Qualla: County Laois https://qualla.com/county-laois en-us © 2026 Bendyline Wed, 08 Jul 2026 02:40:12 GMT Qualla serial false Qualla support@bendyline.com yes https://qualla.com/_res/siteimages/rsslogo.png Qualla: County Laois https://qualla.com/county-laois County Laois: Introduction https://qualla.com/county-laois/ Laois is the only county in Ireland that is doubly landlocked - none of its neighbors touch the coast either. To leave for the sea you must cross at least two county lines. That fact says something about Laois: that it lives inland, that it has always been a place travellers pass through, that it has had to know itself without the help of harbors or holiday beaches. Queen Mary made it England's first Irish plantation in 1556 and called it Queen's County. It carried that name for nearly four hundred years. When the Irish Free State arrived in 1922, the county quietly went back to being Laois.

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]]> Sat, 23 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/g/c/6/t/county-laois-wp/gc6t-county-laois-intro.mp3 0:06 1 full County Laois: The Plantation That Failed https://qualla.com/county-laois/ In 1556, Queen Mary signed off on the first organized English plantation in Ireland. The county was carved out of the O'More clan's territories - Loígis (Leix), Slewmarge, Irry, and a portion of Glimnaliry - and renamed Queen's County in her honor. The plan was straightforward: d...

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]]> Sat, 23 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/g/c/6/t/county-laois-wp/gc6t-county-laois-the-plantation-that-failed.mp3 0:06 2 full County Laois: Black '47 in the Midlands https://qualla.com/county-laois/ When the Great Famine reached Laois between 1845 and 1849, the county's workhouses could not cope. By the time a new workhouse opened at Donaghmore in 1853, many of the poorest had already died or emigrated. The Irish language had still been spoken across the county as late as th...

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]]> Sat, 23 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/g/c/6/t/county-laois-wp/gc6t-county-laois-black-47-in-the-midlands.mp3 0:06 3 full County Laois: The Sons of Laois Who Left https://qualla.com/county-laois/ Peter Lalor, born in Tenakill in 1827, sailed to Australia as a young man and ended up leading the Eureka Stockade miners' revolt at Ballarat, Victoria - the most famous armed uprising in Australian history. His brother James Fintan Lalor was a Young Irelander writer who died you...

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]]> Sat, 23 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/g/c/6/t/county-laois-wp/gc6t-county-laois-the-sons-of-laois-who-left.mp3 0:06 4 full County Laois: The Rock and the Mountains https://qualla.com/county-laois/ Two pieces of older geology define the county. The Rock of Dunamase rises east of Portlaoise, a 150-foot limestone outcrop crowned with the ruined castle of Diarmait Mac Murchada - the king of Leinster whose marriage of his daughter Aoife to Strongbow in 1170 began the Norman inv...

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]]> Sat, 23 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/g/c/6/t/county-laois-wp/gc6t-county-laois-the-rock-and-the-mountains.mp3 0:06 5 full County Laois: Modern Crossroads https://qualla.com/county-laois/ Today most travellers experience Laois at speed, on the M7 motorway between Dublin and Limerick or the M8 to Cork. Both pass directly through the county; the Abbeyleix and Mountrath bypasses opened in 2010, ending the legendary thirty-minute traffic jams that used to define an Ir...

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]]> Sat, 23 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/g/c/6/t/county-laois-wp/gc6t-county-laois-modern-crossroads.mp3 0:06 6 full