These ten thematic essays examine the three Irish wars of the seventeenth-century in relation to each other, thereby yielding important comparative insights. The military potential of England and, later, an emergent Britain, was immeasurably greater than that of Irish Catholics. John McGurk, James Scott Wheeler and Paul Kerrigan evaluate the logistical and naval strategies exploiting this advantage.
Such was the disparity that an effective Irish military response to conquest and colonisation was only feasible in the favourable archipelagic and continental European circumstances explored by John Young and Tadhg O hAnnrachain. Defeat or victory ultimately depended on relative military performance in manoeuvre, battle and siege, operations evaluated by Padraig Lenihan, Donal O'Carroll and James Burke. Bernadette Whelan examines the role of women as victim, survivor and, occasionally, combatant. ‘You cannot carry fire in a sack’, Raymond Gillespie notes the impact of war, especially on urban Ireland.