The Irish Medieval Patron-Client State in World Perspective

Summary

This is an abstract from the "SAA 2024: Individual Abstracts" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology.

The state of the O’Briens, at times called the Kingdom of Limerick, lasted from the mid-eleventh century until it accepted the sovereignty of Henry VIII at the end of the sixteenth century. In its features it conforms to the model of the patron-client state that William Sanders formulated to distill the similarities in organization that were apparent in historic African kingdoms and the polities of the Classic period lowland Maya. While it is to be doubted that the Classic Maya possessed states, the Kingdom of Limerick compares well with historic East African states, as well as with the kingdoms of the Goths of Late Antiquity. This paper updates Sander’s model and demonstrates its fit to historic Celtic, Gothic and Bantu kingdoms. It will be shown that all patron-client states began their existence as chiefdom confederacies that evolved into states where alliances between the participating leaders continued to play a key role. Aristocratic polygyny posed a constant challenge to the state’s stability that was dealt with in different ways by the historic states. Though born in violence, contrary to expectations, patron-client states proved to be remarkably stable and resilient. The reasons why they were so will be explored.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• SAA 2024: Individual Abstracts   •
• Society for American Archaeology 89th Annual Meeting, New Orleans, LA (2024)

Keywords

Record Identifiers

Abstract Id(s): 41713.0