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Sean Leahy, who conducts regular guided tours of the building (admission is free to the public) was on hand to recount the story of this fascinating architectural masterpiece and to point to its many interesting features.

The Irish Houses of Parliament was the world's first purpose-built two-chamber parliament house.   It served as the seat of both chambers (the Irish House of Lords and Irish House of Commons) of the Irish Parliament of the Kingdom of Ireland for most of the eighteenth century until that parliament was abolished in the Act of Union 1800 in 1800 when the island became part of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland.

In the 17th century, parliament had settled in Chichester House, a mansion in Hoggen Green (later renamed College Green) that had been owned by Sir George Carew, President of Munster and Lord High Treasurer of Ireland, and which had been built on the site of a nunnery disbanded by King Henry VIII of England.   Carew's house, (later renamed Chichester House after a later owner Sir Arthur Chichester) was already a building of sufficient importance to have become a temporary home of the Kingdom of Ireland's law courts during the Michaelmas law term in 1605.   Most famously, the legal documentation facilitating the Plantation of Ulster had been signed in the house on 16 November 1612 The House was in a dilapidated state, allegedly haunted and unfit for parliamentary use.   In 1727 parliament voted to spend £6,000 on a new parliament building on the site.   It was to be the first purpose-built two chamber parliament building in the world.

The design of this radical new Irish parliamentary building was entrusted to a talented young architect, Edward Lovett Pearce, who was himself a Member of Parliament and a protègè of the Speaker of the House of Commons, William Connolly of Castletown House Pearce's design for the new Irish Houses of Parliament was revolutionary.   The building was effectively semi-circular in shape, occupying nearly an Acre and a half of ground.   The principal entrance consisted of a colonnade of Ionic order columns extending around three sides of the entrance quadrangle, forming a letter 'E'.   Three statues, representing Hibernia, Fidelity and Commerce stood above the portico.   Over the main entrance, the royal coat of arms were cut in stone.   

Pearce died at a young age and when it came to extending the building the contract was awarded to the renowned architect James Gandon, who was responsible for three of Dublin's finest buildings, The Custom House, the Four Courts and the King's Inns.   He added a new peers' entrance onto Westmoreland Street between 1785 and 1789.    The uniqueness of the House of Lords made it one of Dublin's most highly regarded buildings, more highly regarded than its membership, some of whom were chosen from Rotten borough and all of whom represented the Church of Ireland Anglo-Irish ascendancy in Ireland, not the vast majority of Irish people.   In addition, it had little control of the Irish government, which was in fact a British government under a British Lord Lieutenant of Ireland .    Following 1800 the Houses of Parliament was used for a variety of purposes; as a militant garrison and an art gallery.   In 1803 the fledgling Bank of Ireland bought the building from the British government for £40,000 for use as its headquarters.   One proviso is stipulated; it must be so adapted that it never could be used as a parliament again.   As a result, the only recently rebuilt House of Commons chamber, though one of Dublin's finest locations, was broken up to form a number of small offices but primarily replaced by a magnificent cash office added by the architect employed to oversee the conversion, Francis Johnston, then the most prominent architect working in Ireland.   However contrary to the stipulation, the House of Lords chamber survived almost unscathed.   It was used as the board room for the bank until in the 1970s the Bank of Ireland moved its headquarters to Baggot Street.   

The Bank of Ireland bought the Mace at a sale in Christies in London in 1937.   The Chair of the Speaker of the House of Commons is now in the possession of the Royal Dublin Society, while a bench from the Commons is in the Royal Irish Academy.   The original two tapestries have remained in the House of Lords.   The Chandelier of the House of Commons now hangs in the Examination Hall of Trinity College Dublin.   The Woolsack, on which the Lord Chancellor of Ireland sat when chairing sessions of the House of Lords, is now back in location in the chamber on display.   And so we return to King Billy.   The tapestries in the House of Lords are the originals, designed for the space and dating from circa 1733.   One represents the "Glorious Battle of the Boyne" and the other the "Glorious Defence of Londonderry".   Each of the tapestries has five portrait and narrative medallions around the central scene which depict, narrate and name central characters and events in each of the battles.   The tapestries were the brainchild of Robert Baillie who "in 1727 presented a petition offering his services to perpetuate the late revolution by preparing suits of tapestries for the proposed New Parliament House".   It is thought that the designer of the tapestries was the Dutch landscape painter William Van der Hagen (born circa 1720 - died 1745).   The weaver is thought to be the well-known John Van Beaver, most famous for inscribing a tapestry he wove for Weavers Hall in the Coombe.   In the "Boyne" tapestry King Billy sits on a brown horse which is probably more accurate than the white charger which is his mount in other paintings.   "They don"t breed white horses in The Netherlands" explained Sean.

After thanks were expressed on our behalf by Robert Prole, the C.A.R.   members adjourned to Avoca restaurant for an informal and most pleasant lunch.

F.C.