Six thousand years ago, Neolithic farmers landed on the west coast of Ireland… and the human story of large-scale community settlement began. Over millennia, they carved out a life against wet Atlantic winds, based in agriculture that shaped hundreds of generations of West of Ireland families.

Following the long, bloody invasion by England, Ireland would finally became Britain’s first colony — the proving ground for policies of conquest, control, and dispossession that would later be exported across the globe. The legacies of empire, shaping today’s conflicts in Ukraine, the Middle East, and beyond, were first tested here. And no place bore that impact more sharply than the West of Ireland.

Here, where the Atlantic Ocean meets the edge of Europe, poverty, famine, and emigration forged a people whose resilience became the backbone of Irish identity. The rugged landscapes preserved Gaelic culture and language, creating a distinct way of life that resisted assimilation and inspired global movements.

To understand the forces shaping our world today, we must return to where they began. In the West of Ireland — in the memories, the struggles, and the records of its people.