Waterford

Waterford's English name comes from the Old Norse Veðrafjǫrðr, "ram fjord"; its Irish name, Port Láirge, means "Lárag's port". Viking raiders first settled near the site in 853, were driven out around 902, and returned in 914 under Jarl Ottar and then Ragnall ua Ímair, building what would become Ireland's first city. In 1170 the deposed King of Leinster, Diarmait Mac Murchada, and Cambro-Norman mercenaries under Strongbow took the town after a desperate defence; Strongbow's marriage to Diarmait's daughter Aoife is remembered at Reginald's Tower, and Henry II landed at Waterford in 1171. Through the Middle Ages it was Ireland's second city after Dublin.

In the 15th century Waterford repelled two pretenders to the English throne, Lambert Simnel and Perkin Warbeck, and Henry VII gave it the motto Urbs Intacta Manet, "the untaken city". It remained Catholic after the Reformation and joined the Confederation of Kilkenny, until Henry Ireton took it for Cromwell in 1650; in 1690 the Jacobite army surrendered it after the Boyne. The 18th century brought great prosperity and the Georgian buildings of John Roberts, and glassmaking began in 1783. In the 19th century shipbuilding thrived; the Malcomson family's Neptune yard built and ran the largest fleet of iron steamers in the world between the mid-1850s and the late 1860s.

John Redmond, later leader of the Irish Parliamentary Party, represented the city from 1891 to 1918, and in July 1922 Waterford saw fighting in the Civil War. The crystal works closed in 2009 after the receivership of Waterford Wedgwood, and the recession that followed hit the city hard, but a new visitor centre and factory opened in the Viking Quarter in 2010 and production resumed.

Waterford's culture is rooted in its long history and its theatre. The Theatre Royal on the Mall, a Victorian house of 1876, hosts the International Festival of Light Opera every November, as it has since 1959; Garter Lane Arts Centre houses a theatre, a gallery and a dance studio; and Red Kettle, founded by the Waterford playwright Jim Nolan, and the street theatre company Spraoi are based here. Spraoi's festival of street theatre and world music, held every August bank holiday weekend since 1992, is the city's largest event and has drawn audiences of more than 80,000. Waterford Walls invites street artists to paint the city each August, and the Waterford Collection of Art, founded in 1939, holds works by Jack B. Yeats, Paul Henry and Mainie Jellett.

Music runs deep too: the composer William Vincent Wallace is commemorated by a plaza near Reginald's Tower, and the local radio station WLR FM is a fixture of daily life. In sport the city has a strong Gaelic games tradition, with clubs such as Mount Sion, De La Salle and Ballygunner, as well as Waterford FC in football and Waterford Boat Club, founded in 1878 and the city's oldest active sports club.

Faith shaped the city's landmarks and its schools. Waterford has two cathedrals by the same architect, and Edmund Ignatius Rice, who founded the Christian Brothers, is remembered at Mount Sion. People take pride in being from Ireland's oldest city, and the Viking past is everywhere, from the Viking Triangle's museums to the replica longship beside Reginald's Tower.

About 60,000 people lived in the city and suburbs at the 2022 census, making Waterford the fifth-largest city in the Republic and the main city of the south-east. Ferrybank, with a village centre of its own, is the only suburb north of the river, and Ardkeen, on the Dunmore Road, has a shopping centre and the local radio stations. The South East Technological University, formed in 2022 from the merger of Waterford Institute of Technology and IT Carlow, brings students to the city.

The port has been central to Waterford for more than a thousand years. Waterford Port is Ireland's closest deep-water port to mainland Europe and handles about 12 per cent of the country's external trade by value. Crystal-making employed thousands for generations, and the dairy co-operatives of the surrounding farmland, later part of Glanbia, were another pillar. The recession from 2008 hit hard, with the closure of several multinational employers and high unemployment. A coworking community opened offices in the Viking Quarter in 2013, and a new railway station is proposed as part of the North Quays project.

Weekdays centre on the shopping streets around John Roberts Square; evenings and weekends bring crowds to the Apple Market's bars. City and county are run by Waterford City and County Council, formed by a merger in 2014, which elects a mayor each year, an office that dates from 1377.

Waterford's signature food is the blaa, a soft, square, floury white bread roll. Blaas come soft — slightly sweet, with a malt flavour — or crusty, and are eaten mainly at breakfast with butter or filled with anything from rashers to the luncheon meat locals call "red lead"; the breakfast blaa, with egg, bacon and sausage, is more common in the city than the breakfast roll. Some say the Huguenots brought it at the end of the 17th century, though that is disputed, and in 2013 the Waterford blaa won Protected Geographical Indication status. Only a few bakeries still make it, among them Walsh's Bakehouse and Hickey's Bakery.

The farmland around the city has long supplied dairy: the co-operative at Kilmeadan, about 5 kilometres away, made Kilmeadan cheddar, which won medals at the World Cheese Awards in 2005. The harbour and coast provide seafood, and Irish seafood dishes — mackerel, hake, mussels, crab and chowder, popular around the coasts — appear on local menus alongside representative Irish dishes such as Irish stew and bacon and cabbage.

For drinking, Waterford's pubs range from the late-night bars of the Apple Market to T & H Doolan's on George's Street, the city's oldest pub, where a section of the original city wall, almost 1,000 years old, can be seen in the lounge. Stout and Irish whiskey are the standard orders.