Nicholas Canny held an Established Chair in History 1979-2009; at the National University of Ireland, Galway where he was also founding Director of the Moore Institute 2000-2011 and Vice President for Research 2005-8 all, An expert on early modern history broadly defined, he edited the first volume of The Oxford History of the British Empire (1998) and, with Philip D. Morgan, The Oxford Handbook of the Atlantic World, c.1450-c.1850 (2011). His major books on Irish History have been The Elizabethan Conquest of Ireland, A Pattern Established, 1565-1576 (Harvester Press, 1976); The Upstart Earl: A Study of the Social and Mental World of Richard Boyle, first earl of Cork, 1566-1643 (Cambridge University Press, 1982), Making Ireland British, 1580-1650 (Oxford University Press, 2001), and Imagining Ireland’s Pasts: Early Modern Ireland through the Centuries that has just been published by Oxford University Press.

He is a Fellow of the British Academy (2005), a Member of the Royal Irish Academy (1981), of Academia Europaea, (1995), of the American Philosophical Society (2007) and of Real Academia de la Historia (Madrid) (2011). He served as President of the Royal Irish Academy, 2008-11, and was Ireland’s first member, and only member so far, of the Scientific Council of the European Research Council. On which he served 2011-16. He has been twice winner of the Irish Historical Research Prize.