ABSTRACT
As Michael Laffan has noted, 'there was widespread bewilderment and even dismay' amongst many of the inhabitants of Dublin in particular, especially from those outraged at its negative implications for the prospect of obtaining Home Rule after the war on the continent was over. In the years that that immediately preceded the Rising, the Irish political climate changed profoundly, due in no small part to the militarisation of nationalist and unionist politics and the concurrent Home Rule crisis. Irish Home Rule, as Roy Jenkins has noted, 'was the dominating domestic political issue of the period'. Set within the broader international context, the direction of Irish history in the lead-up to the Rising was significantly distorted by the events of the Great War, with Britain at conflict with Germany.
