Maurice Craig

Maurice James Waldron Craig (25 October 1919 – 11 May 2011) was an Irish architectural historian, the author of several books on the architectural heritage of Ireland and other subjects, and a conservation activist.

Life He was born in Belfast in 1919, in a prosperous presbyterian family, though he later rejected his unionist background in favour of socialism and atheism and respect for Irish culture.

Craig became active in Dublin architecture conservation in the 1940s.

From 1952, he worked in London in the Inspectorate of Ancient Monuments, but left in 1970 to join An Taisce in Dublin as its full-time executive secretary. and anthologies of his photos have been published in book form. The Volunteer Earl (1948) – a biography of James Caulfeild, 1st Earl of Charlemont Irish Bookbindings 1600–1800 (1954) – a history of Irish bookbinding Classic Irish Houses of the Middle Size (1976) – a survey of 17th/18th/19th-century houses of the minor gentry The Architecture of Ireland from the Earliest Times to 1880 (1982) Cats and their Poets: An Anthology (2002) - a collection of ancient and modern poems about cats Mausolea Hibernica (2009) - a survey of mausoleums in Ireland Poems - a collection of poetry Photographs (2011) - a collection of architectural photographs taken by Craig around Ireland