Proclamation of the Republic | |
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![]() A retouched copy of the original Proclamation | |
Presented | 24 April 1916 |
Signatories | 7 members of the Provisional Government of the Irish Republic |
Purpose | To announce separation from the United Kingdom |
The Proclamation of the Republic (Irish: Forógra na Poblachta), also known as the 1916 Proclamation or the Easter Proclamation, was a document issued by the Irish Volunteers and the Irish Citizen Army during the Easter Rising in Ireland, which began on 24 April 1916.[1][2] In it, the Military Council of the Irish Republican Brotherhood, writing as the "Provisional Government of the Irish Republic," proclaimed Ireland's independence from the United Kingdom. The reading of the proclamation by Patrick Pearse outside the General Post Office (GPO) on Sackville Street (now called O'Connell Street), Dublin's main thoroughfare, marked the beginning of the Rising.[3] The proclamation was modelled on a similar independence proclamation issued during the 1803 rebellion by Robert Emmet.[4]