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The Great Famine, also known as the Great Hunger (Irish: an Gorta Mór [ənˠ ˈɡɔɾˠt̪ˠə ˈmˠoːɾˠ]), the Famine and the Irish Potato Famine, [1] [2] was a period of mass starvation and disease in Ireland lasting from 1845 to 1852 that constituted a historical social crisis and had a major impact on Irish society and history as a whole. [3]
The famine of 1740–1741 is different from the Great Famine of the 19th century. By the mid-19th century, potatoes made up a greater portion of Irish diets, with adverse consequences when the crop failed, causing famine from 1845 to 1852. The Great Famine differed by "cause, scale and timing" from the Irish Famine of 1740–1741.
Famine memorial in Ballingeary, County Cork Ballingeary famine soup-pot Ballingeary famine plaque. Souperism was a phenomenon of the Irish Great Famine.Protestant Bible societies set up schools in which starving children were fed, on the condition of receiving Protestant religious instruction at the same time.
The Great Famine (1845–1849) was a watershed in the history of Ireland. [4] Its effects permanently changed the island's demographic, political and cultural landscape. For both the native Irish and those in the resulting diaspora, the famine entered folk memory [5] and became a rallying point for various nationalist movements.
The effect of the crisis on Ireland is incomparable to all other places, causing one million deaths, [4] up to two million refugees, and spurring a century-long population decline. Excluding Ireland, the death toll from the crisis is estimated to be in the region of 100,000 people.
On the eve of the Great Famine the population of Ireland had risen to 8 million, most people living on ever-smaller farms and depending on the potato as a staple diet. By the 1840s, many farms had become so small that the only food source that could be grown in sufficient quantity to feed a family was potatoes.
The already weak harvests of the north suffered, and a seven-year famine ensued. In the years 1315 to 1317, a catastrophic famine, known as the Great Famine, struck much of North West Europe. It was arguably the worst in European history, perhaps reducing the population by more than 10%. [16]
The Great Famine of 1315–1317 (occasionally dated 1315–1322) was the first of a series of large-scale crises that struck parts of Europe early in the 14th century. Most of Europe (extending east to Poland and south to the Alps) was affected. [ 1 ]