What was life like for Irish Protestants between the mid-seventeenth and the late-eighteenth centuries? In an account filled with entertaining episodes and memorable characters, Toby Barnard scrutinizes social attitudes and structures in every segment of Protestant society during this period and also reassesses Ireland's place in the British state and empire. "Toby Barnard, unparalleled excavator of Irish social history in the late seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries, has published the first volume of his magnum opus investigating the origins of this vanishing world, demonstrating its vitality, quirks and variations as never before."?Ray Foster, Financial Times "Elegant, amusing, engaging, and exceedingly informative."?Homan Potterton, Irish Times