About County Tipperary
County Tipperary is the largest inland county in Ireland, its fertile Golden Vale and river valleys making it one of the most agriculturally productive areas in the country. The county has always been proud, it calls itself the Premier County, and its history of resistance, from the Desmond Rebellions to the Land War, reflects a deep unwillingness to accept injustice quietly.
History
The Rock of Cashel, rising dramatically from the Tipperary plain, was the seat of the kings of Munster for centuries before it was given to the Church. The county was heavily contested during the Cromwellian wars and the subsequent land confiscations. Tipperary was a hotbed of agrarian agitation throughout the 19th century, its secret societies, the Whiteboys and Ribbonmen, terrorising landlords in response to evictions.
How Tipperary families left Ireland
Tipperary families emigrated through the ports of Waterford, Cobh and Limerick. The county had a particularly strong connection to the United States through the Fenian movement, many of the Irish-American revolutionaries who funded and organised resistance to British rule had Tipperary roots.
Places worth visiting in County Tipperary
- Rock of Cashel, one of Ireland's most iconic sites, its cluster of medieval buildings rising from the plain
- Cahir Castle, the largest castle in Ireland, almost perfectly preserved on an island in the River Suir
- Holy Cross Abbey, the restored Cistercian monastery on the banks of the Suir, a pilgrimage site since medieval times
- Glen of Aherlow, the beautiful wooded valley between the Galtee Mountains and Slievenamuck ridge
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