53.3495° N, 6.2602° W
DUBLIN
Most Famous People Born in Dublin, Ireland
- Notable people
- 3,490
- Peak decade
- 1980s
- Median birth year
- 1946
- Most distinctive
- Cricket 2.6×
A city defined by what it sends abroad and what it keeps at home. Dublin's notables are split almost in two: a literary tradition that the rest of the English-speaking world claims as its own — Wilde, Shaw, Beckett, Swift, Burke — and a sporting culture in Gaelic football, hurling, and camogie that exists almost exclusively on the island itself. The result is a profession mix that looks both unusually international and unusually local at the same time.
One face per decade — the most globally famous figure born in Dublin during each.
Notable Births by Decade
Click a decade to filter the list below. Peak: 1980s with 433 notable births.
What Dublin Is Known For
Click any row to filter the list of people below.
Football is Dublin's biggest profession — 21% of all notables (746).
Dublin over-indexes on cricket — 2.6× the global rate.
Profession Mix Over Time
Each band shows a profession family's share of Dublin's notable births by decade. Hover the chart for the breakdown at any decade.
- Sports
- Politics & Law
- Film & TV
- Writing
- Art & Design
- Music
- Other
- Filtered to 1840s Clear ×
Augustus Saint-Gaudens
1848 - 1907
Thomas John Barnardo
1845 - 1905
Lord George Hamilton
1845 - 1927
Margaret Lindsay Huggins
1848 - 1915
Robert Stawell Ball
1840 - 1913
Edward Guinness, 1st Earl of Iveagh
1847 - 1927
Robert Anderson (Scotland Yard official)
1841 - 1918
Vincent Arthur Smith
1848 - 1920
Sarah Purser
1848 - 1943
Valentine Ball
1843 - 1894
Alfred Perceval Graves
1846 - 1931
Arthur Guinness, 1st Baron Ardilaun
1840 - 1915
Thomas F. Byrnes
1842 - 1910
Edward Villiers, 5th Earl of Clarendon
1846 - 1914
Charles Dickinson West
1847 - 1908
Richard Collins, Baron Collins
1842 - 1911
Joshua Millner
1847 - 1931
Chichester Bell
1848 - 1924
Hugh Seymour, 6th Marquess of Hertford
1843 - 1912
Edmund O'Donovan
1844 - 1883
Edmund Dwyer Gray (Irish politician)
1845 - 1888
Harvey du Cros
1846 - 1918
Joseph Henry Longford
1849 - 1925
Robert William Genese
1848 - 1928
George W. Joy
1844 - 1925
William O'Shea
1840 - 1905
Joseph Patrick McDonnell
1846 - 1906
William Walsh (archbishop of Dublin)
1841 - 1921
Albert Bruce-Joy
1842 - 1924
William M. Laffan
1848 - 1909
Hugh McCalmont
1845 - 1924
Reginald Walter Macan
1848 - 1941
Forbes George Vernon
1843 - 1911
Sir Charles Cameron, 1st Baronet
1841 - 1924
J. E. Kenny
1845 - 1900
Marianne Fannin
1845 - 1938
Samuel Geoghegan
1845 - 1928
William Lennon
1849 - 1938
William Ludwig (singer)
1847 - 1923
William Kenny (politician)
1846 - 1921
Henry Bernard Carpenter
1840 - 1890
Joseph Byrne (bishop)
1843 - 1901
John Tracy (Medal of Honor)
1848 - 1918
James Digges La Touche
1844 - 1921
Margaret Dockrell
1849 - 1926
Brandram Boileau Ussher
1845 - 1925
Barbara McDonnell
1847 - 1928
Catherine Mary MacSorley
1848 - 1929
Peter O'Brien (Medal of Honor)
1842 - 1898
May Laffan
1849 - 1916
Percy Evans Freke
1844 - 1931
Thomas Boyd (Wisconsin politician)
Born 1844
Richard Whateley West
1848 - 1905