Seven Ages is a historical documentary series that was produced by

Araby Productions Araby may refer to: * Araby, an archaic name for Arabia or the Arab world * Araby (Mason's Springs, Maryland), a historic home listed on the NRHP * "Araby" (short story), from James Joyce's 1914 ''Dubliners'' ** ''Araby'' (1999 film), an indepen ...

, in association with

The O'Reilly Foundation The O'Reilly Foundation is a personal charitable trust set up in 1998 by media magnate, and former CEO of Heinz, Sir Anthony "Tony" O'Reilly. Its stated function is the funding of educational projects; the two main work areas in its active peri ...

, for

RTÉ (RTÉ) (; Irish for "Radio & Television of Ireland") is the national broadcaster of Ireland headquartered in Dublin. It both produces and broadcasts programmes on television, radio and online. The radio service began on 1 January 1926, while ...

and

BBC Northern Ireland BBC Northern Ireland ( ga, BBC Thuaisceart Éireann; Ulster-Scots: ''BBC Norlin Airlan'') is a division of the BBC and the main public broadcaster in Northern Ireland. It is widely available across both Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ire ...

. It charts the birth, growth and development of the

Irish state Ireland ( ga, Éire ), also known as the Republic of Ireland (), is a country in north-western Europe consisting of 26 of the 32 counties of the island of Ireland. The capital and largest city is Dublin, on the eastern side of the island. ...

since its foundation in 1921. The series was produced and directed by Seán Ó Mórdha, and the music was composed by

Bill Whelan Bill Whelan (born 22 May 1950 in Limerick, Ireland) is an Irish composer and musician. He is best known for composing a piece for the interval of the 1994 Eurovision Song Contest. The result, '' Riverdance'', was a seven-minute display of tr ...

. It was first broadcast in 2000.

Episodes

The series consists of seven 55-minute episodes, each dealing with a different decade, beginning with independence in 1921. The episodes do not, however, stick rigidly to their particular decade in order to avoid certain historical events from being split across two successive programmes (the

Arms Crisis The Arms Crisis was a political scandal in the Republic of Ireland in 1970 in which Charles Haughey and Neil Blaney were dismissed as cabinet ministers for alleged involvement in a conspiracy to smuggle arms to the Irish Republican Army in Nort ...

is an example of this). The final episode covers both the 1980s and 1990s. *Programme 1. The Birth of the New Irish State *Programme 2. Depression and the Rise of Fianna Fáil to Power *Programme 3. The Forties - Decade of Neutrality and Censorship *Programme 4. The Fifties - The Make or Break Decade *Programme 5. The Modernisation of Ireland *Programme 6. The Seventies - A Decade of Terror, Tension and Transformation *Programme 7. Haughey and FitzGerald - Great Adversaries of the Eighties

Contributors

Several important Irish figures gave interviews for the series. Among them were ex-Presidents

Patrick Hillery Patrick John Hillery ( ga, Pádraig J. Ó hIrghile; 2 May 1923 – 12 April 2008) was an Irish Fianna Fáil politician who served as the sixth president of Ireland from December 1976 to December 1990. He also served as vice-president of the Euro ...

and

Mary Robinson Mary Therese Winifred Robinson ( ga, Máire Mhic Róibín; ; born 21 May 1944) is an Irish politician who was the 7th president of Ireland, serving from December 1990 to September 1997, the first woman to hold this office. Prior to her elect ...

, and former

Taoisigh The Taoiseach is the head of government, or prime minister, of Ireland. The office is appointed by the president of Ireland upon the nomination of Dáil Éireann (the lower house of the Oireachtas, Ireland's national legislature) and the offic ...

Liam Cosgrave Liam Cosgrave (13 April 1920 – 4 October 2017) was an Irish Fine Gael politician who served as Taoiseach from 1973 to 1977, Leader of Fine Gael from 1965 to 1977, Leader of the Opposition from 1965 to 1973, Minister for External Affairs from ...

Charles Haughey Charles James Haughey (; 16 September 1925 – 13 June 2006) was an Irish Fianna Fáil politician who served as Taoiseach on three occasions – 1979 to 1981, March to December 1982 and 1987 to 1992. He was also Minister for the Gaeltacht from ...

and

Garret FitzGerald Garret Desmond FitzGerald (9 February 192619 May 2011) was an Irish Fine Gael politician, economist and barrister who served twice as Taoiseach, serving from 1981 to 1982 and 1982 to 1987. He served as Leader of Fine Gael from 1977 to 1987, a ...

. There are also contributions from

Desmond O'Malley Desmond Joseph O'Malley (2 February 1939 – 21 July 2021) was an Irish politician who served as Minister for Industry and Commerce from 1977 to 1981 and 1989 to 1992, Leader of the Progressive Democrats from 1985 to 1993, Minister for Trade, ...

and

Michael D. Higgins Michael Daniel Higgins ( ga, Mícheál Dónal Ó hUigínn; born 18 April 1941) is an Irish politician, poet, sociologist, and broadcaster, who has served as the ninth president of Ireland since November 2011. Entering national politics throug ...

, as well as historians, journalists, economists, public servants and the sons and daughters of

Civil War A civil war or intrastate war is a war between organized groups within the same state (or country). The aim of one side may be to take control of the country or a region, to achieve independence for a region, or to change government polic ...

veterans.

Video and DVD release

In 2002 the series was released as a box-set on both VHS and

DVD The DVD (common abbreviation for Digital Video Disc or Digital Versatile Disc) is a digital optical disc data storage format. It was invented and developed in 1995 and first released on November 1, 1996, in Japan. The medium can store any kin ...

. The former consisted of three video cassettes, which are in

PAL Phase Alternating Line (PAL) is a colour encoding system for analogue television. It was one of three major analogue colour television standards, the others being NTSC and SECAM. In most countries it was broadcast at 625 lines, 50 fields (25 ...

format. The two-disc DVD set, however, was mastered in

NTSC The first American standard for analog television broadcast was developed by National Television System Committee (NTSC)National Television System Committee (1951–1953), Report and Reports of Panel No. 11, 11-A, 12–19, with Some supplement ...

format (used in North America and Japan). As a consequence, the DVDs are not watchable an older Irish television sets that can only accept standard PAL signals if used with a DVD player that strictly enforces output coding. Although there may be some interested in the series in America, it is assumed that the NTSC formatting was a mistake by the company that mastered the DVDs. Additionally, neither the DVD inlay nor the DVD itself has any mention of the NTSC formatting.

References

External links

* {{RTÉ Factual Documentary television series about economics Irish history television shows Irish documentary television series