Munster during the Sixteenth Century: Culture, Society, Land and Rebellion

Introduction:

Scholars agree that by the early fifteenth century Munster ‘had been completely

abandoned by the central administration in Dublin… [by the middle of the fifteenth

century] the earls of Desmond had almost completely replaced royal authority with their

own in Limerick, Kerry, much of Cork and Waterford, and in parts of southern

Tipperary.1

The societal and cultural history of any nation in any given period is of vital importance.

It encompasses all aspects of life, and is therefore its history. Gaelic Ireland in the

sixteenth century is no different. Since Kenneth Nicholls ‘great monument’ was first

published in 1972 and re published in 2003, scholars have provided us with a huge

amount of primary source materials, and secondary sources which help guide students in

their use. In this essay, I have summarised a few aspects of life in Gaelic Ireland between

1300 and 1600: Ireland as a clan society, the poets and their art, the law, and the church

in society.

Adrian IV, by the Bull Laudabiliter, had conferred the Lordship of Ireland upon Henry

II.2 Henry VIII had been declared Head of the Irish Church in 1536, thus severing his

connection with Rome … [in] 1541 a Parliament was summoned … attended [by many

1 MacCotter, P. ‘The Geraldine lineages of Imokilly and Sir John FitzEdmund of Cloyne’ in Edwards, D. (ed.) Regions and rulers in Ireland, 1100-1650; essays for Kenneth Nicholls. Dublin, 2004, p.54-77.2 ‘In virtue of the Donation of Constantine, by which the Popes claimed temporal dominion over all the islands of the ocean, Maxwell, C . Irish History from contemporary sources (1509-1610). London, 1923, p.22

1

Irish chiefs who] gave their assent to this measure. In a proclamation of this same year

the King’s style appears as: ‘Henry VIII, King of England, Ireland and France, Defender

of the Faith and on earth Supreme Head of the Church of England and Ireland.’3 An Irish

Statute of 1542 I. 176 is entitled An Act that the King of England, his Heirs and

Successors, be Kings of Ireland (33 Henry VIII, c. I0).4 Such was the state of the church

in Ireland that in 1576 Sir William Gerard the Irish Chancellor recommended that

Archbishop Loftus be translated to a bishopric in England and the profits from his see be

applied to the maintenance of legal affairs within the Pale!5

England’s grasp of power over Ireland, was always “much easier won than kept…”’6

Maps constitute an important primary source for the historian also. Their importance is

emphasized by the inclusion of three maps in The Calendar of State Papers of Henry

VIII.7 ‘For the purpose of assisting those, who are curious in Irish topographical history,

in locating the Septs, 8 particularly the smaller ones, [and] change of name, which many

places in Ireland have undergone … One of these Maps comprises only the Province of

Munster [i.e., Lythe’s map] and appears, by the frequent occurrence of Lord Burleigh’s

handwriting upon it, to have been much in his use …’ Rough as the maps may have been,

great expense and effort went into their preparation, as we shall see. The Desmond

rebellions of 1569-73 and 1579-83 are good examples of the difficulty of controlling

Ireland and resulted in bringing war to the homesteads of the people in a widespread and 3 Cal Car MSS I p. 183, cited in Maxwell, ibid, p.22.4 Ibid, p. 101-25 Cal Carew MSS II p 55 cited in Maxwell, op. cit.6 CSPI Hen.VIII, II. 535. quoted in Maxwell, C. op. cit. p.22.7 ‘[Introduction] The Calendar of State Papers of Henry VIII. Vol. II part III: Correspondence between the governments of England and Ireland 1515-1538. p.a2. 8 Nicholls points out that ‘sept’ was the normal term used by the English. ‘Sept’ seems to be a translation of the Irish word sliocht which literally means a section sixteenth and seventeenth century English writers for the basic Irish corporate family group. He prefers to use the term ‘clan’ as being in more general use: clan is a unilineal descent group forming a definite corporate entity with political and legal functions. (‘Glossary’, Nicholls, K. W. Gaelic and Gaelicized Ireland in the Middle Ages. Dublin, 2003, p. 224-226).

2

ruthless manner, massacres such as that at Smerwick, a distinctly English innovation and

the Plantation of Munster.

Society and culture:

Ireland may be regarded as unique in terms of assets such as its topography.

Kenneth Nicholls points out that ‘Irish genealogical texts constitute a body of material

which is unique in Europe both for its chronological sweep – from the seventh –

eighteenth centuries – and, considering its date and the losses which it has sustained, its

extent.’9 Its individualism is no less apparent in other aspects Gaelic society. Christianity

had infiltrated all aspects of European society where as in Ireland it ‘never seems to have

really expanded outside the purely religious sphere of life.’10 To illustrate this point

Nicholls uses the example of marriage and divorce in Ireland. He says, it ‘tended to be

determined by secular rules quite different from the teachings of the Church on these

matters.’11 He goes on to refer to the uniqueness of the ‘lineage or clan expansion’ that

prevailed in Gaelic Ireland and how crucial it is to an understanding of this period. The

idea of society as clans or lineages was a Gaelic one. K. W. Nicholls describes a clan as

‘a unilineal (in the Irish case, patrilineal) descent group forming a definite corporate

entity with political and legal functions.’12 Nicholls goes to great lengths to emphasise to

the reader that the clan does not in any way represent the ‘socio-familial’ sphere of

society. He also expresses amazement at how speedily the Anglo-Normans adapted to the 9 Nicholls K. W. ‘Genealogy’ in Buttimer, N., Rynne, C., Guerin, H.(eds. )The heritage of Ireland. (Cork, 2000), p. 156-16110 Nicholls, K. W.: Gaelic and Gaelicized Ireland in the Middle Ages (Dublin, 2003), p. 311 Ibid, p. 312 Ibid, p. 9

3

idea of the clan after invasion, saying, ‘the most outstanding feature in the Gaelicization

of the Anglo-Norman settlers was the speed with which, within the first century

following the invasion, the concept of the clan had become established among them.’13

Anne Chambers notes that ‘To the proud Earl of Desmond, the great gaelicised feudal

aristocrat of Munster, Drury was but a servant, a hireling, one of the contemptible

‘English churls’ of inferior degree.’14 (fig. 2). This sums up how fully the Anglo Normans

adapted to the idea of the clan, and the clan mentality towards those whose lineage could

not be established.

‘A clan may be represented by a single individual only, the only member remaining of

his descent-group, which nevertheless continues to exist so long as any member of it

survives. The small descent-groups within a larger clan may each constitute entities or

clans, while remaining part of the larger one, and may again be similarly subdivided

themselves.’15

Like Christianity, the clan did not penetrate all levels of society. Poorer families did not

belong to a clan, rather just to immediate family. These persons were frowned upon by

the society as ‘mere churls and labouring men.’16 Although there were periods when the

genealogies were not recorded at all, as for instance between 1130 and 1300,17 the

keeping of genealogies was ‘entrusted to the professional families of scribes and

chroniclers.’18 This is one reason why poorer people could not record their genealogies.

Tension and conflict within a clan was very common. The grounds for disputes would

13 Ibid, p. 814 Chambers, A. Eleanor Countess of Desmond. (Dublin, 2000). p. 112.15 Nicholls (2003), p. 9-1016 Ibid, p. 1017 Nicholls (2000), p. 156.18 Nicholls, (2003), p. 10

4

come in the form of rights over the clan property.19 Nicholls uses the example of a

seventeenth century lawsuit between two brothers, ‘who held in common a minute

property in county Tipperary’20, that resulted in one brother murdering the other over the

right to the land, something which very possibly could have been a common outcome in

such cases. When the scale of property went up the scale of violence must have followed.

Historians see the rate of clan expansion as ‘the most important phenomena in a clan

based society.’ The expansion would come from the top down i.e. the dominant stocks

would expand at the expense of the smaller entities, thus commoners would be displaced

by royals. The rate of expansion of an Irish clan should not be underestimated. For

example, Turlough an fhíona O Donnell, lord of Tirconnell (d. 1423) had eighteen sons

(by ten different women) and fifty-nine grandsons in the male line. This was by no means

the exception rather it was common practice.21 ‘The concept of the lineage or clan…in

1310…received formal recognition in an Irish statute which decreed that the chief of

every ‘great lineage’ should be responsible for its members, a principal which was

already in force in Hiberno-English law regarding native Gaelic clans, but was now

formally extended to those of Anglo-Norman origin’.

Scholars agree that due to the lack of surviving internal Gaelic administrative

documentation they have had to rely on the views of hostile outsiders when it comes to

researching society and culture in the later middle ages.22 ‘The Topographia Hibernie of

Giraldus Cambrensis was the matrix as it were, for descriptions of Ireland from the 12th

century onwards. Such portrayals (mainly by English writers) generally contained some

19 Ibid, p. 1120 Ibid, p.1121 Ibid, p. 11-1222 For example, Simms, K. ‘Bardic poetry as a historical source’ in The writer as witness: literature as historical evidence; Dunne, T. (ed.) (Cork, 1987), p. 58-75. Historical Studies XVI

5

religious or philosophical sanction, stated or implied, for either occupation in the 12th

century (as with Giraldus) or for continued rule or further colonisation in the 16th century

(as with Stanihurst, Spencer and Polydor Vergil). The general thrust of these portrayals

was that the Gaelic Irish were a barbarous unruly nation; lax or aberrant in its practice of

the Christian religion, a nation much in need of being taken in hand, humanized and

religiously or economically reformed.’23 With the passage of time and painstaking work

of historians more reliable information surfaced regarding Gaelic society and in ‘these

latest accounts [Gaelic society] is seen as a complex and organised system of institutions

with its own principals and rules of arrangement.’24

Irish society in the sixteenth century cannot be divided into two sharply opposed classes

i.e. a free class and a servile class. It is true that there were men known as ‘bond-men’ but

these were not cultivators or peasants. They were the middlemen between the proprietor

of the land and the actual cultivators i.e. the peasantry. These ‘bond-men’ were merely

subjects of the lord.25 ‘That the distinction, however, that has been drawn between the

‘free’ and ‘unfree’ elements of the population is certainly unreal in legal terms must not

blind us to its reality in social and economic ones. In practice the status of the great mass

of the population in Gaelic Ireland, the actual cultivators and labourers – ‘churls’, as they

are referred to by contemporary English writers – was very low indeed.’26 The landless

clans of ‘followers’ also referred to in Nicholls’ work were similar to the ‘bonds-men’ in

that they were of a higher social class then the peasantries. These ‘followers’ were to be

found especially in Munster.

23 Caulfield, M. D. ‘Introduction’ The Tenebriomastix of Don Philip O’Sullivan Beare: Poitiers (MS 259 (97): an edition of part of Book I (1-24 and 87-137) with introduction, translation and notes. Ph D thesis, UCC 2004, p.5.24 Lennon, C. Sixteenth-Century Ireland: The Incomplete Conquest, (Dublin, 1994), p. 4225 Nicholls (2003) p. 7826 Ibid, p.79

6

The Poets:

Nicholls refers to the poet as ‘a sacred personage of the Gaelic order.’ Poets (aos dana;

fileadh, singular file) ‘were the most striking group of the learned classes … his position

in late medieval society represented a most extraordinary survival from an earlier and

pre-Christian phase of Celtic life … His versified curses (usually miscalled satires in

English, but their purpose was magical harm, not ridicule) could injure and kill those

against whom they were directed.’ The training of a poet took seven years. 27

James Carney points out that ‘the understanding of this verse requires a knowledge of the

whole Irish genealogical scheme back, at least, to the fifth century, as well as a good

knowledge of Irish topography.’28 He goes on to say ‘Bardic poems are in the main

contemporary historical documents. Any facts alluded to, such as details of immediate

ancestry, must be taken as true, for they had to receive the assent of a contemporary

audience. Poets were trained diplomats. Even when they exercised the office of ollamh to

a given prince they travelled and exercised their art for the benefit of other princes.

Today’s enemy might be tomorrow’s friend, so that, while there are exceptions, poets

praised one man in such generalised terms that they could not thereby incur the disfavour

of another.’29

Duffy, Edwards and FitzPatrick point out that ‘an unhelpful mystique evolved around the

Gaelic literature scaring off interested scholars from outside the discipline. It is

encouraging to note, therefore that one of the principal debates currently raging in Gaelic

27 Ibid, p19, 9328 Carney, J. ‘Literature in Irish, 1169-1534’ in Moody, T.W., Martin, F.X., Byrne, F.J. A New History of Ireland, Volume II pt.2, Early Modern Ireland 1534 – 1691 (London, 1976) p. 69429 ibid. p. 694

7

literary studies, concerning the extent to which bardic poetry reacted to the

transformation of the Irish political scene during the Elizabethan and early Stuart period,

or remained unresponsive, locked into age-old conventions, was sparked off by historians

who ventured into the field of Gaelic literature in the late 1970s and 1980s. They provide

a bibliography of approx. ten items over a twenty-year period up to 1998 and the debate

still goes on.’30

Ireland as a lineage or clan society

Ireland may be regarded as unique in terms of assets such as its topography.

Kenneth Nicholls points out that ‘Irish genealogical texts constitute a body of material

which is unique in Europe both for its chronological sweep – from the seventh –

eighteenth centuries – and, considering its date and the losses which it has sustained, its

extent.’31 Its individualism is no less apparent in other aspects Gaelic society. Christianity

had infiltrated all aspects of European society where as in Ireland it ‘never seems to have

really expanded outside the purely religious sphere of life.’32 To illustrate this point

Nicholls uses the example of marriage and divorce in Ireland. He says, it ‘tended to be

determined by secular rules quite different from the teachings of the Church on these

matters.’33 He goes on to refer to the uniqueness of the ‘lineage or clan expansion’ that

prevailed in Gaelic Ireland and how crucial it is to an understanding of this period. The

30 Duffy, S., Edwards, D., and FitzPatrick, E. (eds.) Gaelic Ireland c.1250-1650; land, lordship and settlement. Dublin, 2001. p. ?31 Nicholls K. W. ‘Genealogy’ in Buttimer, N., Rynne, C., Guerin, H.(eds. )The heritage of Ireland. (Cork, 2000) p. 156-16132 Nicholls, K. W.: Gaelic and Gaelicized Ireland in the Middle Ages (Dublin, 2003) p. 333 Ibid, p. 3

8

idea of society as clans or lineages was a Gaelic one. K. W. Nicholls describes a clan as

‘a unilineal (in the Irish case, patrilineal) descent group forming a definite corporate

entity with political and legal functions.’34 Nicholls goes to great lengths to emphasise to

the reader that the clan does not in any way represent the ‘socio-familial’ sphere of

society. He also expresses amazement at how speedily the Anglo-Normans adapted to the

idea of the clan after invasion, saying, ‘the most outstanding feature in the Gaelicization

of the Anglo-Norman settlers was the speed with which, within the first century

following the invasion, the concept of the clan had become established among them.’35

Anne Chambers notes that ‘To the proud Earl of Desmond, the great gaelicised feudal

aristocrat of Munster, Drury was but a servant, a hireling, one of the contemptible

‘English churls’ of inferior degree.’36 (fig. 2). This sums up how fully the Anglo Normans

adapted to the idea of the clan, and the clan mentality towards those whose lineage could

not be established.

‘A clan may be represented by a single individual only, the only member remaining of

his descent-group, which nevertheless continues to exist so long as any member of it

survives. The small descent-groups within a larger clan may each constitute entities or

clans, while remaining part of the larger one, and may again be similarly subdivided

themselves.’37

Like Christianity, the clan did not penetrate all levels of society. Poorer families did not

belong to a clan, rather just to immediate family. These persons were frowned upon by

the society as ‘mere churls and labouring men.’38 Although there were periods when the

34 Ibid, p. 935 Ibid, p. 836 Chambers, A. Eleanor Countess of Desmond. (Dublin, 2000). p. 112.37 Nicholls (2003) p. 9-1038 Ibid, p. 10

9

genealogies were not recorded at all, as for instance between 1130 and 1300,39 the

keeping of genealogies was ‘entrusted to the professional families of scribes and

chroniclers.’40 This is one reason why poorer people could not record their genealogies.

Tension and conflict within a clan was very common. The grounds for disputes would

come in the form of rights over the clan property.41 Nicholls uses the example of a

seventeenth century lawsuit between two brothers, ‘who held in common a minute

property in county Tipperary’42, that resulted in one brother murdering the other over the

right to the land, something which very possibly could have been a common outcome in

such cases. When the scale of property went up the scale of violence must have followed.

Historians see the rate of clan expansion as ‘the most important phenomena in a clan

based society.’ The expansion would come from the top down i.e. the dominant stocks

would expand at the expense of the smaller entities, thus commoners would be displaced

by royals. The rate of expansion of an Irish clan should not be underestimated. For

example, Turlough an fhíona O Donnell, lord of Tirconnell (d. 1423) had eighteen sons

(by ten different women) and fifty-nine grandsons in the male line. This was by no means

the exception rather it was common practice.43 ‘The concept of the lineage or clan…in

1310…received formal recognition in an Irish statute which decreed that the chief of

every ‘great lineage’ should be responsible for its members, a principal which was

already in force in Hiberno-English law regarding native Gaelic clans, but was now

formally extended to those of Anglo-Norman origin’.

39 Nicholls (2000) p. 156.40 Nicholls, (2003) p. 1041 Ibid, p. 1142 Ibid, p.1143 Ibid, p. 11-12

10

Scholars agree that due to the lack of surviving internal Gaelic administrative

documentation they have had to rely on the views of hostile outsiders when it comes to

researching society and culture in the later middle ages.44 ‘The Topographia Hibernie of

Giraldus Cambrensis was the matrix as it were, for descriptions of Ireland from the 12th

century onwards. Such portrayals (mainly by English writers) generally contained some

religious or philosophical sanction, stated or implied, for either occupation in the 12th

century (as with Giraldus) or for continued rule or further colonisation in the 16th century

(as with Stanihurst, Spencer and Polydor Vergil). The general thrust of these portrayals

was that the Gaelic Irish were a barbarous unruly nation; lax or aberrant in its practice of

the Christian religion, a nation much in need of being taken in hand, humanized and

religiously or economically reformed.’45 With the passage of time and painstaking work

of historians more reliable information surfaced regarding Gaelic society and in ‘these

latest accounts [Gaelic society] is seen as a complex and organised system of institutions

with its own principals and rules of arrangement.’46

Irish society in the sixteenth century cannot be divided into two sharply opposed classes

i.e. a free class and a servile class. It is true that there were men known as ‘bond-men’ but

these were not cultivators or peasants. They were the middlemen between the proprietor

of the land and the actual cultivators i.e. the peasantry. These ‘bond-men’ were merely

subjects of the lord.47 ‘That the distinction, however, that has been drawn between the

‘free’ and ‘unfree’ elements of the population is certainly unreal in legal terms must not

44 For example, Simms, K. ‘Bardic poetry as a historical source’ in The writer as witness: literature as historical evidence; Dunne, T. (ed.) Cork, 1987. p. 58-75. Historical Studies XVI45 Caulfield, M. D. ‘Introduction’ The Tenebriomastix of Don Philip O’Sullivan Beare: Poitiers (MS 259 (97): an edition of part of Book I (1-24 and 87-137) with introduction, translation and notes. Ph D thesis, UCC 200446 Lennon, C Sixteenth-Century Ireland: The Incomplete Conquest, (Dublin, 1994) p. 4247 Nicholls (2003) p. 78

11

blind us to its reality in social and economic ones. In practice the status of the great mass

of the population in Gaelic Ireland, the actual cultivators and labourers – ‘churls’, as they

are referred to by contemporary English writers – was very low indeed.’48 The landless

clans of ‘followers’ also referred to in Nicholls’ work were similar to the ‘bonds-men’ in

that they were of a higher social class then the peasantries. These ‘followers’ were to be

found especially in Munster.

The Poets:

Nicholls refers to the poet as ‘a sacred personage of the Gaelic order.’ Poets (aos dana;

fileadh, singular file) ‘were the most striking group of the learned classes … his position

in late medieval society represented a most extraordinary survival from an earlier and

pre-Christian phase of Celtic life … His versified curses (usually miscalled satires in

English, but their purpose was magical harm, not ridicule) could injure and kill those

against whom they were directed.’ The training of a poet took seven years. 49

James Carney points out that ‘the understanding of this verse requires a knowledge of the

whole Irish genealogical scheme back, at least, to the fifth century, as well as a good

knowledge of Irish topography.’50 He goes on to say ‘Bardic poems are in the main

contemporary historical documents. Any facts alluded to, such as details of immediate

ancestry, must be taken as true, for they had to receive the assent of a contemporary

audience. Poets were trained diplomats. Even when they exercised the office of ollamh to

a given prince they travelled and exercised their art for the benefit of other princes.

48 Ibid, p.7949 Ibid, p19, 9350 Carney, J. ‘Literature in Irish, 1169-1534’ in Moody, T.W., Martin, F.X., Byrne, F.J. A New History of Ireland, Volume II pt.2, Early Modern Ireland 1534 – 1691 (London, 1976) p. 694

12

Today’s enemy might be tomorrow’s friend, so that, while there are exceptions, poets

praised one man in such generalised terms that they could not thereby incur the disfavour

of another.’51

Duffy, Edwards and FitzPatrick point out that ‘an unhelpful mystique evolved around the

Gaelic literature scaring off interested scholars from outside the discipline. It is

encouraging to note, therefore that one of the principal debates currently raging in Gaelic

literary studies, concerning the extent to which bardic poetry reacted to the

transformation of the Irish political scene during the Elizabethan and early Stuart period,

or remained unresponsive, locked into age-old conventions, was sparked off by historians

who ventured into the field of Gaelic literature in the late 1970s and 1980s. They provide

a bibliography of approx. ten items over a twenty-year period up to 1998 and the debate

still goes on.’52

The Law:

‘The native Irish legal system was and is usually referred to as the Brehon Law, from

brehon, the English form of the Irish word breitheamh, a judge.’53 The term ‘Brehon

Law’ is a very appropriate one. ‘Irish law was “judge-made” law; its texts distill the legal

rules and remedies developed over the centuries by highly trained professional jurists. It

was an “organic” system that reflected the complexities of Irish society. This explains its

richness and sophistication…Brehon law was the product of a learned class which

51 ibid. p. 69452 Duffy, S., Edwards, D., and FitzPatrick, E. (eds.) Gaelic Ireland c.1250-1650; land, lordship and settlement. Dublin, 2001. p. ?53 Nicholls (2003) p. 50

13

transcended political boundaries. As a result, Brehon law was “national,” in the sense that

it was a cultural phenomenon of Ireland as a whole, with few (if indeed any) discernable

regional variations…a vast treasury of judges law survives. The principal document is the

Senchas Már,54 “The Great Collection of Traditional Learning.” This consisted of about

fifty separate texts. Twenty-one of these survive more or less intact, and fragments of

most of the others remain. Most of the texts deal with a discrete topic of law. For

example, the first text in the Seanchas Már is a tract “On the Four Divisions of Distraint”

(Di Chetharshlicht Athgeabala). Distraint was a process by which parties could force

their opponents to court by impounding their cattle.’55 The Law covered all aspects of life

in an agrarian society: Kelly gives a full list of these from the king, through the family

unit, servants, manufacturers, contracts, livestock, foodstuffs, even bees and their honey,

noting especially marriage, and the care of women and children.56, 57

54 The oldest fragments of the Senchas Mar are in Trinity College Dublin (MS. H.2.15) and a facsimile was published by the Irish Manuscripts Commission in 1931.55 McLeod, N. ‘Brehon Law’, in Duffy, S. (ed.) Medieval Ireland: an encyclopedia. New York and London, 2005. p. 42-4356 Nicholls ‘Genealogy’ p. 15757 Kelly, F. ‘Contents’ A guide to early Irish law. Dublin, 1988 p vii-xii. Binchy, D. A. (ed) Corpus iuris hibernici. Dublin, 1976 is the compilation of extant early Irish law texts.

14

Examples of Taxes:

Taxes were as necessary in early Ireland as they are now. Two of the better known, and

most burdensome were those of coshery (coshering)58 and coyne and livery.59 Both

were obligatory hospitality, with coshering usually lasting ‘two days and two nights …

[around times of the seasonal] major religious feasts like Christmas, Easter ‘As it is

usually understood, coyne and livery was the single most important tax in later medieval

Ireland. It comprised the key element in the system of tributes and exactions used in the

native lordships whereby the lords and chieftains required their subjects to give free

entertainment (food, lodging, etc.) to their servants and followers. Often used as a tax to

meet the maintenance of a lord’s army, the extent to which it could be imposed

determined the military strength of a lordship; conversely, a strong military lord [like the

Earl of Desmond] could impose it as often as he liked, once he had the troops to enforce

it.’

Edwards points out that this term ‘is a hybrid one; used by English writers to describe a

range of taxes in use in the Gaelic and gaelicised lordships … the cuddy, (coid oidche),

[which] was specifically the taking of a night’s entertainment, but was sometimes dubbed

coyne and livery by English observers … bishops in Gaelic areas levied ‘noctials’,

something very similar to coyne and livery. Cosgrove tells us the word ‘‘coyne’ derives

from the Irish term coinneamh and coinnmheadh , both meaning billeting or quartering ...

Livery referred to the practice of similarly supporting horses and grooms without

payment.60 Empey and Simms cite a report entitled ‘State of Ireland and plan for its

58 Edwards, D. ‘Coshering’ in Duffy op. cit., p. 10859 Edwards, D. ‘Coyne and livery’ in ibid., p. 110-11.60 Cosgrove, A ‘The emergence of the Pale, 1399-1447’ NHI 2, p. 541-2

15

reformation’ (c. 1515) which defined coyne and livery as ‘takeing horsse meate and

mannes meate of the kinges pore subgettes by compulsion, for nought, withoute any peny

paying therfor.’61Attempts were made by parliament during the fifteenth century to

‘abolish a bad, most heinous and unbearable custom, called coigne.’62 As we know, this

had no effect in Munster and Edwards remarks that ‘Coyne was an especially heavy

burden in the Desmond lordship, imposed as often as once a fortnight on the earls’

subjects, many of whom were reduced to subsistence levels of existence as a result.’63

The Church:

From earliest times Ireland had established a reputation for learning, scholarship and the

ownership of books. Irish Franciscans collected so many books that in 1336 the Pope

[Benedict XII, who was interested in reforming the abuses in the church] instructed them

to compile a list of their books, which should be kept up-to-date.64

Nicholls points out that by ‘the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries the monasteries had

become completely secularized, [but] it must not be supposed that the tradition of

Christian asceticism or monastic piety was absent from Ireland … Abbacies and

priorships came to be treated as simply ecclesiastical benefices, and like other benefices

became quasi-hereditary … ambitious clerics transferred from one order to another

61 Empey, C.A. and Simms, K. ‘The ordinances of the White Earl and the problem of coign in the later middle ages’ Proc Roy Ir Acad C 75 (1975) p 178-87 quoted in Ibid p 542. (S.P. Hen. VIII, ii, 12)62 State Papers Ireland John-Hen. V, p 573 cited in Cosgrove, A. op. cit. p. 542 n. 3 63 Edwards op. cit. 2005 p 11164 Davis, H.M. ‘The library tradition’ Buttimer, N., Rynne, C., Guerin, H. op. cit. The only catalogue of an Irish house which exists however, dates from the latter half of the fifteenth century and is an inventory of the books which were in the Franciscan library at Youghal in 1491. Further titles were added to the catalogue in 1523. The list was written by the Sub-Prior, Brother William O’Hurrily, ‘lest perchance, by carelessness or neglect, or which is worse, want of conscience … they might be completely destroyed and no memorial of the remain.’p. 275

16

whenever a chance of promotion presented itself.’65 In 1576 Sir William Gerard the Irish

Chancellor recommended that Archbishop Loftus be translated to a bishopric in England

and the profits from his see be applied to the maintenance of legal affairs within the

Pale!66

Through the Donation of Constantine67Adrian IV, by the Bull Laudabiliter, had conferred

the Lordship of Ireland upon Henry II. Henry VIII had been declared Head of the Irish

Church in 1536, thus severing his connection with Rome. In June 1541 a Parliament was

summoned in Dublin, attended by many Irish chiefs who gave their assent to this In a

proclamation of this same year the King’s style appears as: ‘Henry VIII, King of

England, Ireland and France, Defender of the Faith and on earth Supreme Head of the

Church of England and Ireland.’68 An Irish Statute of 1542 I. 176 is entitled An Act that

the King of England, his Heirs and Successors, be Kings of Ireland (33 Henry VIII, c.

I0).69, 70 The latter years of the 1530s saw the commencement of the dissolution of the

monasteries in Ireland by George Browne, Archbishop of Dublin and John Staples, both

sent to enforce the Act of Supremacy. The Annals of the Four Masters record all of this.71

The destruction of the Cistercian Abbey at Graignamanagh, Co. Kilkenny, was described 65 Nicholls op. cit. p. 12566 Cal Carew MSS II p 55 cited in Maxwell, C . Irish History from contemporary sources (1509-1610). London, 1923 p. 30.67 A document fabricated in the second half of the eighth century , by which the Popes claimed temporal dominion over all the islands of the ocean. Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church. Oxford, 1997. p 49968Maxwell, C op. cit. p.22.69Irish Statutes, cited in Maxwell, C op. cit. p. 101-2 70 http://www.heraldica.org/topics/national/ireland_docs.htm#act1542 71AFM 5, 1576 ‘A heresy and a new error [sprang up] in England, … the men of England went into opposition to the Pope and Rome … they styled the King the Chief Head of the Church of God in his own kingdom. New laws and statutes were enacted by the King and Council [Parliament] according to their own will. They destroyed the orders to whom worldly possessions were allowed, namely, the Monks, Canons, Nuns …They broke down the monasteries, and sold their roofs and bells, so that … there was not one monastery that was not broken and shattered, with the exception of a few in Ireland, of which the English took no notice or heed … it is impossible to narrate or tell its description, unless it should be narrated by one who saw it.’p. 1445-9.

17

by the Protestant Bishop of Ossory, John Bale, in his Preface to Leland’s New Year’s

Gift to King Henry VIII: ‘A greate number of them [people] which purchased those

superstychous mansions, reserved of those librayre bookes some to serve theyr jokes,

some to scoure theyr candlesticks, and some to rub theyr bootes; some they sold to the

grosser and sopesellers, and some they sent over the sea to the bookbinders – not in small

number, but at tymes whole shippes full, to the wonderynge of foren nacyons; yea, ye

universities of this realme [England] are not all cleare in this detestable fact, but cursed is

that bellye which seeketh to be fed with such ungodlye gayness, and so depelye shameth

his natural conterye. I know a merchantmanne, which shall at this time be namelesse, that

bought ye contents of two noble libraryes for forty shillings price: a shame be it spoken.

Thys stuffe hath he occupied in the stedde of grey paper by the space of more than these

ten years, and yet he hath store ynoughe for as many years to come.’72

And so some of ‘the most prominent features of the man-made landscape’73 in Ireland

were torn down and destroyed but the unique topography they were constructed on

remained intact. This will be discussed in the following section.

The Land:

72 O’Leary, P. ‘Notes on the Cistercian Abbey of Graignamanagh’ Journal of the Royal Society of Antiquaries of Ireland 2 (5th series), pp 237-47. quoted in Davis ‘The library tradition’ Buttimer, Rynne Guerin op. cit., p. 276.73Quinn, D.B. and Nicholls, K.W. ‘Ireland in 1534’ in NHI III. p. 29

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These however, are not the earliest maps of Ireland. John H. Andrews says ‘Islands have

always held a fascination for the mapmaker … The smaller the island, the stronger its

aura of insularity.74 Ireland’s significance was sufficient for the geographer Ptolemy of

Alexandria to have it feature in his Geographia of the world known to the Romans and

Greeks (ca. CE 150). He provided ‘the latitudes and longitudes of fifty Irish capes,

settlements, estuaries, and cities, [most likely] iron age hill forts rather than urban

communities allows for the earliest construction of the shape and size of Ireland…’75 The

longitudes are reckoned from the Canary Islands Ptolemy’s Geographia was first

published in 1477 (shortly after the introduction of printing into Europe in 1450). To

return to Andrews, he points out ‘Even after an accurate survey the smallness of Ireland

remains hard to express in quantitative terms, mainly because internal and external water

surfaces are so difficult to distinguish … However, its smallness is psychologically

diminished by the nearby presence of an island … actually 2.75 times as large … Ireland

was invaded and feudalised by Anglo-Norman magnates in the middle ages, conquered

by English armies in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, and then governed by

British civil servants until the twentieth century.76

A special volume of A new history of Ireland dedicated to maps, genealogies and lists,

published in 1984 warrants the inclusion of Ptolemy’s map of Ireland, ‘based on the

reconstruction in Ordnance Survey … 1956’ and the footnote by F. J. Byrne, shows that

almost two thousand years later, it has given rise to much scholarly debate ranging from

74 Andrews, J. H. Shapes of Ireland: maps and their makers 1564-1839. Dublin, Geography Publications. 1997. p. 1. 75 Ibid., p 26-7.76 Andrews, J. H. Shapes.. pp. 1-2.

19

commerce, through language and surveying throughout Europe, particularly during the

last two centuries.77

Lennon rightly claims ‘That no native cartographical overview [of Ireland] existed about

1500 was due to the lack of those antiquarian and historical studies being pioneered by

the humanists in countries influenced by the Renaissance…In the later sixteenth century

the topographical unveiling of much of the island took place in the context of English

governmental reform proposals.’78. Andrews’ book cites another source which discusses

the portolan charts79 on which Ireland was represented as early as 1300 prior to giving

giving an account of the various English and other cartographic Irish projects. 80

To show how important these maps were for the contemporary would-be colonisers and

for the modern historian, we can do no better than quote from Edmund Tremayne (1525-

82), secretary to Sir Henry Sidney (Lord Deputy of Ireland 1565-71; 1575-8), in

recommending what became Lythe’s map ‘… it will be liked for that you shall make a

general description of the whole realm. There is not so plain a way to make

77 Moody, T.W., Martin, F.X., Byrne, F.J. (eds) A new history of Ireland IX: maps, genealogies, lists; a companion to Irish history part II. Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1984. p. 16 fig. 14 ‘Ptolemy’s map of Ireland c. 150 AD’; n. 14 p. 98 by F. J. Byrne. 78 Lennon, Colm: Sixteenth-Century Ireland: The Incomplete Conquest, (Gill & Macmillan, Dublin, 1994) p. 1-279 A portolan chart. also called  Harbour-finding Chart, Compass Chart, or Rhumb Chart,  is a navigational chart of the European Middle Ages (1300–1500). The earliest dated navigational chart extant was produced at Genoa by Petrus Vesconte in 1311 and is said to mark the beginning of professional cartography. The portolan charts were characterized by rhumb lines, lines that radiate from the centre in the direction of wind or compass points and that were used by pilots… http://www.britannica.com/eb/article-9060998/portolan-chart 80 Andrews, M. C. ‘The map of Ireland 1300-1700’, Proc Belfast Natural History and Philosophical Society, 1922-3, p. 16-23, quoted in Andrews Shapes p. 67

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demonstration thereof as by the view of that perfect cart that your lordship hath caused to

be taken in hand … whereby you shall have occasion to describe every part o it with their

frontiers, and all the borders, havens, creeks, and rivers with other notable commodities.

By the same your lordship is able to describe every man his country, of what power he is,

and what he hath been, and how it is neighboured, what quarrels he hath, and how every

war each of them is affected … The places that be fortified already will appear. And so

you may with good commodity thereupon express what your opinion is for fortification

in any other place that your lordship shall think good. … And finally by these means you

shall describe what commodity hath grown of such things as are done and what her

highness shall embrace by proceeding onward ever abating cost behind as she shall

bestow it forward.’81 The ensuing large map (eight and a half feet long and five and a half

feet wide) has not survived, but the one which concerns us ‘A single draght of Mounster’

does.82 Andrews points out ‘Lythe deserves credit for ignoring the well-established

distinction between land and water surveys. His expenses included the hire of boats along

the coast from Kinsale to Dingle as well as in the harbours of Cork and Kinsale, the lower

Shannon … as early surveys go, this one is quite well documented, not only in the

author’s expense accounts but in a series of letters which include a signed specimen of

his distinctive handwriting.’83 Roads are totally omitted in his map, but his recording of

hills, lakes and island (the last two generally too large) and tower houses are ‘plain and

functional …; his choice of subject matter, coasts, inland water, mountains, principal

settlements and territorial divisions’. Bringing as many maps as possible together can

give a description of soil, vegetation (including forests and foodstuffs), animal

81 London. Public Record Office SP63/32/66 June 1571 quoted in Andrews Shapes p. 67 n.1782 London. Public Record Office. MPF 73.83 Andrews Shapes p. 63-4.

21

husbandry, the flow of rivers and the obstacles they created are needed Topography

affected communication, probably the most important aspects of everyday life, because

society depends on it. It includes all activities e.g., travel, trade, commerce. Manmade

structures of all kinds, including houses large and small, roads, bridges, fortifications,

mills are other features of the landscape which are significant. Weather was of course an

external determinant of the condition of the land and its produce.

‘Much of the evidence for the geographical character of Ireland at this time derives from

the observations of English visitors [including people like Richard Stanihurst, who based

much of his work on Giraldus Cambrensis84] and it is often difficult, therefore, to

distinguish between the ‘real’ Ireland and Ireland as viewed through the perceptual lenses

of statesmen, soldiers, officials, settlers, and curious observers, few of whom were able to

give objective accounts of their experiences ‘…These biases and often-untrustworthy

contemporary accounts of 16th century Ireland are balanced out by the actualities of life

and landscape in Ireland that in the main survived the brief and relatively ineffective

attempts at reform and change.85 It was not only for geographical aspects of Ireland that

these subjective views were forwarded by the ‘New English’86 settlers but also for

commercial expansion and colonisation in Ireland. ‘A Discourse of Ireland’ typifies most

Elizabethan projects in that it is coated in propaganda.87 The Discourse ‘is in no sense an

84Richard Stanihurst, a 16th-century Dubliner. Stanihurst was a highly-skilled Latin author whose works were published on the continent during the latter part of the 16th century and early 17th century but have not appeared in modern editions, have mostly not been translated, and have no commentaries.  Other continuing studies have been focused primarily on writings produced by Irish authors from c.1500 onwards. http://www.ucc.ie/acad/classics/CNLS/Background.html 85.Moody, T. W Martin, F. X. Byrne F. J. (eds)s A New History of Ireland, Volume III, Early Modern Ireland 1534 – 1691, (Oxford University Press, 1976) p. 142.86 So-called to distinguish them from the ‘Old English’ settlers. The ‘New English’ settlers would have been predominantly protestant.87 Quinn, D. B. ‘A Discourse of Ireland’ (Circa 1599); a sidelight on English colonial policy, Proc Roy Ir Acad C XLVII (1942) P. 151-66 p. 159.

22

objective description or analyses of Irish conditions, but a propagandist tract whose main

object is to encourage the exploitation of Ireland in the economic interest of England.’88

‘Gerald of Wales describes Ireland, at the close of the twelfth century, as a land full of

woods, bogs and lakes, and for most of the country, and especially the midland plain and

the north, the description would still have been true in the sixteenth century.’89 This being

said, it was not true of all of Ireland despite what might be suggested in some

contemporary military accounts (which were prone to exaggeration and contradiction).90

The claim that Ireland is overpopulated by woods and bogs is refuted by Fynes Moryson

(1566-1630) secretary to the Lord Deputy Sir Charles Blount91 in his ‘Description of

Ireland’: ‘…But I confess myself to have been deceived in the common fame that all

Ireland is woody, having found in my long journey from Armagh to Kinsale few or no

woods by the way excepting the great wood of Ophalia [Offaly] and some low shrubby

places which they call ‘glins’.’92

‘The Peyton Survey’, also known as the ‘Desmond Survey’, (the Annals of the Four

Masters do not refer to this under the relevant years, i.e. 1584-86) set up in June1584 to

acquire knowledge of the Earl of Desmond’s escheated property, is a most convenient

and appropriate way to discover information about the lands of Munster in the sixteenth

century.93, 94 This survey was to comment on the lands ‘topography, thus providing us 88 Ibid p. 15289 Nicholls, K. W: Gaelic and Gaelicized Ireland in the Middle Ages, (Dublin, 2003) p. 590 Moody, T. W., Martin, F. X., Byrne F. J. (eds): A New History of Ireland, Volume III, Early Modern Ireland 1534 – 1691, (Oxford University Press, 1976)91 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fynes_Moryson92 Butlin Moody, T. W., Martin, F. X., Byrne F. J. (eds): A New History of Ireland, Volume III, Early Modern Ireland 1534 – 1691, (Oxford University Press, 1976)p. 14393 Maccarthy – Morrogh, M. The Munster Plantation, English Migration to Southern Ireland, 1583 – 1641. (Oxford, 1986) p. 4 -594 Ibid Get footnote number.. The Peyton Survey originals were destroyed in 1922; transcript of a small part of the original Latin calendar for Limerick, PROI, M. 2759; English translation and condensation for

23

with a similar opportunity.’95 Sir Valentine Browne was appointed head of the

commission. ‘The commission’s instructions were to discover the area of escheated land,

compute its value, and name the present occupier. Church property was to be recorded.

The topography of the areas, minerals available, timber and stock, all were to be

catalogued and special mention was to be made of corn production and prices.’96,97

The commission made a detailed report on the topography of County Limerick. ‘Most of

Limerick lies in a half basin with a rim of high land to the west, south, and east, and the

River Shannon to the north. Straggling the Kerry border was Slevelogher, not a

particularly high range of hills with a summit of just over 1,000 feet, but throughout the

early modern period referred to with awe and exasperation since it was sometimes

impassable in wet weather. Three days of continuous rain – not an incredible occurrence

in south-west Ireland – could sever all communications to Kerry…Most of the county’s

interior is under 250 feet. Two Sluggish rivers, the Maigue and the Deel, make their way

north from the surrounding high rim to the Shannon estuary. The region has mostly heavy

soils and the lowlands the lowest rainfall in Munster, 30 to 40 inches a year. The

inadequate drainage, combined with clays, produces a rich grassland ideal for pastoral

farming and today, as in the sixteenth century, wealth lies in herds rather than in crops.

Apart from the way to Kerry, there were no route difficulties to County Cork in the south

or to Tipperary in the east; neither were there internal barriers to communications. Both

all Limerick and Kerry, ibid, 5037-9. Kerry portion privately printed (n.d.; presented to PROI, 1923); copy in The Kerryman (Tralee), Aug-Nov. 1927. Survey for Mallow translated and transcribed by H. F. Berry, ‘The Manor and Castle of Mallow in the days of the Tudors’, CHAS, 2 (1893). Part of a MS exists, endorsed ‘a book of parcels of the earl of Desmond’s lands’ (n.d.), but much of this is a verbatim copy of the 1572 survey of the Earl’s lands, itself probably utilized for later confiscation, SP/63/110/79; Cal, Carew, 1515-74, pp. 414-18.95 Maccarthy – Morrogh, M. The Munster Plantation, English Migration to Southern Ireland, 1583 – 1641,(Oxford, 1986) p. 4 -596 Ibid, p. 597 Ibid, p. 5

24

the Deel and Maigue were bridged in many places, although the lowest crossing over the

latter was at Adare, a good ten miles from the river mouth.’98 From Limerick the

commission travelled to county Kerry, running into much difficulty along the way. Sir

Valentine Browne related to Lord Burghley they had been through ‘woods, bogs,

mountains and dangerous waters’; giving an idea of the dangers of travelling across

Ireland in this period and how hazardous the topography could be. Browne’s son broke

an arm and some of their horses drowned while trying to cross a river.99

In the sixteenth century the county of Kerry was divided into two counties, there was

both an Irish region and an Anglo-Norman region. The Anglo-Norman region, known as

‘Kerry’ designated the Norman northern half, while ‘Desmond’ occupied the southern

Irish half. The boundary was from Dingle Bay up the Maine River, then along the Brown

Flesk tributary until the Cork border.100

‘There were two low-lying areas in north and central Kerry and traversing the first of

these could be difficult because of a lack of bridges on the River Feale. In winter one of

its tributaries, the Brick, was navigable for a large galley up to Lixnawe, seven miles

from the sea. For some time military advisers had pressed for a bridge at the head of the

Feale to allow a route from Limerick into Kerry along the banks of the Shannon estuary.

Rainfall of course was much higher than Limerick. Relief rain soaked most of ‘Desmond’

with 60’’ to 100’’ or more. The mountains in the Dingle peninsula attracted similar

amounts, but north Kerry experienced lower averages of 40’’ to 50’’ a year.’101

For its comparatively small size Ireland has a distinct and varied terrain. Different levels

of land both mountainous and undulating as well as a variety of soils and bogs can appear 98 Ibid, p. 899 Ibid, p. 10100 Ibid, p. 10101 Ibid, p. 10

25

in a small plain. Cultural distinctiveness and traditional lifestyles were in part maintained

by Irelands natural frontiers i.e. mountains, forests and bogs.102 The main woodland areas

[In Ireland, not only Munster] lay to the north-west of Lough Neagh, in the Erne basin,

along the Shannon, in the river valleys of the west and south, and on the eastern slopes of

the Wicklow and Wexford hills, with ‘smaller but significant areas…in eastern county

Down, in the Glens of Antrim, in the Sperrin valleys, on the western coast of Lough

Swilly, on the western coast of Donegal and in north Sligo and south Galway’.’103

Kenneth Nicholls points out ‘in general it could be said that fifteenth and sixteenth

century Ireland was extensively wooded in all mountainous areas, even those of the

western seaboard – and on the margins and islands of the bogs of the central plain.’104

Looking at John Goghe’s map of Ireland (c. 1567)105 and comparing it with Laurence

Nowell’s A General Description of England and Ireland (1564-65)106 reinforces this

statement. Further study of Irish maps, including Eileen McCracken’s map regarding

forestry and highland (c. 1600)107, and Andrews’ analyses of the maps (examples already

mentioned above), shows that scholars are agreed on this point. Nicholls refers to another

map 66. P. R. O. i. 7. ‘This is a map of the counties of Cork, Kerry, and Limerick, somewhat

roughly drawn on paper, 16 x 12 inches, of which the chief feature is a careful descriptioin of the

forests, coloured green, which then (1580) covered a large part of the province, viz. . ' Glangaruf,'

102 Lennon, C. Sixteenth-Century Ireland, The Incomplete Conquest, (Gill & Macmillan, Dublin, 1994) p. 3103 Moody, T. W. , Martin, F. X., Byrne, F. J. (eds) A New History of Ireland, Volume III, Early Modern Ireland 1534 – 1691, (Oxford University Press, 1976) p. 143104 Nicholls, K. W. Gaelic and Gaelicized Ireland in the Middle Ages, (Dublin, 2003), p. 6-7105 Smyth, W. J. Map-making, Landscapes and Memory, A Geography of Colonial and Early Modern Ireland c. 1530-1750, Plate 1d, fig. 2.6 Hibernia, insular non procul ab Anglia vulgare Hirlandia vocata, John Goghe’s map of Ireland (c. 1567). By permission of Public Record Office, London (MPF 168), (Cork University Press, Cork, 2006). 106 Smyth, William J. Map-making, Landscapes and Memory, A Geography of Colonial and Early Modern Ireland c. 1530-1750, Plate 1e, fig. 2.8 Laurence Nowell’s A General Description of England and Ireland (1564-5). By permission of the British Library (Add MS 62540), (Cork University Press, Cork, 2006).107 T. W. Moody, F. X. Martin, F. J. Byrne (eds) A New History of Ireland, Volume IX, Maps, Genealogies, lists, A companion to Irish History part II, (Oxford University Press, 1984) p. 49

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‘Glanrought’, ' Glanflesky',' Leanmore,' ' Glenglas,' ' Arlo Wood,' and 'Killhugy.' The map furnishes

no clue to the author of it, but it contains a few notes in Burghley's hand, as, e.g., ' Smerwick wher ye

Spanyard was ouer.’ Note.-In addition to the above maps there are said (footnote 19 Historical

Manuscripts Commission, 6th Report p. 309) to be four others relating to Munster in the possession of

Lord Leconfield at Petworth House, made in connection with the ' general survey of all such lands as

are conteyned within the county of Desmound, as well of such lands as as well as such as wear the

Earl of Clancartyes own demeans, as of all other lands belonging to the Lords and others the

freeholders of the said county.'108 Nicholls points out that the town of Killarney is a good

esample of this; we find that the town is surrounded by mountainous land that in turn is

covered by forestry. In general the map portrays Munster as a predominantly

mountainous region with much forested land encircling this highland. 109

On the other hand, it is worth mentioning that the Dutchman Gerard Mercator’s map

(Angliae Scotiae Hiberniae nova descriptio), although ‘essentially an English view of

Ireland’s place in the British Isles, and his title sets the and by printing ‘Hiberniae’ in

smaller script than ‘Angliae’ and ‘Scotiae’.’110 ‘Andrews goes on to say ‘Mercator’s

Ireland was physically well organised. It had no forests and no bogs or waste … The

implication is that the whole country was cultivated apart from the mountain … extensive

coverage [was] given to Ireland’s wealth of rivers and lakes … In human as in physical

geography [he] gives the impression of peace, order and uniformity. Settlement is

108 Dunlop, R. ‘Sixteenth-century maps of Ireland’ The English Historical Review, Vol. 20, No. 78. (Apr., 1905), pp. 309-337. Stable URL: http://links.jstor.org/sici?sici=0013-8266%28190504%2920%3A78%3C309%3ASMOI%3E2.0.CO%3B2-8. Cited in Nicholls K.W. ‘Woodland cover in pre-modern Ireland’ Duffy, P.J. Edwards, D. , FitzPatrick, E. (eds.) Gaelic Ireland c. 1250 – c. 1650. Dublin, Four Courts, 2001. p. 191 n.55.

,109 ibid.110 Andrews J. H. Ireland: maps and their makers 1564-1839. (Dublin, 1997). p. 46.

27

hierarchical. Towns as opposed to villages are shown by towers and spires with one or

more additional buildings to indicate the more important centres. The contemporary

preoccupation with security appears in Mercator;s liking for the word ‘castle … which

signals a countryside under control, presumably by legitimate forces as in central Europe

… ‘scene by displaying heraldic devices for England and Scotland but not for Ireland’.

111

The foregoing makes it clear that although maps are an important primary sources and

many are available, they cannot be taken at face value. They must be used in connection

with other documentary evidence and need much scholarly interpretation to get a picture

of the land as it was in sixteenth century Ireland.

The Desmond Rebellion:

Their power is emphasised in the entry in the Annals of the Four Masters which states

under the year 1579 ‘The Earl of Desmond] delivered up to the Lord Justice his only son

and heir, as a hostage, to ensure his loyalty and fidelity to the crown of England. A

promise was thereupon given to the Earl that his territory should not be plundered in the

future; but, although this promise was given, it was not kept, for his people and cattle

were destroyed, and his corn and edifices burned.’112

It was the breaking of promises such as this that would later see Eleanor Countess of

Desmond plead her husband’s innocence in a letter to the English Privy Council,

111 Ibid. 112 Annala Rioghachta Eireann. Annals of the Kingdom of Ireland, by the Four Masters, from the earliest period to the year 1616; edited from MSS in the Library of the Royal Irish Academy and of Trinity College, Dublin, with a translation, and copious notes by John O’Donovan, (hereafter AFM) Vol 5 p. 1717

28

claiming the Earl was forced into rebellion. In 1579 she wrote to the Privy Council and

while ‘giving an objective analysis of her husband’s shortcomings’, she reminds them of

but also insinuates her conviction that he had been pushed by Sir William Pelham, the

Lord Justice of Ireland and Sir Nicholas Malby, [Lord President of Connaught, who had

been appointed temporary governor of Munster113], into a rebellion that he did not want.

“My husband and his countrie have bene bled by persons who are in authoritie here,” she

wrote, and reminded the Council of her husband’s loyal conduct up to the death of Sir

William Drury [in 1579]. Then, she contends, Sir Nicholas Malby was allowed free rein

in Munster and ‘the place of Justice was void. Malbie marched therewith into my

husbands countrie, murdered certaine of his men, toke and spoyled certaine of his castles,

burned within houses old men and children and within churches bourned certaine

monuments of his ancestors and, a thinge which,’ as the Countess diplomatically assures

the Council, ‘greeved him most, openlie called him a traytor within the cytye of

Lymerick’.’114 Once Desmond had been vilified and tarnished a traitor his whole

‘Kingdom’ of Munster was at risk of plantation by ‘New English’ settlers. This is what

many of the Crown’s officials wanted as they would stand to gain from Desmond’s loss

of land and this is why, after resisting for so many years, the fifteenth Earl of Desmond

was forced into rebellion. ‘The Papal banner was unfurled over his head. The centuries-

old Desmond war-cry ‘Shanid abú!’ gave way to ‘Pápa abú!’ as the Geraldine rode out at

the head of a crusade he neither understood nor with which he could sympathise.’115

113 Chambers, A. Eleanor Countess of Desmond. Dublin, Wolfhound, 1986,2000. p. 130.

114 Countess of Desmond to Privy Council 28 June 1580 (SP 63/73/67) quoted in Chambers, Anne: Eleanor Countess of Desmond, (Dublin, 2000) p. 149, n. 19.

115 Chambers op. cit. p. 134

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The years prior to the Earl of Desmond being branded a traitor had witnessed contrasting

relations between the Crown’s officials and the Geraldine family in Munster. Basically,

the English wanted Desmond’s lands in Munster so that they could settle ‘New English’

loyal subjects there and run the province on the Crown’s terms. ‘The overall aim of

successive viceroys was, as elsewhere, for crown jurisdiction to flow throughout the

lordships great and small, with the elimination of the overlordship of major aristocrats

over lesser gentlemen. Given their dominance, the prime targets in the southern province

were the Anglo-Norman earldoms, encompassing two palatinates, Kerry in Desmond and

Tipperary in Ormond…’116 Opposition to this had come in the form of the first Desmond

rebellion 1569-73 revolt. ‘James, the son of Maurice, son of the Earl, was a warlike man

of many troops this year [1569]; and the English and Irish of Munster, from the Barrow

to Carn-Ui-Neid, entered into a unanimous and firm confederacy with him against the

Queen’s parliament.’117 Though originally arousing the support of the Butler brothers,

and the Earls of Thomond and Clanrickard and ‘leaving a trail of corpses looted and

burnt out houses and hovels’ in their wake, James FitzMaurice FitzGerald’s 1569 rising

was unsuccessful. The support from the other earldoms was not strong enough and their

following soon subsided as they submitted to the Lord Justice of Ireland, Sir Henry

Sidney, ‘who [had] retaliated with the same ferocity as FitzMaurice had shown to the

planters.’118 Sidney made his way to Munster where ‘he remained for a week besieging

the town [of Ui-Mac Caile]…The town was finally taken by the Lord Justice, and he left

warders in it to guard it for the Queen. He passed from thence through Barry’s country,

116 Lennon, C. Sixteenth-Century Ireland: The Incomplete Conquest, (Gill & Macmillan, Dublin, 1994) p. 209117 AFM. Vol 5 p. 1631118 Chambers, A. op.cit. p. 70

30

and through Gleann-Maghair, to proceed to Cork. Here there was a rising out of

Munstermen to give him battle; but the pass was nevertheless ceded to the Lord Justice…

From thence the Lord Justice went on to Limerick, and he demolished some of the towns

of Munster between Cork and Limerick…no deputy of the King of Ireland had ever

before made a successful expedition, with a like number of forces, than that journey

performed by him.’119 FitzMaurice had at this time retreated into the Kerry Mountains.

His first attempt at a rising in Munster had failed.

The re-ignition of FitzMaurice’s rebellion [1569-73] was sparked off on the continent of

Europe. The Saint Bartholomew’s Day massacre120 and its religious connotations had

FitzMaurice believe that a crusade in Ireland under a similar flag (i.e. a religious

crusade), would be backed by England’s enemies on the continent. ‘James FitzMaurice

FitzGerald had emerged from his retreat and raised the banner of crusade aloft once more

in Munster.’121 Though this crusade ended with FitzMaurice’s unexpected submission in

1573 to the Lord President, Sir John Perrot, it had a resounding effect in Munster. ‘The

rebellion had made it impossible for the colonisation process started by [Sir Peter] Carew

to make headway in Garrett’s lordship during his absence. It had demonstrated to the

Crown that the earl’s removal had not produced the results anticipated, namely the

extension of English law and custom throughout Desmond and thereby the curtailment of

his power and privileges there. His removal merely exchanged one Gaelic leader for a far

more dangerous and able one [i.e. James FitzMaurice FitzGerald]. Elizabeth had seen no

119 AFM. Vol 5 p. 1635120 4,000 Huguenots seen as cause of religious wars in France 1562-70 massacred Paris 24 August, 1572. by Catherine de Medici, and her son Charles IX.http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/13333b.htmThis, along with the excommunication of Queen Elizabeth by Pope Pius V in 1570, had turned the European struggle for power by France, England and Spain into a religious conflict (Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church. Oxford, 1997.121 Chambers, A. op.cit. p. 82

31

improvement in her finances resulting from the imprisonment of the Earl of Desmond.

On the contrary, she had to dig even deeper into her pocket to support her prisoner and

his retinue in England, while at the same time endeavouring to suppress an expensive

rebellion within his territory…’122. An good example of the cost of ‘Charges of the realm

of Ireland for martial affairs and all other extraordinary charges for one half year ending

last of March 1576 is given in the Carew MSS Vol 628 p. 314: Details are given under

the following headings123: Diets, wages, and entertainment of the head officers (over

£3,000); Horsemen, footbands attendant on the Lord Deputy [Sidney] (almost £2,000);

Warders in sundry forts and castles (over £3,750), Kernes,124 Pensioners at sundry rates,

Ministers of the Ordnance, Ministers of the Ordnance, Ministers of the Victuals: The sum

total came to £11,832. 0s.7d.’ Added to this were ‘Extraordinary charges, which included

freight, transportation, carriage of letters125 …The whole half year charge almost, £13,000

sterling.’126 So, the cost for that half year was £24,832. 0s. 7d.

This being said, once FitzMaurice had submitted to the Crown, there were some

successes for Perrot who could afford to concentrate his attentions on the ‘reforming aims

of his office as envisaged by Sidney. Already he had established the pattern by

conducting common law sessions throughout the province at which hundreds were

convicted of felonies and treasons and executed. Besides this innovative juridical regime,

Perrot banned aspects of the Gaelic system, including brehon law, coign and livery,

private maintenance of troops, bardic poetry and native dress. The key restriction was on

122 Ibid, p. 84123 Brewer, J.S. and Bullen, W. (eds) Calendar of the Carew MSS preserved in the Archiepiscopal Library at Lambeth 1575-1588(hereafter Cal. Carew MSS) p. 44-46; with a note that this is a contemporary copy covering three and a half pages.124

125 Cal. Carew MSS. p 45 which cost ‘ordinarily £13.6s.8d. per letter’126 Ibid. p. 45.

32

‘masterless’ men: all followers of lords were to be booked and accounted for, in default

of which they faced death.’127 Within days of Desmond’s return ‘the fortresses of

Castlemaine and Castlemartyr had been repossessed, and it seemed as if Perrot’s work

was being completely undone.’128 Desmond’s return was conditional in that he professed

loyalty to the Queen amongst other carefully arranged conditions, ‘although he was

reported to have said that, for the future, Irish and not English law would be administered

in his territory.’129

Both Sir William Drury and Sir Nicholas Malby were brought into office in the same

period, Drury as president of Munster and Malby as military governor of Connacht.

Drury had been highly recommended by Sidney in a letter dated 1576 to the Privy

Council: ‘Munster needs a discreet and active governor, “for these people are of the most

part Papists, and that in the maliciest decree … delighted in ravyne and licentious life” …

Hasten therefore my good Lords, him that shall take the charge here in the Queen and

country’s behalf, - I crave it; and the only man I hope you will find is Sir William

Druerye.’130 ‘These men, both of them soldiers, used violence to combat what the state

called lawlessness, but what retrospection shows us to have been the inevitable reaction

of vested interests to an enforced change in the pattern of society.’131 In a letter from the

Queen, to ‘Lord Justice Drury’132 she commends him on the job he has been doing in the

‘diseased state’ of Munster. The Queen applauds his hands on approach in Munster

127 Bagwell, R. Ireland under the Tudors ii p. 233-4 cited in Lennon, Colm: Sixteenth-Century Ireland: The Incomplete Conquest, (Gill & Macmillan, Dublin, 1994) p. 216 n. 10.128 Brady, C. ‘Faction and the origins of the Desmond rebellion of 1579’ Ir Hist Studies xxii 1981 cited in Lennon op. cit. p. 217 n.11.129 Moody, T. W., Martin, F. X., Byrne, F. J. (eds) A New History of Ireland, Volume III, Early Modern Ireland 1534 – 1691, (Oxford University Press, 1976) p. 100130 Cal. Carew MSS p. 41-2. The double inverted commas are used in the text.131 Moody, T. W., Martin, F. X., Byrne, F. J. (eds) op. cit. III p. 102132 Under the date May 29 1578 we read ‘Instructions given by the Queen’s Majesty … to Sir Wm. Drury, Knight, [whom] she hath appointed Lord Justice of Ireland …’Cal Carew MSS. p. 130.

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saying ‘since your cominge to the place and office of that our realme you have not given

your selfe to ease by makinge a continewall residence at Dublin…but have chosen rather

to be removinge to and from many and the pricipall provinces within that realme, as the

diseased state of that cuntry hath required.’133 The Queen also commends the violence

inflicted upon the people of Munster by Drury and his men, but this violence goes under

the heading of justice in the Queen’s letter. She says ‘that allmoste in all places of this

your jorney where occasion of doinge justice hath been offred, you have not in the

ministration thereof spared the cheefest persons; but proceaded against them by taking

good pledges and bandes, or otherwise orderinge of them as severely as anie of the

meanest sorte and condition; a thinge no doubte moste acceptable to God, who in matters

of justice mislikethe nothinge more then acceptation and regarde of persons.’134 The

Queen also refers to the people of Ireland as ‘ill and disordered persons’135 showing her

complete lack of regard for the Irish. But more importantly the Queen had given Drury

licence to continue with severe violence against the inhabitants of Ireland. ‘In Munster,

violence escalated. Drury executed hundreds of malefactors, some after sentence in the

courts, others by martial law’.136

Lord Justice Drury had originally taken the post of president of Munster in the summer of

1576. Drury ‘embarked on his presidency in a way that was bound to bring him into

collision with the uneasy earl [of Desmond]. Drury wrote enthusiastically to Walsinhgam

about the methods he had begun to employ. ‘… I began the assizes in Cork,’ he reported,

‘where I hanged to the number of 42. Of which some were notable malefactors, one

133 Hogan, J. and McNeill O’Farrell N. (eds). The Walsingham Letter-Book or Register of Ireland, May, 1578 to December, 1579, Dublin, IMC, 1959 (hereafter Walsingham p. 34134 Ibid135 Ibid136 Moody, T. W., Martin, F. X., Byrne, F. J. (eds) op. cit. Volume III, p. 103

34

pressed [i.e. pressed to death] and two gentlemen of the chief of the MacSweeneys

hanged drawn quartered; one of these …captain of galloglass … [whose] banner I reserve

for your honour.’137 This is the behaviour was commended by the Queen in her letter to

Drury mentioned above, and one reason why he was promoted to Lord Justice.

Relations between Drury and Desmond were tenuous from the outset (see above p..).

Drury felt threatened by the earl’s army which greatly outnumbered his own. In an

attempt to entice the earl into reducing the capacity of his army, Drury compiled a list of

Desmond’s men and made him directly responsible for their future conduct. Drury

continued to provoke the earl and ‘he next attempted to extract cess, in money and in

kind, from the earl’s tenants in order to defray the expenses of his presidency.’138 The

earl’s blood began to boil. Drury’s next target was the earl’s palatine in Kerry, which had

been deemed void by the Irish Privy Council. Drury claimed that traitors and rebels

resided there and proposed ‘to make a passage for law and justice to be there exercised.’

Drury set out for Kerry with the intention of establishing Crown courts there to prosecute

offenders by English law. This would result in a confrontation between both men’s

armies and Drury accusing Desmond of treachery and reporting to the government that he

was clearly intending to declare war on the Queen’s army.139 An intermediary was badly

needed. This came in the form of Eleanor Countess of Desmond. She pleaded

successfully with Drury not to attack her husband’s army and with great difficulty

managed to defer the earl from doing vice versa.

137 Calendar State Papers Ireland 1574-85 (hereafter CSPI) xxxv; also quoted in Chambers, A. op. cit. p. 110-111. 138 Chambers, A. op. cit. p. 111; 29Ibid, p. 111

139

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Rumours of the earl’s imminent arrest sent him into hiding with his family. Sidney tried

in vain to get the fugitives to negotiate in an attempt to develop cordial relations between

the earl and president Drury. On receiving a letter from the English Privy Council ‘to

assure them that the rumours of Garret’s [The Earl of Desmond] imprisonment were

totally false, and that it was believed that they had been instigated ‘no doubt by some of

your private enemies, that by practise would be glad to draw you into any undutiful

action that might purchase unto you Her Majesty’s indignation to the overthrow of your

state … We cannot but greatly commend and allow your Lordship … to take better heed

how you credit such false rumours …’140, Eleanor was inclined to agree with these

sentiments and she convinced Garrett not to play into the hands of ‘his enemies but to

make his peace with the Crown’.’141 After meeting with Sidney and submitting himself to

the Lord Deputy, Garrett agreed to negotiate with Drury. ‘Sidney reconciled Eleanor and

a reluctant Garrett with Drury and, as he reported, ‘made them ffriendes in as good sorte

as I could’. He urged the earl to disband his army, as it was considered a threat to the

Lord President’s position and peace of mind in Munster [this is the sort of loyal conduct

enacted by Garrett to the Crown of which Eleanor would speak of in the afore mentioned

letter to the English Privy Council regarding her husband’s innocence and how he was

forced into rebellion]. Drury was every bit as reluctant to make peace with Garrett. He

privately considered that the Lord deputy had dealt far too leniently with the troublesome

earl, who, to Drury’s mind, was the single greatest obstacle to peace and order in

Munster.’142 But the two men were eventually to reconcile. The Queen in her letter to

140 CSPI. 1574-85, xli; partially quoted in Chambers, A op. cit. p.113.141 Chambers, A op. cit p. 113-114; 32 Ibid, p.114 142

36

Eleanor heightened this air of reconciliation. ‘She wrote in friendly tones to Eleanor in

appreciation of her ‘good travail with your husband, to remove from him this vain fear of

his apprehension and to leave off his number of followers. So have you [Elizabeth

assured her, aware of Eleanor’s personal motivations] declareth yourself no less wise and

loving towards your husband for the preservation of his estate, which might easily have

been utterly ruined if he had not by your good means been brought to the said

submission.’143

Though tried and tested as they were throughout Drury’s tenure, relationships between

both he and the Earl of Desmond remained cordial. Incidents such as the cold-blooded

double murder of Henry Davells and Arthur Carter144 truly tested the relationship between

both men as ‘Drury would probably suspect him [the Earl of Desmond] of being

implicated in the murder, and both Eleanor and Garrett could well believe that the crime

was intended to force his hand and alienate him further from the Crown.’145 In an attempt

to remain loyal to the Crown Garrett distanced himself from such actions, believed to

have been carried out by James FitzMaurice or Sir John or his brother James of

Desmond, ‘he endeavoured to impress it on their minds [Sir William Drury, the Earl of

Kildare and Sir Nicholas Malby] that he himself had no part in bringing over James, the

son of Maurice [who had returned from France ‘and it was rumoured that he had come

with a greater number of ships than was really the case’146 to attack the Crown forces], or

in any of the crimes committed by his relatives…’147 By distancing himself from such

actions Garrett lost many of his men to FitzMaurice’s command and ‘it seems clear that

143 Ibid, p. 115144 Ibid, p. 123145 Ibid, p.123146 AFM Vol 5 p. 1713-1715147 Ibid, p. 1717

37

since 1576 Garrett, with Eleanor’s encouragement, had been making a genuine attempt to

adjust his status in Munster, to conform to the demands imposed on his position by the

Crown, and to maintain some semblance of loyalty to Elizabeth’, while both Drury and

Eleanor were also working together to uphold Garrett’s loyalty to the Queen.148 With the

death of Lord Justice Drury Captain Malby took the reins in Munster [until a new Lord

Justice could be selected, eventually to be Sir William Pelham]. Malby had no intention

of dealing in a cordial manner with the Desmonds.

Before his death and under the influence of Sir Nicholas Malby’s accusations of the Earl

of Desmond’s disloyalty to the Crown, Drury decided to investigate the earl’s recent

conduct. ‘Accompanied by the Earl of Kildare, Eleanor’s brother the Baron of Dunboyne,

and the Baron of Upper Ossory, Drury marched south and established camp near

Kilmallock…The pressures on the Earl of Desmond were now immense. Eleanor’s

brother, on Drury’s instruction, counselled him to repair to the Lord Justice; at the same

time Dr. Sanders, Sir John and his clansmen pressed him from the opposite side to

prohibit Drury passage through the palatinate. His own pride cried out that he, the great

Earl of Desmond, should not be so ordered hither and thither by subordinates and Crown

servants.’149 Garrett’s resulting meeting with Drury’s delegation ended in turmoil, with

the earl erupting in anger. Garrett was slowly but surely being pushed into rebellion. He

was being alienated from the Crown by the Queen’s official’s acts of arrogance in trying

to secure his lands. ‘As the English administration seemed determined to humiliate and

148 Chambers, op. cit. p. 124/129.149 Ibid p. 125-126.

38

strip him of the remaining vestiges of his traditional power, they intentionally or

accidentally pushed the earl into the arms of Sanders.’150Is Sanders papal commissioner

‘As for Captain Malby, he, after the death of the Lord Justice, proceeded to Limerick to

recruit his army, and to procure provisions for his soldiers; and from thence he marched

to Askeaton; and it was on the same day that the young sons of the Earl of Desmond

came to look for a fight or prey in the county of Limerick, when they and the captain met

face to face…’151 Malby recounts the events of this battle at Monasternenagh in a letter to

the Privy Council on 4th October, 1579.152 In this same letter Malby advises the Privy

Council that after asking the Earl of Desmond for ‘his advice and forces to joyne with

mee for the service of hir Majestie’153 he refused, thus accusing him of disloyalty and

treason of the Crown. He goes on to claim that many of the earl’s men were fighting on

the rebel’s side, ‘there were slaine by shott and by the horsemen 140 or 160, and all the

principal captaines and leades of the galloglasses, which were the Erle of Desmondes

owne men…’154 Malby asserts no doubt that the earl is a traitor and is secretly fighting for

the rebels against the Crown even though the earl portrays himself as loyal to the Crown.

After victory against John and James of Desmond at the battle of Monasternenagh the

earl wrote a letter of congratulations to Malby, who was unimpressed by the earls

apparent display of loyalty. ‘The Erle did nowe write to mee that he was glad of that I

had the victorie, and yet is the onlie man that did seeke to cutt my throate, and to be plain

with your honors hee is the onlie archtraytor of Mounster, his two brethren are but

150 Ibid, p. 128.151 AFM Vol 5 p. 1719152 Walsingham p. 200-204153 Ibid, p. 201154 Ibid, p. 202

39

ministers to serve his vile disposition…’155 It was Malby’s actions at Askeaton that were

as good as detrimental to the earl’s relationship with the Crown. ‘The Captain {Malby]…

remained nearly a week at Askeaton, the Geraldines threatening everyday to give him

battle, though they did not do so. The Captain destroyed the monastery of that town, and

then proceeded to Adare, where he remained, subjugating the people of that

neighbourhood, until the new Lord Justice, William Pelham, the Earl of Kildare, and the

Earl of Ormond, came to join him, and they all encamped together in Hy-Conillo. The

Earl of Desmond did not come to meet them on this occasion, because his territory had

been ravaged and his people destroyed, although it had been promised to him that these

should not be molested.’156 Sir William Pelham’s behaviour as Lord Justice, was the final

push for the Earl of Desmond. The Carew MSS give us an account of ‘The Estate

wherein the Province of Munster was left by Sir William Pelham, Lord Justice, at his

departure …’157

It was Pelham who proclaimed the Earl of Desmond a traitor on 2nd November 1579, on

Malby’s advice.158 ‘Those compelled to justify the outlawing of the Earl of Desmond to

an uneasy Queen [who wanted to avoid another expensive war against the rebels] claimed

that he had foreknowledge of FitzMaurice’s plans, condoned the murder of Davells and

provided protection for the rebels, including Dr. Sanders. His own apologia – that he had

notified Drury of the invasion [the landing of James FitzMaurice and the squadron at

Smerwick harbour, 18 July, 1579], aided in the capture of Bishop Patrick O’Healy of

Mayo, victualled the Lord Deputy’s men and yielded up his heir as hostage – counted for

155 Ibid, p. 202156 AFM Vol 5 p. 1721157 Cal Carew MSS Aug 28 1580 p. 302-310.158 Bagwell, R. Ireland under the Tudors III London 1880 p.25-30. cited in Lennon op. cit. p.224 n. 21.

40

nothing.’159 The Earl of Desmond was now a fugitive his only option was rebellion if he

was to retain his ‘kingdom’ of Munster. ‘The whole country from Luachair-Deaghaidh to

the Suir, and from Ceann-Feabhrad to the Shannon, was in a state of disturbance.’ Both

the Irish rebels and the English Crown forces destroyed land and people as they travelled

throughout Munster so as to deny each other the opportunity to avail of any such lands or

properties, ‘so that between them the country was left one levelled plain, without corn or

edifices.’160 Desmond’s rebellion began with the sacking of Youghal161. ‘Taking

advantage of decrepit defences, the earl’s followers sacked the town, abusing the women

folk and carrying away rich plunder.’162 The government officials, Ormond [who had

been appointed general in Munster] and Pelham, reacted with un-relenting ferocity,.

‘Ormond and Pelham laid waste the Desmond lands of Limerick and the border lands

with Cork before bringing fire and sword into north Kerry. The capture of Carrigafoyle

castle and the slaughter of its garrison led to the surrender of the strongholds of Askeaton

and Ballilogher. By the summer of 1580 lords such as Decies, Roche, Barry and Sir

Cormac Mactaidhg were responding with alacrity to Pelham’s summons to Limerick, the

Gaelic lords of Kerry had come into Ormond, and the notable belligerents were offered

pardons only if they gave up their superiors.’163 As had happened to FitzMaurice,

Desmond’s followers began to desert him while submitting to the Crown’s officials. It

looked as though brief rebellion was coming to an end, with Desmond now hiding in the

Kerry Mountains, but it was re-ignited by the uprising of James Eustace and Viscount

159 Lennon, C op. cit. p. 224160 AFM Vol 5 p. 1721/1723161 A detailed description of how Desmond and his follower’s took apart Youghal may be found in a letter of Sir Nicholas Walshe to Lord Justice Pelham: Waterford, 20 November, 1579. Walsingham p. 228162 Lennon, C op. cit. p. 225163 Ibid. p. 225

41

Baltinglass in Leinster. Eustace, the Annals of Ireland record, ‘having embraced the

Catholic faith and renounced the sovereign’164, broke down his castles, ‘so that war and

disturbance arose on the arrival of Arthur Lord Gray in Ireland as Lord Justice.’165 Those

who flocked to Eustace’s aid from across the country were forced back into Glenmalure

at news of the impending arrival of Lord Justice Grey’s ‘overwhelming force’ that was

ready to besiege them. Grey, selecting ‘the most trustworthy and best tried captains of his

army’, searched Glenmalure. ‘But they were responded to without delay by the parties

that guarded the valley, so that very few of these returned without being cut off and

dreadfully slaughtered by the Irish party.’166 Though it had not coincided with the

Munster rebellion it seemed as though the rebellion in Leinster was the oxygen to its

flame.

Dún an Óir, which had been used by FitzMaurice in 1579, was once again the scene of

much destruction and slaughter. The arrival of continental troops, in aid of the Geraldine

rebellion, at Smerwick in early September realised the Queen’s worst fears that Ireland

would be used by Spain to gain access to England, thus spreading the counter

reformation. Disaster ensued for ‘600 expeditionary soldiers, mostly of Italian birth with

some Spaniards who were dispatched by Pope Gregory’ to assist in refuting the Crown-

inspired reformation and help spread the Catholic faith. ‘The Italian captains came to the

Lord Justice as if they would be at peace with him; [but] the people of the Lord Justice

went over to the island, and proceeded to kill and destroy the Italians; so that of the seven

164 AFM Vol 5 p. 1737165 Ibid, p. 1737166 Ibid, p. 1737

42

hundred Italians, not one individual escaped, but all were slaughtered on the spot.’167,168

‘The Munster rebellion continued, but the morale of the leadership never recovered.’169

Since the beginning of the Desmond rebellion in 1579, anyone residing in Munster under

the lordship of the Earl of Desmond was deemed an enemy. A huge army was required in

Munster, thus creating major costs for the Queen. ‘Accordingly, a general pardon was

offered to all but a few named individuals in May 1581. Besides Desmond, Sir John and

Baltinglass, Lord Grey excepted several others from pardon, including Countess Eleanor

for her encouragement of rebels, and David Barry, to whom Lord Barrymore had

conveyed all his lands.’170 The Earl of Ormond was dismissed as general of Munster and

the army was greatly reduced. ‘The effects of these decisions on the ground in the five

counties was to delay the final quelling of the revolt for another two years…The earl

ranged freely throughout the province, striking at his enemies, but the real leadership had

been removed. Sir John of Desmond had been surprised by a party of soldiers north of

Cork city in the early days of 1582 and had been killed, his head being sent to Grey as a

‘new year gift’.’171

During Arthur Baron Grey de Wilton’s tenure as Lord Deputy ‘alarming reports were

reaching England of the devastating effects upon the Munster inhabitants of the policies

with which Grey was most closely associated. The tactic of systematically ‘burning their

corn, spoiling their harvest and killing and driving their cattle’ did not originate in Grey’s

regime but it reached its fullest expression therein.’172 Grey was removed from office in

167 Ibid, p. 1743168 Lennon op. cit quotes the figure of Italian soldiers that arrived at Smerwick as 600 while the Annals of Ireland give 700 hundred. This is an example of inaccuracy one is bound to encounter in any research of historical events. 169 Lennon, C. op. cit, p. 226170Bagwell op cit. Vol III quoted in Lennon cop cit., p. 226171Lennon op. cit., p. 227172 Ibid, p. 227

43

1582. Under him the suffering of the people of Munster had reached alarming extents by

1582. ‘…Famine conditions were rife in many parts of the province, coupled with disease

brought on by malnutrition. Not only were resources of corn and animals wantonly

destroyed to prevent their providing sustenance to the rebels, but also large herds of cattle

and sheep in Cork, Kerry and Limerick were preyed upon by the expanded soldiery and

the insurgents. Within a six month period down to mid-1582 at least 30,000 people were

said to have died.’173 Any survivors were so ravaged by malnutrition and disease they

might as well have been dead. The poet Edmund Spenser, Grey’s secretary, described the

survivors as looking like ‘anatomies of death.’174 ‘The Earl of Ormond was reappointed

as lord general of Munster at the start of 1583, Queen Elizabeth thereby gave her backing

to the strategy of drawing away from the Earl of Desmond his principal of supporters by

a mixture of diplomacy and violence. Some of these, such as Lord Lixnaw and the White

Knight, were thought to be still in rebellion through fear of Desmond’s reprisals if he

were to be restored to favour. Consequently it was made absolutely clear that there would

be no pardon for the Geraldine magnate. Furnished with an army of 1,000, Ormond

quickly got into his stride by attempting to localise the rebellion. This he succeeded in

doing by closing off the Glen of Aherlow as a bolt-hole and confining Desmond and a

small band to the mountains of Kerry and west Cork. Gradually, as the spring and

173 Ibid, p. 227174 ibid p. 27; the quotation is taken from Spenser, Edmund ‘A view of the present state of Ireland’ (1596). They looked like anatomies of death; they spake like ghosts crying out of their graves; they did eat the dead carrions, happy where they could find them; yea, and one another soon after, insomuch as the very carcasses they spared not to scrape out of their graves. And if they found a plot of watercresses or shamrocks, there they flocked as to a feast for the time, yet not able long to continue there withal; that in short space there were none almost left, and a most populous and plentiful country suddenly left void of man and beast. Yet sure, in all that war there perished not many by the sword, but all by the extremity of famine which they themselves had wrought.’ http://www2.wwnorton.com/college/english/nael/16century/topic_4/spenview.htm

44

summer of 1583 wore on, the lure of pardons coupled with war-weariness proved too

attractive for Lixnaw, the seneschal of Imokilly and the Countess Eleanor to resist, the

latter surrendering unconditionally in June…By now, however, the fugitive [Desmond]

was in dire straits in the mountainous south-west, having an ever dwindling band of

followers. After a few narrow escapes Desmond was tracked to a cabin at Glanageenty, to

the east of Tralee, by the O’Moriartys on 2 November 1583. His plea for mercy proved

unavailing, and the injured Desmond was beheaded, the body being displayed at Cork

and the head sent to Queen Elizabeth.’175

175 Ibid, p. 228

45

Conclusion:

Munster the richer province of the two [here being compared with Connacht] and the one

that, because it was more open to continental invasion, required closer attention,

presented a notable opportunity, following the attainder of the late earl of Desmond and

his associates in 1586, for complete reformation. This, after elaborate planning, was

attempted.’176

New English officials…pressed for a more extensive plantation of exclusively English

born colonists under their own supervision…About a third of the eventual undertakers

had previous experience of Munster…Elizabeth commissioned Sir Valentine Browne and

other officials to prepare a rough survey of forfeited lands, but bad weather, local

hostility, and interminable difficulties over title and fraudulent conveyances delayed the

commissioners: assuming that widespread concealment had and would occur , they

included almost everything in sight and reported in October 1585 that 574, 645 acres of

land, worth precisely IR£9,887 11s.5d., were available for settlement, scattered chiefly

throughout Cos. Limerick, Kerry and Cork….The aim was to plant. Besides subtenants,

eighty-six households with seventy-one household servants per seignory: thus the

government aimed initially to introduce c. 8,400 settlers into Munster, a formidable

undertaking by comparison with the hundred and eight persons landed in 1585 on

Roamoke Island, the first English settlement in North America…in December 1585 the

176 Edited by T. W. Moody, F. X. Martin, F. J. Byrne: A New History of Ireland, Volume III, Early Modern Ireland 1534 – 1691, (Oxford University Press, 1976) p. 108-9

46

conditions of settlement were substantially determined. Yet the detailed measuring and

division of estates did not begin until September 1586…177

177 Ellis, Steven G. Tudor Ireland, Crown, Community and the conflict of cultures, 1470-1603, (London and New York, 1985) p. 292-293

47

Primary Sources:

Edited by James Hogan and N. McNeill O’Farrell: The Walsingham Letter-Book or Register of Ireland, May, 1578 to December, 1579, (Dublin, 1959

The Calendar of State Papers of Henry VIII vol II part III: Correspondence between the governments of England and Ireland 1515-1538.

Quinn, David B. ‘A Discourse of Ireland’ (Circa 1599); A Sidelight on English Colonial Policy, (Royal Irish Academy Proc., Vol. XLVII, C, pp. 151-66, Feb., 1942)

John Goghe’s map of Ireland (c. 1567). Public Record Office, London (MPF 168), (Cork University Press, Cork, 2006).

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Andrews, J. H., Shapes of Ireland, maps and their makers 1564-1839, (Dublin, 1997)

Annals of the Kingdom of Ireland by the Four Masters, from the earliest period to the year 1616; 3rd ed.; introduction by Kenneth Nicholls. 7 vols. (Dublin, 1990).

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