Book excerpt: This 3-volume book features a detailed historical account of one of the most turbulent periods in Irish history. The Tudor conquest (or reconquest) of Ireland took place under the Tudor dynasty, which held the Kingdom of England during the 16th century. Following a failed rebellion against the crown by Silken Thomas, the Earl of Kildare, in the 1530s, Henry VIII was declared King of Ireland in 1542 by statute of the Parliament of Ireland, with the aim of restoring such central authority as had been lost throughout the country during the previous two centuries. Several people who helped establish the Plantations of Ireland also played a part later in the early colonization of North America, particularly a group known as the West Country men. Alternating conciliation and repression, the conquest continued for sixty years, until 1603, when the entire country came under the nominal control of James I. Contents: Introductory The Reign of Henry VII From the Accession of Henry VIII to the Year 1534 The Geraldine Rebellion, 1534-1535 From the Year 1536 to the Year 1540 End of Grey's Administration 1540 and 1541 1541 to the Close of the Reign of Henry VIII The Irish Church under Henry VIII From the Accession of Edward VI to the Year 1551 From the Year 1551 to the Death of Edward VI The Reign of Mary From the Accession of Elizabeth to the Year 1561 1561-1564 1564 and 1565 1566-1570 1570 and 1571 Foreign Intrigues 1571-1574 Administration of Fitzwilliam, 1574 and 1575 Administration of Sidney, 1575-1578 The Irish Church during the First Twenty Years of Elizabeth's Reign Rebellion of James Fitzmaurice, 1579 The Desmond Rebellion, 1579-1580 The Desmond War 1580-1582 Government of Perrott, 1583-1588 The Invincible Armada Administration of Fitzwilliam, 1588-1594 Government of Lord Burgh, 1597 General Rising under Tyrone, 1598-1599 Essex in Ireland, 1599 Government of Mountjoy, 1600-1601 The Spaniards in Munster, 1601-1602 The End of the Reign, 1602-1603 Elizabethan Ireland