Royal Pomp: Viceregal Celebrations and Hospitaity in Georgian Dublin

During the successive reigns of the Hanoverian kings in England (1714-1830), a total of thirty-seven different viceroys were sent to Ireland as representatives of the British Crown (Table 1). The position of viceroy (also referred to as lord-lieutenant) was awarded as a matter of political exigency, but the viceroy’s role was one of social as much as political significance. The viceroy and his vicereine played the roles of the British monarchs in absentia, and the Protestant minority ruling class, often referred to as the Ascendancy, expected the viceregal court at Dublin Castle to not merely mirror, but to outshine that of St. James’s Palace in London. The standards of hospitality set by the Irish themselves ensured that no incoming lord lieutenant would long be in doubt as to what was expected of him as the chief host of the Irish nation, and, perhaps even more importantly, as the leader of Dublin society.