Irish inventions and discoveries are objects, processes or techniques which owe their existence either partially or entirely to an Irish person. Often, things which are discovered for the first time, are also called "inventions", and in many cases, there is no clear line between the two. Below is a list of such inventions.

Pre-history

* Ogham alphabet. *Iomániocht (Scuaib/Camán/Ioman) - precursors to modern

Hurling Hurling ( ga, iománaíocht, ') is an outdoor team game of ancient Gaelic Irish origin, played by men. One of Ireland's native Gaelic games, it shares a number of features with Gaelic football, such as the field and goals, the number of p ...

6th century

The sacrament of confession

Penitential A penitential is a book or set of church rules concerning the Christianity, Christian sacrament of penance, a "new manner of reconciliation with God in Christianity, God" that was first developed by Celtic monks in Ireland in the sixth century A ...

14th century

Caid ''Caid'' () (meaning "stuffed ball") is a collective name used in reference to various ancient and traditional Irish mob football games. "Caid" is frequently used by people in Gaeltacht areas of Ireland to refer to modern Gaelic football. The wo ...

(precursor to modern

Gaelic football Gaelic football ( ga, Peil Ghaelach; short name '), commonly known as simply Gaelic, GAA or Football is an Irish team sport. It is played between two teams of 15 players on a rectangular grass pitch. The objective of the sport is to score by kic ...

). * Whiskey''Annals of the Kingdom of Ireland''
p.785, footnote for year 1405. This is likewise in the '' Annals of Connacht'' entry for year 1405
''Annals of Connacht''

17th century

* Irish road bowling. *1661: Modern

chemistry Chemistry is the science, scientific study of the properties and behavior of matter. It is a natural science that covers the Chemical element, elements that make up matter to the chemical compound, compounds made of atoms, molecules and ions ...

founded by Robert Boyle with the publication of ''

The Sceptical Chymist ''The Sceptical Chymist: or Chymico-Physical Doubts & Paradoxes'' is the title of a book by Robert Boyle, published in London in 1661. In the form of a dialogue, the ''Sceptical Chymist'' presented Boyle's hypothesis that matter consisted of corp ...

''. *1662: Boyle's law discovered by Robert Boyle. *1680s: European adaptation of Drinking chocolate - Hans Sloane. However, this "adaption" is highly disputed. According to historian Jame Delbougo, the Jamaicans were brewing “a hot beverage brewed from shavings of freshly harvested cacao, boiled with milk and cinnamon” as far back as 1494.

18th century

*1730: The concept of an entrepreneur -

Richard Cantillon Richard Cantillon (; 1680s – ) was an Irish-French economist and author of '' Essai Sur La Nature Du Commerce En Général'' (''Essay on the Nature of Trade in General''), a book considered by William Stanley Jevons to be the "cradle of p ...

19th century

*1805:

Beaufort scale The Beaufort scale is an empirical measure that relates wind speed to observed conditions at sea or on land. Its full name is the Beaufort wind force scale. History The scale was devised in 1805 by the Irish hydrographer Francis Beaufort ...

created by

Francis Beaufort Rear-Admiral Sir Francis Beaufort (; 27 May 1774 – 17 December 1857) was an Irish hydrographer, rear admiral of the Royal Navy, and creator of the Beaufort cipher and the Beaufort scale. Early life Francis Beaufort was descended f ...

. *1809:

Milk of Magnesia Magnesium hydroxide is the inorganic compound with the chemical formula Mg(OH)2. It occurs in nature as the mineral brucite. It is a white solid with low solubility in water (). Magnesium hydroxide is a common component of antacids, such as milk ...

discovered by James Murray. *1813: Clanny safety lamp created by William Reid Clanny. *1820: 30 January, Edward Bransfield discovered the Antarctic Continent (mainland, islands were discovered earlier). *1820: Modern meat curing and the Bacon Rasher were invented by Henry Denny, a Waterford butcher, in 1820 *1821: The development of "Extra

Stout Stout is a dark, top-fermented beer with a number of variations, including dry stout, oatmeal stout, milk stout, and imperial stout. The first known use of the word ''stout'' for beer, in a document dated 1677 found in the Egerton Manuscript ...

" beer by The Second Arthur Guinness and others. *1831: Column still design enhanced and patented by Aeneas Coffey. *1831:

William Brooke O'Shaughnessy Sir William Brooke O'Shaughnessy (from 1861 as William O'Shaughnessy Brooke) MD FRS (October 1809, in Limerick, Ireland – 8 January 1889, in Southsea, England) was an Irish physician famous for his wide-ranging scientific work in pharmacology, ...

pioneered the cure for cholera through

Intravenous therapy Intravenous therapy (abbreviated as IV therapy) is a medical technique that administers fluids, medications and nutrients directly into a person's vein. The intravenous route of administration is commonly used for rehydration or to provide nutri ...

*1832: The Kyanizing process for preserving wood, created by

John Howard Kyan John Howard Kyan (27 November 1774 – 5 January 1850) was the inventor of the 'kyanising' process for preserving wood. He was the son of John Howard Kyan of Mount Howard and Ballymurtagh, County Wexford, and was born in Dublin on 27 November 1 ...

. *1834: The game of Croquet. *1836:

Induction coil An induction coil or "spark coil" (archaically known as an inductorium or Ruhmkorff coil after Heinrich Rühmkorff) is a type of electrical transformer used to produce high-voltage pulses from a low-voltage direct current (DC) supply. p.98 To ...

created by Nicholas Callan. *1843:

Quaternion In mathematics, the quaternion number system extends the complex numbers. Quaternions were first described by the Irish mathematician William Rowan Hamilton in 1843 and applied to mechanics in three-dimensional space. Hamilton defined a quatern ...

(a mathematical entity) first described by

Sir William Rowan Hamilton Sir William Rowan Hamilton LL.D, DCL, MRIA, FRAS (3/4 August 1805 – 2 September 1865) was an Irish mathematician, astronomer, and physicist. He was the Andrews Professor of Astronomy at Trinity College Dublin, and Royal Astronomer of Ireland ...

. *1844: Hollow needle in

syringe A syringe is a simple reciprocating pump consisting of a plunger (though in modern syringes, it is actually a piston) that fits tightly within a cylindrical tube called a barrel. The plunger can be linearly pulled and pushed along the inside ...

created by

Francis Rynd Francis Rynd AM, MRCS, MRIA (1801–1861) was an Irish physician, known for inventing the hollow needle used in hypodermic syringes. Background Rynd was born in Dublin, Ireland, in 1801 to James Rynd and his third wife Hester Fleetwood, of Rynd ...

. *1846: Seismology founded by Robert Mallet, who used dynamite explosions to measure the speed of elastic waves in surface rocks - pioneering and coining the word 'seismology'. *1848: Kelvin scale created by William Thomson, 1st Baron Kelvin. *1851: Binaural

stethoscope The stethoscope is a medical device for auscultation, or listening to internal sounds of an animal or human body. It typically has a small disc-shaped resonator that is placed against the skin, and one or two tubes connected to two earpieces. ...

created by

Arthur Leared Arthur Leared, M.D. (1822 – October 16, 1879) was an Irish physician and traveller of the world. Early life Leared was born in Wexford, Ireland in 1822 and was educated at Trinity College, Dublin, where he graduated with a B.A. in 1845, am M. ...

. *1856: Icosian calculus discovered by

. *1859: Greenhouse Effect theory proven by

John Tyndall John Tyndall FRS (; 2 August 1820 – 4 December 1893) was a prominent 19th-century Irish physicist. His scientific fame arose in the 1850s from his study of diamagnetism. Later he made discoveries in the realms of infrared radiation and the p ...

. *1865: The first Transatlantic telegraph cable pioneered by William Thomson, 1st Baron Kelvin on Valentia Island. *1866: The Standard drop method of hanging developed by Dr Samuel Haughton. *1874: ** Electron introduced as a concept by

George Johnstone Stoney George Johnstone Stoney FRS (15 February 1826 – 5 July 1911) was an Irish people, Irish physicist. He is most famous for introducing the term ''electron'' as the "fundamental unit quantity of electricity". He had introduced the concept, thoug ...

. ** Brennan torpedo created by

Louis Brennan Louis Brennan (28 January 1852 – 17 January 1932) was an Irish-Australian mechanical engineer and inventor. Biography Brennan was born in Castlebar, Ireland, and moved to Melbourne, Australia in 1861 with his parents. He started his caree ...

. *1879: The rules of

first standardised with the foundation of the Irish Hurling Union. *1880:

Boycott A boycott is an act of nonviolent, voluntary abstention from a product, person, organization, or country as an expression of protest. It is usually for moral, social, political, or environmental reasons. The purpose of a boycott is to inflict som ...

triggered by Charles Boycott over a dispute with the Irish Land League. *1884:

Steam Turbine A steam turbine is a machine that extracts thermal energy from pressurized steam and uses it to do mechanical work on a rotating output shaft. Its modern manifestation was invented by Charles Parsons in 1884. Fabrication of a modern steam turbin ...

: Compound Steam Turbine developed by Anglo-Irish engineer Charles Algernon Parsons. *1885: The Cream Cracker was invented by Joseph Haughton in his home in Dublin and first manufactured by

William Jacob William Jacob may refer to: *William Jacob (MP, died 1851) (c. 1761–1851), English merchant, shipowner, scientist, and MP for Westbury, and for Rye *William Jacob (Canterbury MP) (c. 1623–1692), English physician and politician *William Stephen ...

in his bakery in Dublin. *1888: Gregg Shorthand created by John Robert Gregg. *1894:

Joly colour screen The Joly colour process is an early additive colour photography process devised by Dublin physicist John Joly in 1894. Description Based on a method proposed in 1869 by Louis Ducos du Hauron in ''Les Couleurs en Photographie – Solution du Problem ...

created by John Joly. *1894: cohesion-tension theory proposed by John Joly and

Henry Horatio Dixon Henry Horatio Dixon FRS (19 May 1869, Dublin – 20 December 1953, Dublin) was a plant biologist and professor at Trinity College Dublin. Along with John Joly, he put forward the cohesion-tension theory of water and mineral movement in plants. ...

at Trinity College Dublin *1897: Modern

submarine A submarine (or sub) is a watercraft capable of independent operation underwater. It differs from a submersible, which has more limited underwater capability. The term is also sometimes used historically or colloquially to refer to remotely op ...

design created by John Philip Holland. * Saccharimeter created by Rev John Jellet from Cashel, County Tipperary (1817–1888).Irish Scientists and Inventors
Irish Patents Office.

20th century

*1901: Reflector sight created by Howard Grubb. *1914:

Radiotherapy Radiation therapy or radiotherapy, often abbreviated RT, RTx, or XRT, is a therapy using ionizing radiation, generally provided as part of cancer treatment to control or kill malignant cells and normally delivered by a linear accelerator. Radia ...

developed by John Joly. *1928: Three point linkage, patented by

Harry Ferguson Henry George "Harry" Ferguson (4 November 188425 October 1960) was a British mechanic and inventor who is noted for his role in the development of the modern agricultural tractor and its three point linkage system, for being the first person ...

. *1930: Nickel-zinc battery created by

James J. Drumm James Joseph Drumm (1897 – 1974) was an Irish chemist and the inventor of the Drumm battery. Life Drumm was born in Dundrum, County Down, in 1897, and initially attended a national school where his mother taught. His secondary education wa ...

. *1931:

Sudocrem Sudocrem ( ) is an over-the-counter medicated cream aimed primarily at the treatment of nappy rash. It contains a water-repellent base (consisting of oils/waxes); protective and emollient agents; antibacterial and antifungal agents; and a weak ...

was developed by Dublin-based pharmacist Thomas Smith. *1930s: The first disintegration of an atomic nucleus by artificially accelerated protons (splitting the atom) discovered by Ernest Walton et al. *1946: Ejection seat - first live test of a reliable, successful modern ejection seat developed by James Martin *1940s: World first duty free airport shop at Shannon Airport, created by Brendan O'Regan *1950: Joseph 'Spud' Murphy and his employee Seamus Burke produced the world's first seasoned crisps: Cheese & Onion and Salt & Vinegar. Companies worldwide sought to buy the rights to Tayto's technique. *1954:

Clofazimine Clofazimine, sold under the brand name Lamprene, is a medication used together with rifampicin and dapsone to treat leprosy. It is specifically used for multibacillary (MB) leprosy and erythema nodosum leprosum. Evidence is insufficient to suppor ...

first synthesized by a medical research team led by Cork man

Vincent Barry Vincent Christopher Barry (1908–1975) was a scientist and researcher from Ireland. He is known for leading the team which developed the anti-leprosy drug clofazimine. Early life and education Barry was born in Sunday's Well, Cork. He was ...

Trinity College, Dublin , name_Latin = Collegium Sanctae et Individuae Trinitatis Reginae Elizabethae juxta Dublin , motto = ''Perpetuis futuris temporibus duraturam'' (Latin) , motto_lang = la , motto_English = It will last i ...

. *1965:

Portable defibrillator An automated external defibrillator (AED) is a portable electronic device that automatically diagnoses the life-threatening cardiac Heart arrhythmia, arrhythmias of ventricular fibrillation (VF) and pulseless ventricular tachycardia, and is able t ...

created by

Frank Pantridge James Francis Pantridge, (3 October 1916 – 26 December 2004) was a Northern Irish physician, cardiologist, and professor who transformed emergency medicine and paramedic services with the invention of the portable defibrillator. Early life ...

. *1967:

Pulsar A pulsar (from ''pulsating radio source'') is a highly magnetized rotating neutron star that emits beams of electromagnetic radiation out of its magnetic poles. This radiation can be observed only when a beam of emission is pointing toward Ea ...

discovered by Jocelyn Bell Burnell.

References

{{Inventions Science and technology in Ireland Irish Inventions and discoveries

Pre-history

6th century

14th century

17th century

18th century

19th century

20th century

See also

References