It includes contributions from leading scholars across a range of disciplines, incorporating the 'big issues' - such as gender, class, community, religion and ethnicity, the nature of violence, periodization and the geography of revolution - while also maintaining a close focus on events as they impacted at a local level. The analysis of conditions in the provinces, counties and parishes tells the stories of particular individuals and families caught up in the events of these years.

The spatial/cartographic emphasis required the production of a range of new data that is represented locally, regionally, nationally (across the thirty-two counties) and internationally; this adds an important new dimension to our understanding of the period and to the historical geography of the revolutionary years. The Atlas also includes sections on the evolution of revolution, and on its aftermath, legacy and the collective memory and cultural representation of this fascinating, transformative period of Irish history.