Well I never!

An interesting titbit to come out of the Queen's visit to the Republic of Ireland is that, until just four years ago, she was, under Irish law, the Queen of Ireland!  An Act of the Irish Parliament of 1542 provided that Kings of England should also be Kings of Ireland, and that Act had remained on the Irish statute books until 2007, when it was repealed by the Statute Law Revision Act of that year.  It has been suggested that this was an essential prerequisite to any State Visit by the Queen to the Republic.