ABSTRACT
The 'British' Revolution of the seventeenth century and the French Revolution of the eighteenth century, which are often regarded as social revolutions, failed to transform the proprietary class of those countries. Whereas this revolution in land tenure had its genesis in the Cromwellian period it came to fruition in the Restoration period. Consequently the decades of the Cromwellian and Restoration land disruption are difficult to narrate and have long been the subject of controversy. In the late Restoration period J. H. Andrews hypothesised that the Catholics emerged from the revolutionary period with less than a third of the 'good land of Ireland'. In 1641, Tristram Beresford held a total of 5,980 acres in the County of Londonderry of which 753 was leased from the church. By the mid-Restoration period he not only amassed an estate of 14,526 acres, which he achieved by the purchase of debentures, but he also obtained a knighthood from the king.
