Twenty-six counties kept the name Ireland after 1937
Ireland—also the Republic of Ireland—holds 26 of the island’s 32 counties and about 5.4 million people, with Dublin topping 1.5 million on the east coast. The Irish Free State of 1922 became a constitutional “Ireland” in 1937 and a confirmed republic in practice thereafter.
Both Ireland and Éire trace back to Old Irish Ériu, from a Proto-Celtic word for fertile soil, the root also behind the Latin Hibernia. The 1948 Republic of Ireland Act described the state as a republic without renaming it, to avoid clashing with the constitution, and Britain called it Eire until it adopted “Ireland” after the 1998 Good Friday Agreement.
During the Great Famine of 1845 to 1849 the island lost 30 percent of its more than eight million people, a million to hunger and disease and 1.5 million to emigration. Parnell’s Irish Parliamentary Party pressed land reform and Home Rule, and a Third Home Rule Act passed in 1914 but was suspended for the war. The Easter Rising of 24 April 1916 ended after a week, and fifteen prisoners, among them Patrick Pearse, were executed.
After Sinn Féin won 73 of 105 seats in 1918, its members formed Dáil Éireann in January 1919 and declared independence. Griffith and Collins led the delegation that negotiated the Anglo-Irish Treaty in London in late 1921, ratified by 64 votes to 57, and Northern Ireland left the new dominion two days after its creation in December 1922.
A 2024 inequality-adjusted HDI placed quality of life sixth globally. The 2024 Global Peace Index ranked it the second most peaceful country. EU membership, Council of Europe and OECD founding roles, and long military non-alignment keep the state outside NATO. Éire and Ireland share equal constitutional billing in Irish and English. It ranks among the world’s five richest countries by GDP and GNI per capita, and growth between 1995 and 2007 earned the label Celtic Tiger.
Source: Republic of Ireland
