Limerick once ran its own soviet, printing money for twelve days
In April 1919 striking workers in Limerick printed their own currency, fixed food prices and published newspapers, declaring a soviet against British military rule. It was one chapter in a long, stormy story for a city founded by Vikings in 812, besieged by Cromwell and nicknamed after a treaty stone.
Limerick sits where the River Shannon widens into its estuary on the way to the Atlantic, in the province of Munster in western Ireland. Its old core stands on King's Island, ringed by the Shannon and the Abbey River, and the rich pastures of the Golden Vale lie to the south. The 2022 census counted 102,287 people in the urban area, making it Ireland's third-largest urban area after Dublin and Cork. Viking sources called the place Hlymrekr.
The official founding date is 812, when Scandinavian raiders sailed up the Shannon, though Ptolemy's map of about 150 AD already marks a place called Regia on the same spot, and Saint Patrick is recorded visiting in 434. Limerick later sat at the heart of the Kingdom of Thomond, whose kings included Brian Boru; the name survives in Thomond Bridge and Thomond Park. The Normans reshaped the town in the 12th century, adding King John's Castle and St Mary's Cathedral, and its first charter dates from 1197.
The 17th century brought sieges by Oliver Cromwell in 1651 and twice by Williamite forces in the 1690s. When the fighting between Jacobites and Williamites closed, the Treaty of Limerick came with promises of tolerance for Catholics, but the Protestant Irish Parliament refused to ratify those clauses and tightened the Penal Laws instead. The treaty was reputedly signed on a limestone block once used for mounting horses, now on a pedestal at Clancy Strand, which is why Limerick is called the Treaty City. Its motto boasts of an ancient city skilled in war.
Calmer times in the late 18th century turned the port into a major exporter of Golden Vale produce and filled the centre with Georgian terraces. The 20th century was harder, with industries closing, but Shannon Airport opened nearby in 1942 and the Shannon Free Zone followed in 1959, drawing multinationals. NIHE Limerick, founded in 1969, became the University of Limerick in 1989, and in 2024 the city became the first in Ireland with a directly elected mayor.
Source: Limerick
