History of Belfast
Situated between towering Cave Hill (the
inspiration for Swift’s ‘Gulliver’s Travels’) and the wide,
meandering Lough, Belfast’s distinctive location not only helps
form its open, attractive character but has played a vital part in
enabling it to become one of the world’s great ports.
Although there is evidence of people living in
the Belfast area as far back as the Stone Age, it was only in the
17th century that it began to grow from a small
settlement to an important town. Modern Belfast can be said to date
from 1613, when King James 1 granted a Royal Charter to Sir Arthur
Chichester, incorporating it as a borough. He also permitted the
building of Donegall Quay, where the Lagan and Farset rivers meet
(Belfast gets its name from Béal Feirste, the Gaelic for ‘mouth of
the Farset), thus beginning its development as a port.
Belfast grew steadily during the
18th century, when it was still largely dominated by
Presbyterian merchants, many of whose ancestors had been brought
from Scotland to Ireland during the Plantation of Ulster. It was at
the end of this century that the first great Belfast shipbuilder,
William Ritchie, set up business. It was during the Industrial
Revolution of the 19th century that Belfast’s
astonishing transformation took place, its population growing from
little more than 20,000 at the beginning of the century to over
350,000 by the end. Many thousands, Catholic and Protestant alike,
were drawn from the countryside to work and the city expanded
rapidly. Many linen mills were built, including the world’s largest
in York Street, as Belfast became the world’s leading manufacturer
of fine linen, earning itself the title ‘Linenopolis’.
Belfast became one of the great shipbuilding
ports too, and by the time Harland & Wolff built what was then
the largest and most luxurious ship in the world, RMS
Titanic (whose maiden and final voyage was in 1912),
Belfast led the world in a number of industries, including the
manufacture of tobacco and rope.
The great wealth of Belfast’s industrialists
was reflected in the many magnificent Victorian and Edwardian
buildings you can still see today. Greatest of all is City
Hall, opened in 1906 to celebrate Queen Victoria’s award
of city status to Belfast in 1888.
With its mixed Catholic and Protestant
populations, Belfast bore much of the brunt of the recent Troubles
(1969 to 1996). Reminders of that era can still be seen in the
political murals of areas like the
Protestant Shankill Road and Catholic
Falls Road. But since the peace process kicked in the
transformation of Belfast has been little short of astonishing.
Hundreds of millions of pounds have been invested in new visitor
attractions, hotels, restaurants, bars and clubs to complement the
city’s popular traditional attractions. The influential
Lonely Planet guidebook, which listed Belfast as
one of its top ten ‘Cities on the Rise’, summed the city up best –
‘hip, historical and happening’.
Lonely Planet also recently confirmed Ireland
as the world’s friendliest destination, and the people of Belfast -
warm, genuine, funny and hospitable - are the city’s greatest
visitor attraction. Perhaps it isn’t surprising that Belfast was
voted second most popular city in the
United Kingdom by readers of the Observer and
Guardian papers.