The Making of the Irish Protestant Ascendancy: The Life of William Conolly, 1662-1728

The Making of the Irish Protestant Ascendancy: The Life of William Conolly, 1662-1728. By Patrick Walsh. (Woodbridge, Suffolk, UK: Boydell, 2010, Pp. x, 229. $115.00.)

For historians of eighteenth-century Ireland, the term "Protestant Ascendancy" has eluded precise definition, particularly in relation to the chronology of its appearance and the constituent elements in its composition. In terms of chronology, for some, Protestant Ascendancy developed in the wake of the passing of the penal legislation against Roman Catholics in the early eighteenth century; while, for others, it gained currency in the late eighteenth century when the Protestant interest in the governance of Ireland came under attack. As to composition, it is at least clear that the Protestant elite in church and state, was a mutant body into which, during the course of the century, the newly wealthy entered along with converts...