, northern dynasties pursued their own feuds, and religious communities suffered from local as well as foreign violence.

A Precarious Settlement

At the beginning of the year Diarmait controlled much of Leinster, aided by the forces that had landed in 1169 under Robert fitz Stephen, Maurice de Prendergast and others. Wexford had been captured, and an earth-and-timber stronghold had been established at Carrick near the River Slaney. Diarmait had also reached an accommodation with Ruaidrí Ua Conchobair. He recognised Ruaidrí’s high-kingship and, according to the surviving accounts, was expected to dismiss his overseas allies. His son Conchobar was held as a hostage guaranteeing the agreement.

Neither the settlement nor Ruaidrí’s supremacy was secure. Irish high-kingship depended upon military strength, hostages, tribute and the cooperation of provincial rulers rather than administration by a central state. Diarmait’s renewed ambitions threatened the network of rulers supporting Ruaidrí, particularly Tigernán Ua Ruairc of Bréifne and the kings of Mide, Osraige and northern Leinster. Strongbow’s promised expedition therefore offered Diarmait more than reinforcements: it provided the means to overturn the settlement entirely.

The Baginbun Bridgehead

During the summer, probably in May, Strongbow’s lieutenant Raymond fitz William, called Raymond le Gros, landed near Baginbun on the Hook Peninsula. The exact strength of his party varies between narratives, but it was a small advance force of knights, archers and other fighting men. They occupied or refortified a defensible coastal promontory while awaiting Strongbow. Its position commanded approaches to Waterford Harbour and provided contact by sea with Wexford and south Wales.

A force drawn from Hiberno-Norse Waterford and neighbouring Irish territories attacked Raymond’s encampment but was defeated. Later Anglo-Norman narratives celebrate the victory and claim that hundreds of prisoners were taken. They also report that many captives were executed after the battle, despite Raymond’s objections. The figures and dramatic details cannot be verified, but the encounter clearly weakened Waterford’s defenders and secured a landing place for the larger expedition.

Waterford Taken

Strongbow landed near Waterford on 23 August, according to the chronology preserved in the principal invasion narratives. Estimates of his army differ, although it probably included about 200 mounted knights and a considerably larger body of archers and infantry recruited in Wales and the marches. Raymond joined him, and on 25 August their combined forces assaulted Waterford. The fortified Hiberno-Norse town resisted, but the attackers found a vulnerable point in its defences and broke in. Irish annals and Anglo-Norman accounts alike record severe bloodshed.

Waterford’s capture was strategically decisive. Its harbour gave Strongbow a secure maritime link with Britain and placed a second major south-eastern town, after Wexford, within Diarmait’s coalition. Leading defenders were captured, while a garrison was left to hold the settlement. The present stone form of Reginald’s Tower should not be projected unchanged into 1170: a wooden defensive structure occupied the site, and extensive Anglo-Norman rebuilding followed later.

Diarmait soon arrived with Aífe, and she married Strongbow in Waterford. No wholly secure date for the wedding survives, so it is safest to place it shortly after the city’s fall. The marriage created a powerful alliance between the Uí Chennselaig dynasty and an Anglo-Norman earl. Later sources claim that Strongbow was also promised succession to Leinster. Such a grant did not fit easily with Irish practices of selecting kings from an eligible royal kindred, and historians continue to debate whether Diarmait initially intended to offer all Leinster, Dublin, or a looser political inheritance.

The Fall of Dublin

The allies next turned towards Dublin. Ruaidrí gathered forces near Clondalkin, guarding the expected western approach, but Diarmait and Strongbow advanced through the Wicklow uplands and the region of Glendalough. This difficult route allowed them to appear before the city without first fighting the high-king’s main army. Dublin was a walled Hiberno-Norse port ruled by Asgall mac Ragnaill and one of Ireland’s richest political prizes.

Negotiations began, with Archbishop Lorcán Ua Tuathail playing a mediating role. While talks were still proceeding, troops commanded by Miles de Cogan and Raymond le Gros attacked. Dublin’s capture is conventionally dated to 21 September, the feast of St Matthew, although not every source supplies that precision. The city was stormed, inhabitants were killed, and Asgall escaped by sea. Ruaidrí withdrew rather than risk battle under unfavourable conditions.

The conquest ended independent Hiberno-Norse rule in Dublin, though it did not remove its Scandinavian-descended population or erase the city’s Irish and maritime character. Strongbow’s men took control of a functioning port containing merchants, craftspeople, churches, streets, workshops and closely packed post-and-wattle houses. The speed of the assault meant that political mastery changed before a new colonial government or settlement system had been fully devised.

War Across Leinster and Mide

Possession of Dublin allowed Diarmait to strike at old rivals. The Annals of Tigernach record an attack upon the Uí Fháeláin of northern Leinster, whose king was expelled, followed by pressure on Domnall Mac Gilla Pátraic of Osraige. Diarmait then led a hosting into Mide. Clonard was plundered, and Kells, Dulane, Slane and other ecclesiastical centres were attacked or burned. Domnall Brégach Ua Máelshechlainn submitted, while the army continued towards the territories of the Uí Briúin.

These campaigns reveal that the invaders did not operate as an isolated foreign army. They formed part of Diarmait’s host and served his programme of revenge, restoration and expansion. Churches suffered because they possessed livestock, food, metalwork and stores, and because controlling a major religious centre carried political meaning. The annalists’ condemnation of Diarmait reflects both the destruction itself and the belief that a king should protect ecclesiastical communities.

Ruaidrí answered through the grim political language of hostage-taking. After Diarmait’s incursions into Mide, he ordered the killing of Leinster hostages, including Diarmait’s son Conchobar and another youth connected to his household. The decision, attributed partly to Tigernán Ua Ruairc’s pressure, destroyed the personal guarantee underpinning the earlier peace. It also removed a plausible Uí Chennselaig successor, increasing the future importance of Strongbow and Aífe’s marriage.

Conflicts Beyond the East

Elsewhere, warfare followed older Irish rivalries. Domnall Ua Briain and the Dál Cais turned against Ruaidrí, producing major conflict between Thomond and Connacht. Ruaidrí sent a fleet along the Shannon, ravaged parts of Munster and burned the plank bridge at Killaloe. These operations demonstrate the importance of river fleets and fortified crossings in Irish warfare; events in the south-east did not suddenly replace existing contests for tribute and provincial supremacy.

In the north, Conchobar son of Muirchertach Mac Lochlainn, king of Cenél nEógain and a potential claimant to wider authority, was killed at Armagh on 4 April, according to the Annals of Ulster. His death opened another phase in the struggle for the northern kingship. A fleet from the Isles also killed Diarmait Ua Ainbfheith at an island stronghold, showing that the northern Irish Sea remained a connected military zone extending towards Man, the Hebrides and the western Scottish seaways.

Work, Wealth and Worship

For most inhabitants, Ireland remained overwhelmingly rural. Households depended upon mixed farming, with cattle serving as food, movable wealth, tribute and a frequent objective of raiding. Sheep, pigs, grain and woodland resources supported local economies, while spinning, weaving, leatherworking, carpentry and metalworking filled daily life. Armies disrupted this world by seizing animals, consuming stored grain and burning settlements. Annalistic references to plundered cattle, horses, sheep, books and furnishings reveal what communities valued and what warfare could remove in a single day.

Dublin, Waterford and Wexford were different in scale and occupation. Their inhabitants included sailors, traders and specialist craftspeople working in wood, iron, bronze, antler, leather and textiles. Dublin had long-distance commercial links across the Irish Sea and beyond, and silver coinage had been used there for generations. The conquests of 1170 did not instantly end trade. They redirected political control of harbour dues, markets, shipping and surrounding lands towards new military elites whose own connections ran strongly to Bristol, south Wales and western England.

Religious life likewise combined continuity with crisis. Lorcán Ua Tuathail remained archbishop of Dublin and an advocate of reform, ascetic discipline and pastoral care. The city’s cathedral community followed an Augustinian rule, part of a reform movement already established before the invasion. Yet reform did not prevent clerical institutions becoming entangled in politics. At Saul in Ulaid, canons regular associated with the reforms of Máel Máedóc Ua Morgair were expelled and stripped of books, livestock and possessions by local opponents. At Clonmacnoise the head of the Céli Dé community died, while the raising of St Coman’s relics shows the continuing importance of saints, shrines and ceremonial translation.

A Transforming Year

By the end of 1170 Diarmait and Strongbow held the eastern ports that gave access to soldiers, supplies and overseas commerce. Their success was spectacular but incomplete. Ruaidrí remained high-king, resistance continued, and Henry II had not yet come to Ireland. Nor had a settled Anglo-Norman lordship taken shape. What had changed was the balance of power. A regional Irish dispute had drawn in an earl with his own followers and ambitions, while Waterford and Dublin provided bases from which conquest and settlement could continue. The consequences would become clearer in 1171, but the decisive military and dynastic foundations had been laid.

Primary Sources

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