Over half a million Irish historical records are now free to explore online

Ireland's digital archive of lost history has reached a major milestone with more than half a million historical records now freely available to researchers, family historians, and anyone curious about Ireland's past. The latest release also marks the beginning of an ambitious international project that will trace the stories of Irish people who left their mark across France.

The Virtual Record Treasury of Ireland has added 194,000 new historical records, bringing its total collection to 544,000 freely accessible documents and more than 340 million searchable words of Irish history.

Hosted by Trinity College Dublin and funded by the Department of Culture, Communications and Sport, the Virtual Record Treasury of Ireland is rebuilding, in digital form, the vast archive that was destroyed when the Public Record Office of Ireland was lost on June 30, 1922, during the opening days of the Irish Civil War.

Visitor's in the Long Room, at Trinity College Dublin's Library.

The latest additions span more than 700 years of Irish history and include stories of medieval poachers, taxes on potatoes in 1692, the mysterious Connaught Worm of 1702, women who opposed Daniel O'Connell's Catholic Emancipation campaign, and Irish support for the American Revolution.

The records are reconstructed from transcripts and copies identified in more than 100 archives, libraries, and memory institutions across Ireland and around the world.

The 2026 update also introduces four new curated collections, allowing visitors to explore key moments in Irish history through digitized records and expert commentary. Five new Gold Seams recreate entire collections that were destroyed in 1922, giving researchers a richer understanding of everyday life across the centuries.

The platform's Knowledge Graph for Irish History has also grown significantly. Developed by historians working with computer scientists at ADAPT, Research Ireland Centre for AI-Driven Digital Content Technology, it now includes more than 15,000 historical figures connected through 3.5 million linked historical facts.

Among the latest additions are 5,800 historical individuals, including more than 2,300 women from early modern Ireland and 2,300 people from the medieval and Norman period, making Ireland's digital historical record more representative than ever before.

Looking ahead, the Virtual Record Treasury of Ireland will launch a two-year initiative titled Journey to Europe Archives of the Irish in France. Announced by An Taoiseach Micheál Martin, the project will identify records of Irish significance held in French archives and make them freely available online.

The research will examine subjects including Wolfe Tone's mission to France, the Irish Brigade and Irish Legion in the French Army, the network of Irish Colleges across France, and generations of Irish merchants who traded along France's Atlantic coast.

Dr Ciarán Wallace, Program Director of the Virtual Record Treasury of Ireland and the Department of History at Trinity College Dublin, said, "We are delighted to announce that the number of records in the Virtual Record Treasury of Ireland has passed the half-million mark. This important milestone has only been possible through our unique partnership with 100 archives, libraries, and memory institutions worldwide.

"Four new Gold Seams and five new Curated Collections build on the success of a platform that has already attracted more than 7 million visits. These enriched collections connect Ireland’s past to major international commemorations, giving users fresh resources on many aspects of our history, such as Ireland and the American Revolution as we approach USA250, and the long struggle for Catholic Emancipation.

"Looking ahead, we are embarking on an exciting new collaboration with the Embassy of Ireland in France to uncover Ireland’s historical footprint in French archives. These records tell the stories of women and men who made Ireland more European and Europe more Irish – from famous names like Wolfe Tone to merchants, scholars and artists, but we’ll be looking for the fugitives slavers and criminals too. This project will be a legacy of Ireland’s presidency of the EU Council and serve as a model for future archival collaboration with EU partners."

Professor Declan O'Sullivan of the ADAPT Research Ireland Centre and Trinity College Dublin said the expanding Knowledge Graph was transforming how people could explore Ireland's past.

"The VRTI Knowledge Graph for Irish History is a ground-breaking digital resource connecting thousands of historical sources and records to create one of the most richly linked resources for Irish history ever assembled.

"In the past year, the Graph has grown by nearly six thousand people through collaboration with the VOICES and NAISC projects. Especially exciting is the addition of more than 2,300 early modern women, dramatically expanding the representation of women in Ireland’s digital historical record, and the inclusion of over 2,500 events associated with them.

"This year we are also pleased to introduce a new 'Showcase' feature, which allows historians to directly curate and make available a set of knowledge graph people and events on a particular theme.

"The expansion and enhancement of the Knowledge Graph marks an important step in making Irish history more connected, searchable and accessible. It gives researchers, students and the wider public new ways to discover the people and places of Ireland’s past, and to follow the links between individual lives and the records that survive today."

Launched in 2022 to mark the centenary of the destruction of the Public Record Office, the Virtual Record Treasury of Ireland continues to grow as a lasting legacy of Ireland's Decade of Centenaries, bringing together records once thought to be lost forever and making them freely available to audiences in Ireland and across the global Irish diaspora.