The treaty makers, 6 December 1921. From left to right: Arthur Griffith, Éamonn Duggan, Michael Collins, Robert Barton; standing, George Gavan Duffy
In Ireland it is called ‘The Treaty’. Signed on 6 December 1921, the ‘articles of agreement’ between Great Britain and Ireland is probably the most important and certainly the most controversial document in twentieth-century Irish history.
In providing for the establishment of an Irish Free State, that would, like Canada, have dominion status within the British empire, the treaty ensured that the Irish War of Independence (1919–21) did not resume. By not providing for the establishment of an Irish republic, it became the matter at stake during the Irish Civil War (1922–23).
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