[6] Prior to the construction of the modern Four Courts, a previous complex existed close to Christ Church Cathedral on what is today St Michael's Hill which was in use from around 1608 to the opening of the present building around 1796.

[11] and before that a 13th-century Dominican Friary St. Saviour's was located on the site, confiscated following the dissolution of the monasteries by Henry VIII.

[12] The Four Courts and surrounding areas were held by Commandant Edward Daly's 1st Battalion during the Easter Rising in 1916.

[13] On 14 April 1922, the courts complex was occupied by IRA forces opposed to the Anglo-Irish Treaty, with Rory O'Connor acting as their spokesman.

On 28 June the new National Army attacked the building to dislodge the "rebels", on the orders of the Minister for Defence Richard Mulcahy, authorised by President of Dáil Éireann Arthur Griffith.

[14] For a decade after the destruction of the Civil War, the courts sat in the old viceregal apartments in Dublin Castle.

They also built River House on Chancery Street, which served as Dublin's only motor tax office for a number of years.