View a page

Two Centuries of Life in Down

1600-1800

John Stevenson

A fascinating and highly entertaining excursion into the County Down of several centuries ago.

Using a wealth of contemporary letters, journals, maps and diaries, and an inspired combination of empathy and imagination, Stevenson brings this forgotten world brilliantly to life, familiarising us with its customs, tastes and values, and subtly drawing the reader into the lives of a wide variety of its people, from the drunken Viscount, to the farmer facing eviction and the clergyman with twenty-five children.

Stevenson's scope is encyclopedic. No topic is beneath him, and he is as happy discussing fashion, travel, witchcraft and folk cures, as the Kirk, public morals or the dangers of reading Milton. The result is something of a tour de force, a book of vast range and daring, and one of the great landmarks of literary County Down.

Book Details

ISBN 1 870132 30 0

Paperback 512 pages, 34 illustrations

Book Reviews

'No dry-as-dust academic work this, but a wonderful source for local historians and a marvellous read for anyone who is interested in County Down' Belfast News Letter

"One of the province's finest local history collections... Stevenson expressed the hope that, for the reader, "the hands will go back on the dial of time and he will again see the old people of Down." As far as this reader is concerned, he succeeded." Belfast Telegraph

Other local history titles

• Portavo: an Irish Townland and its peoples Part one: earliest times - 1844
• Portavo: an Irish Townland and its peoples Part two: the famine to the present
• Newtown A History of Newtownards
• The Most Unpretending of Places A History of Dundonald, County Down
• A Taste of Old Comber The Town & its History
• Donaghadee: An Illustrated History
• Yes, Matron