(Reuters) - Britain's Queen Elizabeth arrived in Dublin on Tuesday for a historic state visit steeped in symbolism and surrounded by security after a makeshift bomb was found, highlighting the lingering hostility of a small minority.
The visit, the first by a British monarch since Ireland won independence from London in 1921, is designed to show how warm neighborly relations have replaced centuries of animosity and the queen and her husband, the Duke of Edinburgh, appeared unperturbed by the bomb alert.
The monarch, dressed in an emerald green coat and matching hat, was greeted by Ireland's Minister for Foreign Affairs Eamon Gilmore upon arrival at Casement Aerodrome, a military airfield named after a British diplomat executed in 1916 for aiding the Irish nationalist cause.
She met Ireland's president Mary McAleese, a Catholic from Northern Ireland and a champion of better relations between the two countries, for a ceremonial welcome followed by a lunch of roast turbot and boxty, a traditional Irish potato cake.
Standing before the president's house, the former residence of the viceroys who oversaw British rule in Ireland, the queen reviewed a Guard of Honor and was given a 21-gun salute.
In an overcast capital, local people shook their heads in disgust at the discovery of a bomb in the luggage compartment of a bus headed for Dublin.
"It's bad. They are dragging us into the dark ages," said Tom O'Neill, a 34-year-old salesman. "There are some people in Ireland that have to get over the whole English thing. They are our neighbors."
Militant nationalists opposed to British control of Northern Ireland are suspected of planting the device, which was destroyed in a controlled explosion by the army in Maynooth, 25 km (15 miles) from Dublin, after a telephone warning to police.
Ireland is mounting its biggest ever security operation for the four-day visit and the arrival of U.S. President Barack Obama two days later.
Streets across the capital were cordoned off, miles of barriers erected and some 4,000 police, backed up by 2,000 soldiers, patrolled the city center. Thousands of manholes have been sealed and suspected dissidents arrested and questioned.
TROUBLED PAST
Peace in Northern Ireland after decades of conflict has paved the way for the queen's visit but there are constant reminders of a violent past.
Her arrival coincides with the 37th anniversary of bombings in Dublin and Monaghan, the single bloodiest day in a three-decade sectarian battle over Northern Ireland.
Relatives laid a wreath at the site of one of the bombings in Dublin shortly before Queen Elizabeth landed.
Police in Northern Ireland are on full alert against attempts by dissident republicans to grab headlines during the queen's visit. They said a bus and a van were hijacked and set on fire by armed men in Londonderry on Monday night.
Belfast's main shopping center was evacuated after a bomb alert. A coded bombing warning on Monday triggered a security alert in London.
The monarch's visit is about reconciliation and emphasizing the strong bond, built on generations of Irish emigration, that existed between the two countries even before a 1998 deal brought peace to Northern Ireland.
It is estimated that nearly 1 in 10 British people have an Irish grandparent, entitling them to citizenship. Irish people are avid followers of British soccer clubs and soap operas. The nation of around 4.5 million people is the biggest overseas market for British clothing, food and drink.
Anglo-Irish conflict goes back centuries, marked by a bitter history of settlement by British Protestants in the mainly Catholic country.
Ireland was given self rule in a 1921 treaty and severed its last ties to the British monarchy in 1948. The north of the island remains part of the United Kingdom.
The queen won't have much chance to meet ordinary Irish people. There will be no public walkabouts and onlookers will be limited to glimpses of the royal couple as they whizz by in an armored Land Rover, borrowed from Northern Ireland.
While Irish people consider themselves proud republicans there is a gossipy interest in the British royal family as evidenced by the deserted streets during the televised April 29 wedding of Prince William to Catherine Middleton.
Kathleen Hannon, 60, and her sister Jean Caulderbanks, 64, were planning to get a good place to see the royal cavalcade.
"We have grown up watching the family," said Hannon, under a statue of Irish writer James Joyce as hundreds of police milled around nearby O'Connell Street, Dublin's main thoroughfare.
"We've been to Buckingham Palace and we went to see where Lady Diana was buried. We're not even Protestants," she said. "We just love to see how the other half live,"
(Additional reporting by Adrian Croft in London and Conor Humphries in Dublin and Ian Graham in Belfast; Editing by Elizabeth Fullerton)
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