The Liberties is one of the most long-established areas in Dublin, having first been mentioned as far back
as the thirteenth century. The name derives from the various jurisdictions, or liberties, which lay outside
the city walls and, despite remaining united to the city, retained their own administration and authority.
The area was protected by several gateways which, acting in place of an outer town wall, blocked access
to the city at night and in dangerous times. One such gateway, St. James, later became home to the
Guinness Brewery.
In the sixteenth century, the two most important of these jurisdictions, the Liberty of St Sepulchre and
the Liberty of Thomas Court and Donore, were granted to the Archbishop of Dublin and the Earls of
Meath respectively by King Henry VIII. St. Sepulchre, the Archbishops palace, stood beside St. Patrick’s
Cathedral, while the Earl of Meaths authority stretched to the Coombe: these places bound the Liberties
to this day. The King of England granted the district rulers’ special privileges, such as the rights to
execute justice and impose levies, in return for their support, and this continued until the 1840s.
The late seventeenth century saw the first major changes in the Liberties. Both French Huguenots,
fleeing the persecution of Louis XIV, and English immigrants settled in the Coombe, quickly establishing
themselves in the area. The Huguenots developed their tanning, milling and weaving skills, while
the English were experts at wool manufacture. The combination soon led to a thriving silk and cloth
industry, with thousands employed around the Coombe, in Pimlico and in the Blackpitts. The Huguenots
became quite prosperous as a result, building a Weaver's Hall on Cork Street. This acted as a local hub
for the industry, with a strong community forming around it and many streets, such as Cook St and the
Cornmarket, taking on specialized roles to suit its needs.
The British government didn't make things easy for the weavers. Heavy taxes were applied to Irish wool
exports, while the 1699 Wool Act prevented its export altogether, seriously dampening fortunes in
the Liberties and creating poverty from which the area would never really recover. There was a brief
resurgence of the industry in the eighteenth century, but, by then, the Liberties was in a state of abject
poverty, described as a place of “depraved morals, deplorable sickness and a magazine of fury” by
Dublin Castle authorities.
By the early nineteenth century, there were 18-22,000 people dependant on the weaving industry. One
major development was the opening of the Stove Tenter House on Cork St in October 1815, which had
a specially-designed heating system to allow weavers to dry their materials. It became one of the most
popular and successful institutions in the area but closed in 1855, re-opening six years later as a refuge
for homeless women and children. There were over 700 admittances every week, so this was clearly
badly-needed.
Poverty in the area had reached a critical point by that stage. The already-poor classes of the Liberties
were sorely hit by the Famine, with the many tenements and slums built during the era, especially
around Marrowbone Lane and Chambers Street, quickly reaching appalling levels of sickness and grime.
Various charities and missionaries, especially the Sisters of Mercy, stepped in to help, building shelters
and homes where the James Weir Trust and the Brú Chaomhín Nursing Home stand on Cork Street
today. Some local employers, particularly Guinness, provided accommodation and medical assistance
to employees. The nationalist revolutions which gripped the country during this time also affected
the Liberties. Robert Emmet , leader of the failed 1803 rebellion, was executed outside St Catherine’s
Church on Thomas Street, while, in the later 1916 Rising, fighting took place at the Jacob's Factory (now
DIT) and outposts like the Mendacity Institute.
The twentieth century saw attempts by various groups, especially Dublin City Council and the Iveagh
Trust, to alleviate the terrible slum poverty in the area. Developments like the Oliver Bond Flats, built in
the 1930s, and the Fatima Mansions, built in the 1950s, aimed to re-house those living in the tenements
and provide them with a higher standard of living, but they soon developed a reputation for crime and,
from the late 1970s onwards, serious drug and violence problems. The street trading and open markets
which had thrived in the area, including the Meath St. and Liberties markets, began to decline when
nearby suburban developments in Crumlin and Tallaght became increasingly popular from the 1980s
onwards. This only added to the hardship in the area.
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