Ireland under the Tudors, with a Succinct Account of the Earlier History. Vol. 1 (of 3). Bagwell, Richard
friars kept possession of the popular ear, and the Jesuits found the crop ready for their sickle. Denied education at home, many sons of good families sought it abroad, and the natural leaders of the Irish acquired habits of thought very different from those of English gentlemen. Archbishop Fitzgibbon, one of the most important champions of Catholic Ireland, saw clearly that his country could not stand alone. He would have preferred the sovereignty of England, but she had become aggressively Protestant, and he turned to Spain, to France, to Rome, anywhere rather than to the land whence his own ancestors had sprung. The lineage of the United Irishmen and their numerous progeny may be easily traced back to Tudor times.
A few words now to the critics whom every writer hopes to have. The spelling both of Irish names and English documents has throughout been modernised, from regard to the feelings of the public. Irish history is already sufficiently repulsive to that great unknown quantity the general reader, and it would be cruel to add to its horrors. Etymologists will always go for their materials to originals, and not to modern compositions. When, therefore, such names as Clandeboye or Roderic O’Connor are met with in the text, it is not to be supposed that I have never heard of Clann-Aedha-Buidhe or Ruaidhri O’Conchobair.
Of the first 123 pages of this book, I need only say that original authorities have as much as possible been consulted. In the third and four following chapters, much use has been made of Mr. Gilbert’s ‘Viceroys,’ a debt which I desire to acknowledge once for all. In so succinct a review of more than three centuries, it has not been thought necessary to quote the authority for every fact.
For the reign of Henry VIII. I have chiefly relied on the second and third volumes of the ‘State Papers,’ published in 1834. They are sometimes cited as ‘S. P.’ or ‘State Papers,’ and when only the date of a letter or report is given it must be understood that this collection is referred to. The great calendar of letters and papers begun by Dr. Brewer and continued by Mr. Gairdner contains some items not included in the older publication; it is referred to as Brewer. Other sources of information have not been neglected, and are indicated in the footnotes.
The account of the reigns of Edward VI., Mary, and Elizabeth is chiefly drawn from the ‘State Papers, Ireland’ – all documents preserved in the Public Record Office and calendared by Mr. Hans Claude Hamilton. How excellently the editor has done his work can only be appreciated by one who has entered into his labours as closely as I have done. Except where a document has already been printed, I have nearly always referred to the original MS. All documents cited by date or number without further description must be understood as being in this collection. The late Dr. Brewer’s calendar of the Carew MSS. at Lambeth often fills up gaps in the greater series; it is referred to as Carew. Many papers, both in Fetter Lane and at Lambeth, are copies; but their authenticity is not disputed. The Carew calendar is on so full a plan that it has not been thought necessary to consult the manuscripts; indeed, except for local purposes, it is not likely that they will be much consulted in the future. Other collections are referred to in their places, but it may be well to mention specially the journal of the Irish (Kilkenny) Archæological Society, whose editor, the Rev. James Graves, has done as much as any man to lay a broad foundation for Irish history.
O’Donovan’s splendid edition of the ‘Four Masters’ has generally been consulted for the Irish version of every important fact. O’Clery and his fellow-compilers wrote under Charles I., and are not therefore strictly contemporary for the Tudor period. They appear to have faithfully transcribed original annals, but to this one important exception must be made. The old writers never hesitated to record facts disagreeable to the Church; the later compilers were under the influence of the counter-reformation which produced Jesuitism. Making some allowance for this, the ‘Four Masters’ must be considered fair men. Michael O’Clery spent much time at Louvain, but he wrote in Ireland, and had native assistants. Philip O’Sullivan, on the other hand, was a Spanish officer, and published his useful but untrustworthy ‘Compendium’ at Lisbon. The ‘Annals of Lough Cé’ are preferable in some ways to the ‘Four Masters,’ but they do not cover so much ground. All the native annalists are jejune to an exasperating degree. Genealogy seems to have been the really important thing with them, and they throw extremely little light on the condition of the people. We are forced therefore to rely on the accounts, often prejudiced and nearly always ill-informed, of English travellers and officials.
The Anglo-Irish chronicles in ‘Holinshed’ were written by Richard Stanihurst, who dedicated his work to Sir Henry Sidney, for the reign of Henry VIII., and after that by John Hooker. Stanihurst, a native of Dublin, was not born till 1545. He has been thought an unpatriotic writer, and excited the violent antipathy of O’Donovan; but he appears to have been pretty well informed. The speeches which he puts into the mouths of his characters must be considered apocryphal, but as much may be said of like compositions in all ages. Hooker was an actor in many of the events he describes. He was a Protestant and an Englishman, prejudiced no doubt, but not untruthful, and his statements are often borne out by independent documents. Edmund Campion, the Jesuit, wrote in Ireland under Sidney’s protection; his very interesting work is less a history than a collection of notes.
Other books, ancient and modern, are referred to in the footnotes. Among living scholars, I desire to thank Dr. W. K. Sullivan, of Cork, who had the great kindness to correct the first chapter, and to furnish some valuable notes. Hearty thanks are also due to the gentlemen at the Public Record Office, and especially to Mr. W. D. Selby and Mr. J. M. Thompson.
In making the index a few errors were discovered in the text, and these have been noted as errata. Some mistakes may still remain uncorrected, but I am not without hope that they are neither many nor of much importance.
CHAPTER I.
INTRODUCTORY
The main object of this book is to describe in some detail, and as impartially as possible, the dealings of England with Ireland during the reigns of Henry VIII. and his three children. As an introduction to the study of that period, it seemed desirable to give some account of the course of government during those 340 years which had elapsed since the first Anglo-Norman set foot upon the Irish shore. And, seeing that Teutonic invaders had effected a lodgment about three centuries and a half before Henry II.’s accession, it was hardly possible to avoid saying something about the men who built the towns which enabled his subjects to keep a firm grip upon the island. Lastly, it seemed well at the very outset to touch lightly upon the peculiarities of that Celtic system with which the King of England found himself suddenly confronted.
Agricola took military possession of south-western Scotland partly in the hope of being able to invade Ireland. He had heard that the climate and people did not differ much from those of Britain, and he knew that the harbours were much frequented by merchants. He believed that annexation would tend to consolidate the Roman power in Britain, Gaul, and Spain, and kept by him for some time a petty Irish king who had been expelled by his own tribe, and to whom he professed friendship on the chance of turning him to account. Agricola thought there would be no great difficulty in conquering the island, which he rightly conjectured to be smaller than Britain and larger than Sicily or Sardinia.
‘I have often,’ says Tacitus, ‘heard him say that Ireland could be conquered and occupied with a single legion and a few auxiliaries, and that the work in Britain would be easier if the Roman arms could be made visible on all sides, and liberty, as it were, removed out of sight.’ Agricola, like many great men after him, might have found the task harder than his barbarous guest had led him to suppose; and in any case fate had not ordained that Ireland should ever know the Roman Peace. It was reserved for another petty king, after the lapse of nearly 1,100 years, to introduce an organised foreign power into Ireland, and to attach the island to an empire whose possessions were destined to be far greater than those of Imperial Rome.
Setting aside all ethnological speculations as foreign to the scope of this work, it may be sufficient to say that the inhabitants of Ireland at the dawn of authentic history were Celts, of the same grand division as the bulk of the Scots Highlanders, but differing considerably from the people of Wales. Their organisation in the twelfth century had not passed beyond the tribal