<P> The 1614 overthrow of the Catholic majority in the Irish Parliament was realised principally through the creation of numerous new boroughs which were dominated by the new settlers . By the end of the seventeenth century, recusants (adherents to the older religion were now termed), representing some 85% of Ireland's population, were then banned from the Irish Parliament . Protestant domination of Ireland was confirmed after two periods of war between Catholics and Protestants in 1641 - 52 and 1689 - 91 . Political power thereafter rested entirely in the hands of a Protestant Ascendancy minority, while Catholics and members of dissenting Protestant denominations suffered severe political and economic privations under the Penal Laws . The Irish Parliament was abolished from 1 January 1801 in the wake of the republican United Irishmen Rebellion and Ireland became an integral part of a new United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland under the provisions of the Acts of Union 1800 . Although promised a repeal of the Test Act, Catholics were not granted full rights until Catholic Emancipation was attained throughout the new UK in 1829 . This was followed by the first Irish Reform Act 1832, a principal condition of which was the removal of the poorer Irish freeholders from the franchise . </P> <P> The Irish Parliamentary Party strove from the 1880s to attain Home Rule through the parliamentary constitutional movement, eventually winning the Home Rule Act 1914, although this Act was suspended at the outbreak of World War I . The Easter Rising staged by republicans two years later brought physical force republicanism back to the forefront of Irish politics . </P> <P> In 1922, after the Irish War of Independence and the Anglo - Irish Treaty, most of Ireland seceded from the United Kingdom to become the independent Irish Free State, which after the 1937 constitution, began to call itself Ireland . The six northeastern counties, known as Northern Ireland, remained within the United Kingdom . The Irish Civil War followed soon after the War of Independence . The history of Northern Ireland has since been dominated by sporadic sectarian conflict between (mainly Catholic) Irish nationalists and (mainly Protestant) unionists . This conflict erupted into the Troubles in the late 1960s, until peace was achieved with the Belfast Agreement thirty years later . </P> <P> What is known of pre-Christian Ireland comes from references in Roman writings, Irish poetry and myth, and archaeology . While some possible Paleolithic tools have been found, none of the finds are convincing of Paleolithic settlement in Ireland . However a bear bone found in Alice and Gwendoline Cave, County Clare, in 1903 may push back dates for the earliest human settlement of Ireland to 10,500 BC . The bone shows clear signs of cut marks with stone tools, and has been radiocarbon dated to 12,500 years ago . </P>

When did ireland gain independence and establish a unified government