Cork

The city centre is an island between two channels of the River Lee which meet downstream at its eastern end, where the quays and docks along the river lead outwards towards Lough Mahon and Cork Harbour, one of the world's largest natural harbours.

Cork was founded in the 6th century as a monastic settlement, and was expanded by Viking invaders around 915. Its charter was granted by Prince John in 1185. Cork city was once fully walled, and remnants of the old medieval town centre remain around South and North Main streets. The city's cognomen of "the rebel city" originates in its support for the Yorkist cause in the Wars of the Roses. Corkonians sometimes refer to the city as "the real capital", a reference to its opposition to the Anglo-Irish Treaty in the Irish Civil War.