Mary’s endeavours to restore Catholicism in England have attracted much scholarly attention and not a little controversy, primarily because of her bloody response to the scale and persistence of the Protestant challenge she faced there. Her endeavours in Ireland, by contrast, have been relatively overlooked. Yet the Marian restoration in Ireland ought to be recognised as an integral part of Mary’s religious programme for her dominions. It offers interesting points of comparison for the implementation of the queen’s programme in England, and it was significant in its own right, not as a decisive watershed but, as a time when religious controversies were crystallised and definite decisions were made that proved significant in the subsequent survival of Catholicism as the religion of the people of Ireland.
