2. I. IRELAND, 1450-1534
• After English conquest
lost steam in 14th century
Ireland became a land
occupied by two
distinctive nations
• Some interaction,
assimilation and conflict
but two separate
identities prevailed
3. “Conditions in the Pale and in
the coastal towns would
have appeared familiar to an
observer from the north of
England or the lowlands of
Scotland. However, Gaelic
Ireland, notwithstanding
four hundred years of the
English presence on the
island and an ostensibly
shared religion and church
organisation, would have
appeared exotic and
outlandish: a society outside
the range of ordinary
4. Gaelic Ireland
• In many ways unchanged…
– Tannistry
– Old social hierarchy
– Fabric of church in disarray
– Pastoral and semi-nomadic
– Dress
• Yet some change…
– Power vacuum in Ulster;
consolidation of power by O’Neill’s
(Tyrone) and O’Donnell’s (Donegal)
– MacSweeney clan and Gallowglass
– Firearms
• Yet: power spent on relentless
inter-tribal war
5. English Ireland
• Colony survived through
powerful families: Burkes
(Mayo), FitzGeralds (Kildare,
Desmond), Burkes (Ormond)
• Process of Gaelicisation:
– Tannistry
– Language
– Brehon law
– Fosterage
• BUT NOT CULTURAL
ASSIMILATION
• “the English living in Ireland”
• Loyal to the Crown
• Crown power limited to Pale,
families ruled semi-autonomous
“marches”
6. • BIG PICTURE: War of the Roses
(1455-1485); House of Plantagenet
(York) and House of Tudor
(Lancaster)
• Anglo-Irish were “Yorkists”
• Desire for political autonomy
• 1470: Gerald Fitzgerald, 8th earl of
Kildare appointed Lord Deputy
– Most powerful family in English
Ireland
– Kildare would monopolise post until
1530s
• Gerald plots to overthrow Henry
VII
• 1594, Sir Edward Poyning
appointed LD
– Poyning’s Law: designed specifically to
limit the power of the governor,
particularly the House of Kildare
7. • 1509, Henry VIII succeeds hisfather
• 1513, Gerald FitzGerald dies
• Son, also Gerald FitzGerald, assumes
role of LD
• But Henry has different plans for
Ireland
– Complete the conquest begun 1172
– Ireland brought to civility by “sober
ways, political drifts, and amiable
persuasions”
– Not afraid to use violence; acting the
Renaissance humanist
• 1520, Earl of Surrey appointed LD,
arrives with 500 troops
• 1528, Gerald reappointed LD
• 1530, William “Gunner” Skeffington
appointed LD
• 1534, Gerald imprisoned in Tower of
London for third and final time; dies
of natural causes
8. • Rumours reach Ireland that
Gerald has been executed
• “Silken” Thomas Fitzgerald
mounts rebellion
– Takes Dublin Castle
– Denounces Henry VIII a
heretic
– Seeks support from the Pope
and Charles IV of Spain
– Murders Archbishop of Dublin
– Anglo Irish reckon they know
the outcome – the Kildares are
too powerful, so support
rebellion
• Gunner Skeffington
deployed with 2500 men
• Rebellion ends in March
1535 with “Maynooth
Pardon” Maynooth Castle
9. • Anthony St Ledger appointed
LD
• Pursues policy of “surrender
and regrant”
• Most Gaelic lords consent
(Earls of Tyrone, Tyrconnell,
Thomond)
– Build English style houses with
courts
– English language
– Encase land
• Henry’s policy of politics and
persuasion seems to be on
course
• Yet Silken Thomas’s rebellion
begs a question
• BIG PICTURE: Age of
Reform
10. II. RELIGIOUS REFORM IN EUROPE,
ENGLAND AND IRELAND
• Reformation is not simply the
“beginning of protestantism”
• Actually three reform movements:
– Magisterial Reformation
• Luther, Zwingli, Calvin, Knox,
Melanchthon, Beza
– Counter Reformation
• Council of Trent (1545-63)
• Religious Orders: Ignatius Lloyola
(Jesuits), John of the Cross, Francis de
Salles
– Radical Reformation
• Baptists, Menno Simons, Münster Occupation
• Political Dimension to Reformation
– End of political Christendom (though
not the idea of Christendom!)
– Beginning of confessional states
– Changed orbit of power in Europe
– time of fear, greed, injustice and
religious war
11. Henry VIII and Reform
• Act of Supremacy, 1531
• Dissolution of the Monasteries, 1536-
1541
• 1539, Pilgrimage of Grace
• 1536, Irish Supremacy Act
• Irish dissolution of the monasteries
– Not completed
• LD Anthony St Ledger distributes
monastic lands
• Edward V succeeds father (1547-1553)
• More “reformed” outlook
• 1549, Book of Common Prayer introduced
– Reasonably successful in Ireland
12. III. FAILURE OF THE IRISH
REFORMATION
1. Observant Reform
– Didn’t take root in England, Scotland or Wales
– Ireland possessed well educated clerical elite
– Committed to the communities they served
– Preached in Irish
– Well aware of development son the continent – took tough
stand against Reformation ideas form the get-go
– Influence in courts of lords (both Gaelic and English) lead to
children being educated on the continent in Counter-
Reformation institutions
13. 2. Tudor Political Policy
• 1553, Mary Tudor succeeds Edward
VI
• Fervent Catholic
• Pursued policy of conquest and
colonisation (“Plantation”)
• Colonisation as “solution” first
floated by Anthony St Ledger in
1530s
• The O’More and O’Connor rebellions
on the borders of the Pale gave
excuse
• Founded Marsborough (Port Laois)
and Phillipstown (Daingean)
– Required soldiers
– Violence and massacres occur
• By 1690 over 2/3 of Irish land had
passed hands and 100,000 British
settlers had set up home on Irish
soil
• But why pursue colonisation when “politics
and persuasion” seemed to be working?
14. Plantation a good idea?
– 1573, Thomas Smith murdered in
Strangford
– MacDonnell’s colonised the north
of Ulster through the 16th century
– July 1575, Rathlin Massacre,
ordered by Earl of Essex, carried
out by Francis Drake
Walter Daveraux, Earl of Essex
15. Ideology of Colonisation
• What happened in 1492?
• Spanish established a trans-
Atlantic empire
• Ireland was now
geographically and
tactically important
• Conquest and Colonisation
was seen as a divine act
– Foxe’s Book of Martyrs
– William Hakluyt’s Principle
Voyages
– Edward Spenser
16. Ideology of Colonisation
• Edmund Spenser, planter in
Munster and famous poet, A
View of the Present State of Ireland
(1596): need was to civilise the
barbarous Irish and the
degenerate Old English both
culturally and religiously
• Re-interpreted history,
especially Laudabiliter
• Colony failed on both accounts
– Reform comes form top down
but soldiers make bad
missionaries!
– Wrong sort of settlers:
adventurers not families!
– Trinity College established to
train Gaelic ministers, but failed
17. • Yet some did
sincerely try to
promote the new
religion
• Nicholas Walsh,
Bishop of Ossory (d.
1585)
• Book of Common
Prayer, 1609
• Gaelic does not =
Catholic!!!!
18. Old English Rebellions
• Old English felt ostracized; politically isolated and financially out
of pocket
• Desmond Rebellions, 1569, 1579-83
• Planting of Munster
• Prelude to total conquest?
• Flees to Europe after 1560 rebellion fails
• Appealed to Phillip II and Pope
• Arrives in 1579 – unfurls Papal Banner
• Old English readily support him
• Rebellion fails; famine, massacres, depopulation and
impoverishment
• Also Viscount Baltinglass rebellion, Nugent conspiracy
• REBEL OLD ENGLISH UNITE UNDER BANNER OF
RELIGION
19. IV. THE END OF GAELIC
IRELAND
• Suppression of Gaelic earls in Munster left
Gaelic Ulster dangerously exposed
• Hugh O’Neill, earl of Tyrone (1550-1516)
• Most powerful, and last of the great Gaelic
lords
• Upbringing in England and the Pale
• Loyal to the Crown
• Represses Scots-Gaelic colonisation in
north Ulster
• Militarises Ulster
• Recognised the fragility of his preferment
by the Crown and the implications of the
new ideology
• Would have to choose – am I an English
earl or a Gaelic cheiftan?
• Actions of O’Donnell’s and Maguires
forced his hand
• Ulster at War: 1594-1603 (Nine Year War)
20. • Initially successful:
• Ford of Biscuits (1594)
– Clontibret (1595)
– Yellow Ford (1598)
• Couldn’t take towns
• Emboldened by initial success
• Appeals to Spain and Pope
• Why might this have been a mistake?
– Spanish Armada, 1588
• 1599 – appeals to Old English: “Faith and
Fatherland”
• Draws up demands
• Lord Mountjoy appointed LD, brings
20,000 men to Kinsale to meet Spanish
soldiers
• Tyrone surrenders, but given generous
terms
• However, the age of Gaelic rule is over
