The Irish Confederate Wars, also sometimes called the Eleven Years War (derived from the Irish language name Cogadh na haon deag mbliana),fought in Ireland between 1641 and 1653. are the Irish theater of the Wars of the Three Kingdoms - a series of civil wars in Kingdoms of Ireland, England and Scotland (all ruled by Charles I of England) that also include the English Civil War and civil war in Scotland.

The conflict in Ireland essentially pit the native Irish Roman Catholics against the Protestant British settlers and their supporters in England and Scotland.The war in Ireland begins with the rebellion of the Irish of Ulster in October 1641, during which thousands of Scots and English Protestant settlers are killed.

The rebellion spreads throughout the country and at Kilkenny in 1642 the association of The Confederate Catholics of Ireland is formed to organize the Irish Catholic war effort.

The Confederation is essentially an independent state and is a coalition of all shades of Irish Catholic society, both Gaelic and Old English.

The Irish Confederates professed to side with the English Royalists during the ensuing civil wars, but mostly fight their own war in defense of the Irish Catholic landlords' interests.The Confederates rule much of Ireland as a de facto sovereign state until 1649, and proclaim their loyalty to Charles I.

From 1641 to 1649, the Confederates fight against Scottish Covenanter and English Parliamentarian armies in Ireland.

They are loosely allied with the English Royalists, but are divided over whether to send military help to them in the English Civil War.

Ultimately, they never send troops to England, but do send an expedition to help the Scottish Royalists, sparking the Scottish Civil War.

The wars end in the defeat of the Confederates.

They and their Royalist allies are crushed during the Cromwellian conquest of Ireland by the New Model Army under Oliver Cromwell in 1649-53.

The wars following the 1641 revolt cause massive loss of life in Ireland, comparable in the country's history only with the Great Famine of the 1840s.

The ultimate winner, the English parliament, arranges for the mass confiscation of land owned by Irish Catholics as punishment for the rebellion and to pay for the war.

Although some of this land will be returned after 1660, on the Restoration of the monarchy, the period marks the effective end of the old Catholic landed class.