Athlone Carlow Carrick-on-Shannon Cavan Clare County Clifden Connemara Cork Cork County Dingle Donegal Donegal County Dublin Dundalk Ennis Galway Galway County Kells Kenmare Kerry County Kildare County Kilkenny Killarney Kinsale Leitrim County Letterkenny Limerick Mayo County Offaly County Portlaoise Roscommon Roscommon County Rosslare Shannon Sligo Tipperary Tipperary County Tralee Waterford Westport (Ireland) Wexford Wexford County Wicklow

Check-In 01 02 03 04 05 06 07 08 09 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 01 02 03 04 05 06 07 08 09 10 11 12

Check-Out 01 02 03 04 05 06 07 08 09 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 01 02 03 04 05 06 07 08 09 10 11 12

The culture of the people living on the island of Ireland is far from monolithic. Many notable cultural divides exist between the rural people and city dwellers, between the Catholic and Protestant people of Northern Ireland, between the Irish-speaking people inside and outside the Gaeltacht regions and the English-speaking majority population, and increasingly between new immigrants and the native population.

The two dominant languages in Ireland have long influenced each other, with the local English dialect adopting aspects of the Irish grammatical structure, and in turn, Irish drawing much vocabulary from the foreign tongue.

Several other languages are spoken on the island, including Ulster Scots, a variety of Scots spoken in Ulster, and Shelta, a mixture of Irish, Romany and English, spoken widely by the Travellers.
Some other languages have entered Ireland with immigrants – for example, Polish is now the third most widely spoken language in Ireland, followed by Chinese.
In Limerick City about one in twenty people is Russian-speaking.

* Irish language
* Irish Sign Language
* Hiberno-English
* Northern Ireland Sign Language
* Ulster Scots language
* Shelta language.

Farming and rural tradition 

As archaeological evidence from sites such as the Céide Fields in County Mayo and Lough Gur in County Limerick demonstrates, farming in Ireland is an activity that goes back to the very beginnings of human settlement.
In historic times, texts such as the Táin Bó Cúailinge show a society in which cattle represented a primary source of wealth and status.

Little of this had changed by the time of the Norman conquest of Ireland in the 12th century. Giraldus Cambrensis portrays a Gaelic society in which cattle farming and transhumance is the norm.

Three hundred years later, the society depicted in Edmund Spenser's A View of the Present State of Ireland had changed remarkably little. Even today, when a quarter of the population of the Republic lives in Dublin, the cattle population is of the order of 6.7 million.

Townlands, villages, parishes and counties.

The Normans also introduced the manorial system of land tenure and social organisation. This led to the imposition of the village and parish over the native system of townlands.
In general, a parish was a civil and religious unit with a manor, a village and a church at its centre. Each parish incorporated one or more existing townlands into its boundaries.
With the full extension of English feudalism over the island, the Irish county structure came into existence.
These structures are still of vital importance in the daily life of Irish communities. Apart from the religious significance of the parish, most rural postal addresses consist of house and townsland names.
The village and parish are key focal points around which sporting rivalries and other forms of local identity are built and most people feel a strong sense of loyalty to their native county, a loyalty which also often has its clearest expression on the sports field.

Land ownership and land hunger. 

With the Elizabethan English conquest, the Cromwellian conquest of Ireland, and the organised plantations of English and Scottish settlers, the patterns of land ownership in Ireland were altered greatly.
The old order of transhumance and open range cattle breeding died out to be replaced by a structure of great landed estates, small tenant farmers with more or less precarious hold on their leases, and a mass of landless labourers.
This situation continued up to the end of the 19th century, when the agitation of the Land League began to bring about land reform.

In this process of reform, the former tenants and labourers became land owners, with the great estates being broken up into small and medium sized farms and smallholdings. The process continued well into the 20th century with the work of the Irish Land Commission.

This contrasted with Britain, where many of the big estates were left intact. One consequence of this is the widely recognised cultural phenomenon of "land hunger" amongst the new class of farmer.

In general, this means that farming families will do almost anything to retain land ownership within the family unit, with the greatest ambition possible being the acquisition of additional land. Another is that hillwalkers in Ireland today are more constrained than their counterparts in Britain, as it is more difficult to agree rights of way with so many small farmers involved on a given route, rather than with just one landowner. 

Family Life 

The Constitution of Ireland guarantees the rights of the family and the institution of marriage. However, the reality is that social and economic change in recent years has brought about significant changes in family life in the Republic.

According to figures published in September, 2004, 31% of all births in the Republic of Ireland occur outside marriage. This compares with 5% in 1980.
The average age of mothers having their first child was 30 and the fertility rate is an average of 1.98 children.

In the Republic, divorce became legal on 27 February 1997. The 2002 Census of Population showed that the number of divorced people in the state stood at 35,100, compared with 9,800 in 1996.

The number of separated people, including divorces, increased from 87,800 in 1996 to 133,800 in 2002. Cohabiting couples made up 8.4% of all family units in 2002 compared with 3.9% in 1996. 

Holidays and festivals

Much of the Irish calendar still today reflects the old pagan customs, with later Christian traditions also having significant influence. As in other countries, the date for observing Christmas was deliberately chosen to coincide with the winter solstice. Christmas in Ireland has several local traditions, some in no way connected with Christianity.

On 26 December (St. Stephen's Day), there is a custom of "Wrenboys" who call door to door with an arrangement of assorted material (which changes in different localities) to represent a dead wren "caught in the furze", as their rhyme goes. Brigid's Day (1 February, known as Imbolc or Candlemas) also does not have its origins in Christianity, being instead another religious observance superimposed at the beginning of spring.

The Brigid's cross made from rushes on this day represents a pre-Christian solar wheel. Other pre-Christian festivals, whose names survive as Irish month names, are Bealtaine (May), Lúnasa (August) and Samhain (November). The last is still widely observed as Halloween, followed by All Saints' Day, another Christian holiday associated with a traditional one.

Important church holidays include Easter, and various Marian observances. The national holiday in the Republic is Saint Patrick's Day, 17 March and is marked by parades and festivals in cities and towns. The Twelfth of July, which commemorates William III's victory at the Battle of the Boyne and the beginning of the Protestant Ascendancy, is celebrated by many Protestants throughout Northern Ireland. 

Cultural institutions, organisations and events 

Ireland is well supplied with museums and art galleries and offers, especially during the summer months, a wide range of cultural events.
These range from arts festivals to farming events.

The most popular of these are the annual Dublin Saint Patrick's Day Festival which attracts on average 500,000 people and the National Ploughing Championships with an attendance in the region of 400,000.
There are also a number of Summer Schools on topics from traditional music to literature and the arts. 

Religion 

In the Republic, the last time a census asked people to specify their religion was 2002.
The result was 88.4% Roman Catholic, 2.95% Church of Ireland (Anglican), 0.53% Presbyterian, 0.26% Methodist, less than 0.05% Jewish, approximately 2.3% other religious groupings (mainly Islam) and 3.53% ticked the "no religion" box.

About 2% failed to answer. In Northern Ireland in 2001, the population was 40.3% Roman Catholic, 20.7% Presbyterian, 15.3% Church of Ireland (Anglican), 3.5% Methodist, 6.1% other Christian, 0.3% other religion and philosophy, and 13.9% religion not stated.

Amongst the Republic's Roman Catholics, weekly church attendance dropped from 87% in 1981 to 60% in 1998, though this remained one of the highest attendance rates in Europe.

Food in early Ireland

The worldwide famous pint of Guinness along with a slice of wheaten bread The worldwide famous pint of Guinness along with a slice of wheaten bread There are many references to food and drink in early Irish literature.

Honey seems to have been widely eaten and used in the making of mead. The old stories also contain many references to banquets, although these may well be greatly exaggerated and provide little insight into everyday diet.

There are also many references to fulachtaí fia, which are archaeological sites commonly believed to have once been used for cooking venison. The fulachtaí fia have holes or troughs in the ground which can be filled with water. Meat can then be cooked by placing hot stones in the trough until the water boils.

Many fulachtaí fia sites have been identified across the island of Ireland, and some of them appear to have been in use up to the 17th century.
Excavations at the Viking settlement in the Wood Quay area of Dublin have produced a significant amount of information on the diet of the inhabitants of the town.

The main animals eaten were cattle, sheep and pigs, with pigs being the most common. This popularity extended down to modern times in Ireland.
Poultry and wild geese as well as fish and shellfish were also common, as were a wide range of native berries and nuts, especially hazel.
The seeds of knotgrass and goosefoot were widely present and may have been used to make a porridge. 

Pub culture

Pub culture, as it is termed, pervades Irish society, across all cultural divides.
The term refers to the Irish habit of frequenting public houses (pubs) or bars. Traditional pub culture is concerned with more than just drinking, even though Ireland has a recognized problem with over-consumption of alcohol, with the third-highest alcohol consumption in the world according to the OECD Health Data 2005 survey. Per capita alcohol consumption increased by 41% in the period 1989 to 1999.

Typically pubs are important meeting places, where people can gather and meet their neighbours and friends in a relaxed atmosphere. Pubs vary widely according to the clientele they serve, and the area they are in. Best known, and loved amongst tourists is the traditional pub, with its traditional Irish music (or "trad music"), tavern-like warmness, and memorabilia filling it. Often such pubs will also serve food, particularly during the day.

Many more modern pubs, not necessarily traditional, still emulate these pubs, only perhaps substituting traditional music for a DJ or non-traditional live music. Some larger pubs in cities eschew such trappings entirely, opting for loud music, and focusing more on the consumption of drinks. Such venues are popular "pre-clubbing" locations.

"Clubbing" has become a popular phenomenon amongst young people in Ireland. Clubs usually vary in terms of the type of music played, and the target audience. The immigrant population in many cases, has not adapted to the Irish pub & club culture, particularly in city areas, where drinking to excess is often the focus of pub and club-goers.

A significant recent change to pub culture in the Republic of Ireland has been the introduction of a smoking ban, in all workplaces, which includes pubs and restaurants. The ban was introduced on March 29, 2004.

A majority of the population support the ban, including a significant percentage of smokers. Nevertheless, the atmosphere in pubs has changed greatly as a result, and debate continues on whether it has boosted or lowered sales, although this is often blamed on the ever-increasing prices, or whether it is a "good thing" or a "bad thing".
A similar ban, under the Smoking (Northern Ireland) Order 2006 came into effect in Northern Ireland on the 30th of April, 2007. 

Sport

Sport in Ireland is popular and widespread. Levels of participation and spectating are high, but as in the western world participation has been dropping due to the increasing popularity of other activities such as watching television and playing computer games.

Throughout the country a wide variety of sports are played, the most popular being Gaelic football, hurling, rugby union, soccer and hockey.

By attendance figures Gaelic football is by far the most popular sport in Ireland. In Ireland many sports, such as rugby union, Gaelic football and hurling, are organised in an all-island basis, with a single team representing Ireland in international competitions.

Other sports, such as soccer, have separate organising bodies in Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland. At the Olympics, a person from Northern Ireland can choose to represent either the Great Britain and Northern Ireland team or the Ireland team.

* Community Games
* Gaelic Athletic Association
* Irish Derby Stakes
* Irish Rugby Football Union
* NI football team
* RoI football team