Alexandria French

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Abstract

A final plea for Irish identity, Geoffrey Keating’s History of Ireland stands as a beacon of cultural remembrance during an era marked by English expansion and deliberate suppression. This paper examines how the section On the Miseries of Ireland transforms the colonial archive from a tool of domination into a site of resistance by asserting Irish identity through historiographical techniques and moral appeals. Drawing on Michel Foucault’s concept of the power and knowledge nexus, the analysis situates Keating’s work within the broader dynamics of the colonial archive. It demonstrates how Keating reframes narratives of suffering into sources of cultural strength. By employing historiographical methods, invoking mythology, and using moral rhetoric, Keating reframes oppression as a catalyst for cultural resilience. In doing so, he subverts dominant power structures and insists upon Ireland’s right to historical self-definition. This paper argues that On the Miseries of Ireland represents a historical and philosophical act of defiance, offering a powerful testament to Irish endurance in the face of colonial erasure.

 

Introduction

     Geoffrey Keating’s History of Ireland emerged from a moment in which the production of history itself was entangled with domination. Under English colonial expansion, history became a tool that justified conquest and shaped the Irish as people without culture, order, or moral coherence. Against this background, Keating produced a narrative that sought to preserve Ireland’s identity at a time when that identity was being systematically displaced. In On the Miseries of Ireland, he captures not only the suffering of his nation but also the resilience that suffering produced. His words read as a plea for remembrance and a declaration that cultural memory belongs to those who insist upon telling it.

     The English colonial administration used Ireland as a testing ground for methods later deployed across the empire. Through language suppression, land seizures, and the criminalisation of Irish cultural practices, colonial authorities sought to dismantle Irish identity at its roots. The official archives reflected this power imbalance. These repositories framed Irish history through foreign eyes and reduced a complex civilisation to stereotypes of barbarism and moral lack.

Keating’s work disrupts this imposed archive. By returning to origin stories, Catholic morality, and vernacular memory, he insists that Irish identity survives not because the state permits it, but because the people protect it. Michel Foucault’s theories of power and knowledge illuminate this dynamic. Foucault argues that knowledge operates as a mechanism of control, since those who define truth also shape how societies remember themselves. Yet power always contains within it the seeds of resistance. The archive is not only a tool of domination. It can also be reclaimed.

     Keating’s writing demonstrates this possibility. This paper examines how On the Miseries of Ireland uses historiographical technique, moral rhetoric, and cultural continuity to transform oppression into a site of resistance. Through this analysis, it argues that Irish identity emerges from Keating’s text not as a fragile remnant of a conquered people, but as a resilient cultural force shaped through remembrance and refusal.

 

II. Historical Context of On the Miseries of Ireland

 

     The seventeenth century marked one of the most profound transformations in Irish history. English expansion intensified through a series of policies that sought not only to rule Ireland but to erase its cultural distinctiveness. Systematic land confiscation, the plantation system, and the imposition of Protestantism were central to this project. These efforts destabilised traditional Irish society by uprooting communities and severing ties to ancestral lands. As Gillespie notes, the plantation system functioned not simply as economic restructuring but as an intentional process of cultural displacement.

     The cultural impact of English rule extended beyond material dispossession. Colonial administrators exercised control over knowledge itself. The official record, written primarily by English observers, portrayed the Irish as inherently disorderly, intellectually backward, and unfit for self-governance. Such narratives justified the need for foreign rule. They also ensured that future generations would encounter a distorted history.

     Historiography became a medium of resistance under such conditions. As oral traditions came under threat, the written word offered one of the few stable means of safeguarding cultural memory. Keating understood this. His role as priest and historian positioned him at the crossroads of spiritual duty and cultural preservation. His History of Ireland arises from a sense of urgency, one grounded in the belief that memory itself was under assault.

     Within On the Miseries of Ireland, Keating chronicles suffering not as a tale of defeat but as a testament to moral and cultural endurance. He combines mythic memory, historical narrative, and Catholic ethical frameworks to reclaim the Irish past from the distortions imposed by English power. Through these techniques, he reinserts dignity into Irish history and counteracts the erasure embedded within the colonial archive.

 

III. Power, Knowledge, and the Archive: A Foucauldian Framework

 

     Michel Foucault’s work provides a productive theoretical frame for understanding Keating’s intervention. Foucault argues that power does not simply operate through force. It is embedded in the production of knowledge, since those who shape discourse also shape reality. The archive, in this sense, is not a neutral storehouse of documents. It is a system that determines which narratives appear authoritative and which are dismissed. [1]

     In colonial contexts, the archive functions as an instrument of domination. English administrators used historical writing, legal records, and ethnographic descriptions to frame the Irish as a people lacking reason, stability, and moral order. These representations shaped how the Irish were governed and justified policies of cultural erasure.

     Foucault also argues that power is never total. Where there is power, there remains the possibility of resistance. A dominated people can reclaim agency by producing counter-narratives that disrupt the truths imposed upon them.

Keating’s work embodies this possibility. His historiography constitutes what Derrida describes as an alternative archival gesture. In Archive Fever, Derrida argues that the archive is driven by a mal d’archive, a sickness and a desire, generated by the fact that preservation always requires consigning some memories to oblivion while elevating others to the status of historical truth. The violence of the colonial archive lies precisely in this dynamic: it preserves English narratives by systematically erasing Irish cultural memory.

Keating’s historiography therefore becomes an archival event that challenges this violence.

[1] : Michel Foucault, The Archaeology of Knowledge, trans. A. M. Sheridan Smith (London, Tavistock Publications, 1972), 129.

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IV. Analysis of On the Miseries of Ireland

 

Mythology as Cultural Anchor

     Keating anchors Irish identity in a mythological past that predates English conquest. His lament for the fading of ancient heroic stories, such as the tales of Finnian, reflects the depth of cultural rupture under colonial rule. He suggests that these once vibrant narratives have thinned almost to nothing, indicating how deeply cultural memory has been eroded.

 

Historical Narrative as Resistance

     Keating’s historiography counters English representations by documenting Irish suffering from within Irish cultural logic rather than from a colonial viewpoint. He describes how Irish chieftains were forced from their ancestral homes and how the land itself seems weighed down under the strain of foreign domination. Through such accounts, he reframes endurance as moral strength rather than evidence of inferiority.

 

Catholic Morality as Unifying Force

     Catholic morality operates throughout Keating’s writing as a source of coherence and hope. When he urges his own heart toward stillness and patience, he provides a spiritual model for his readers. This moral framing transforms suffering from passive victimhood into purposeful trial. The result is a historiography grounded in ethical resilience.

 

Close Reading: Emotional Tension and Rhetorical Force

     Keating expresses a longing to awaken and inspire every part of Ireland, acknowledging the widespread pain of his people. He also admits that he does not expect to witness Ireland’s renewal in his own lifetime, yet he articulates a hope that transcends despair. This blend of aspiration and resignation is central to his rhetorical style and reinforces the theme that cultural survival depends on collective memory.

 

V. Resistance and the Reclamation of Power

 

     Keating’s On the Miseries of Ireland offers a clear example of subverting the colonial archive from within its own textual field. His descriptions of exile, land theft, and cultural loss become instruments of moral indictment. Rather than portraying the Irish as defeated subjects, he shows them as agents of cultural endurance.

     Foucault’s claim that resistance emerges wherever power is exercised becomes visible here. Keating uses the tools the colonial state relied upon, including historical narrative, moral discourse, and textual preservation, to challenge the narrative of Irish inferiority. His work transforms suffering into evidence of injustice and into a call for unity.

     The significance of Keating’s text lies not only in its historical detail but in its ethical vision. His writing reframes the Irish past so that cultural identity is sustained through remembrance rather than erasure. The archive, in his hands, becomes a battleground rather than a graveyard.

 

VI. Methodological Reflection

 

     This analysis demonstrates that vernacular texts can function as ethical documents that preserve moral reasoning alongside historical detail. Reading On the Miseries of Ireland as an intervention in the ethics of memory reveals how communities articulate values through narrative. This approach, which blends folklore studies with archival theory and philosophy, aligns with current interdisciplinary methods in cultural memory and provides a bridge to studying silenced or marginalised traditions more broadly.

     A comparative perspective illuminates this further. Keating’s use of mythology and moral symbolism parallels narrative strategies found among Scottish Traveller storytellers, who similarly invoke mythic ancestors to reinforce cultural identity during periods of marginalisation. This comparison highlights a wider Celtic pattern in which oral or vernacular traditions function as counter-archives. It also demonstrates the methodological readiness required for advanced work in Celtic ethnology and folklore.

 

VII. Conclusion

 

     Geoffrey Keating’s On the Miseries of Ireland transforms the colonial archive from a repository of domination into a space of resistance. By reframing Irish suffering as meaningful and morally charged, Keating counters the erasure imposed by colonial narratives. His integration of mythology, historical detail, and Catholic morality produces a historiography that strengthens cultural identity rather than records its disappearance.

     Keating’s work demonstrates that historiography can be a powerful tool for resisting oppression. Through narrative reclamation, he asserts the dignity and resilience of the Irish people. The text stands as a continuing reminder that identity can survive even the most determined attempts at silence.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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