Kingship, religion, culture and order: The native Irish and the Old English in early seventeenth-century Ireland by Eleanor Therese Murtagh Thesis for the degree of PhD National University of Ireland, Maynooth Department of History Supervisor of Research: Professor Raymond Gillespie January 2012 Table of Contents Abbreviations ii Acknowledgements iv Introduction 1 Chapter 1 The idea of Kingship 18 Chapter 2 Conell Mageoghegan 36 Chapter 3 Geoffrey Keating 104 Chapter 4 Henry Burnell 161 Chapter 5 Richard Hadsor 212 Chapter 6 Author of Aphorismical discovery of treasonable faction 277 Conclusion 371 Bibliography 376 i Abbreviations AB Annals of Boyle: Freeman, A. Martin (ed.), ‘The annals in Cotton MS. Titus A xxv’ in Revue Celtique, xli-xliv (1924-7) AClon Annals of Clonmacnoise: (bibliography, Murphy, Denis) AConn Annals of Connacht: Freeman, A. Martin (ed.), Annals of Connacht (Dublin, 1944) Add. MSS Additional Manuscripts AI Annals of Inisfallen: Mac Airt, Seán (ed.), The annals of Inisfallen, MS. Rawlinson B. 503 (Dublin, 1951) Anal. Hib. Analecta Hibernica Archiv. Hib. Archivium Hibernicum ARÉ Annála Ríoghachta Éireann: (bibliography, O’Donovan, John) AT Annals of Tigernach: Stokes, Whitley, ed. and trans. ‘The annals of Tigernach’ in Revue Celtique, xvi-xviii (1895-7) AU Annals of Ulster: Hennessy, W. M. & McCarthy, B. (eds), The annals of Ulster (4 vols, Dublin, 1887-1901, reprinted, ed. Nollaig Ó Muraíle, Dublin, 1998) BL British Library, London Cal. S.P. Ire. Calendar of state papers relating to Ireland (bibliography, Calendar…) CGG Cogadh Gaedhel re Gallaibh (bibliography, Todd, James H.) CS Chronicon Scotorum: Hennessy, W. M., (ed. and trans.), Chronicon Scotorum,RS 46 (London, 1866, reprinted, Wiesbaden, 1964) FAI Fragmentary annals of Ireland: Radner, Joan Newlon (ed.), Fragmentary annals of Ireland (Dublin, 1978) FFÉ Foras feasa ar Éirinn (bibliography, Keating, Geoffrey) H.M.C. Historical Manuscripts Commission IHS Irish Historical Studies ii Abbreviations cont’d. ITQ Irish Theological Quarterly LCé Annals of Loch Cé: Hennessy, W. M., (ed.), Annals of Loch Cé: a chronicle of Irish affairs, 1014-1590 (2 vols, London 1871, reprinted, Dublin, 1939) LG Leabhar gabhála (bibliography, Macalister, R. A. S.) MCB Mac Carthaigh’s Book: Ó hInnse, Séamus, Miscellaneous Irish annals, AD 1114-1437 (Dublin, 1947) N.H.I. New History of Ireland: (bibliography, Moody, T. W. et al (eds) NLI National Library of Ireland, Dublin NUI National University of Ireland ODNB Oxford dictionary of national biography PRIA Proceedings of the Royal Irish Academy RIA Royal Irish Academy, Dublin Stud. Hib. Studia Hibernica TCD Trinity College, Dublin UCC University College Cork UCD University College Dublin iii Acknowledgements I wish to express my thanks to my supervisor, Professor Raymond Gillespie, without whose support, inspiration, guidance and encouragement I could not have completed this thesis. I also would like to record my thanks to the staff of the History Department in Maynooth and especially to Professor Vincent Comerford and Professor Marian Lyons for their patience and understanding. I am indebted also to the help and generosity of the staff of the libraries and archives who have facilitate me during my research including the Russell and John Paul II libraries at Maynooth, the National Library and National Archives, and the libraries of Trinity College and University College Dublin. I also wish to acknowledge with gratitude the assistance of the NUI Maynooth John and Pat Hume Research Scholarship and the Irish Research Council for the Humanities and Social Sciences for their scholarships. I have made many friends during my years at Maynooth both at undergraduate and postgraduate level which has helped to make my sojourn there a thoroughly positive experience and I have particularly enjoyed the friendship of Anne Bergin, Caroline Gallagher and Louise O’Reilly. Finally, I could not have completed my thesis without the support and enthusiastic encouragement of my husband, Charlie and my family. iv Introduction By the beginning of the seventeenth century, the native Irish and the Old English had both inhabited the island of Ireland for approximately four hundred years but, over the centuries, fractious relations had often prevailed between them. These two groups emerged from different political traditions; the native Irish had historically given allegiance to the chieftain of their particular lordship while the Old English political focus, especially that of the Pale, was directed towards London and they had generally seen themselves as subjects of the king of Ireland. Theirs was a fragmented society and separate social, political and cultural priorities had traditionally been a barrier to integration. By the beginning of the seventeenth century, however, circumstances had changed for both groups, especially for the Gaelic Irish. They now found themselves subject to a centralized monarchy which had gradually spread its political and judicial power across the island, and the sixteenth-century Tudor conquest had seen their lands targeted for plantation. The Old English found their influence and political power diminished considerably due to infringement on their hitherto privileged position both in central and provincial government by New English administrators and officials. It was a changed world for each group and the ensuing half-century presented further challenges in their attempts to endure in the unfriendly environment of an anti-Catholic administration. This thesis examines and juxtaposes the political ideas which existed within these two Irish groups as they attempted to find a workable solution to their dilemma by looking at their assumptions surrounding kingship, religion, culture and order, the four staples that embodied the life of early-modern men and women. Many studies have been carried out on the Old Irish and the Old English separately but this thesis examines the political ideas, in tandem, of what the early Irish historian Geoffrey Keating called ‘Irishmen’, linking Old English and native Irish in one unit, and assesses the similarities and differences that existed between them. What emerges is the existence of a Catholic royalism among the Gaelic Irish and Old English in the first half of the seventeenth century. 1 After 1600 the native Irish seem to largely disappear from the historiography. In the sixteenth century, the Gaelic Irish play a significant part in the historical record: the power of Gaelic lordships gradually overcome by Tudor conquest; a series of rebellions culminating in the rising of the northern lords in the Nine Years War at the end of the century; defeat for Hugh O’Neill and Hugh Roe O’Donnell at Kinsale in 1601; and the death of O’Donnell in 1602 and O’Neill’s submission to the crown in 1603.1 The assumption has sometimes been that the Gaelic Irish were henceforth a spent force. Perhaps the departure from Ireland of many of their leaders with the Flight of the Earls in 1607 contributed to their disappearance from historiography. Perusal of the standard general study on early-modern Irish history, A new history of Ireland: early modern Ireland, 1534-1691, bears this out.2 The Gaelic Irish feature prominently in the early part of the work but, after the first decade of the seventeenth century, their presence gradually diminishes. The focus instead has been mostly on the Old English, in whose world it has been assumed, the Gaelic Irish were regarded as ‘the other’, as de-facto rebels. However, this thesis argues that the Old English and Gaelic Irish world was a much livelier world than that. There was much political discourse and debate taking place and ideas were being formulated about how Ireland was going to work for them in the changed climate of New English political hegemony. Gaelic Ireland was a world that may have been alien to many of the sixteenth-century Old English but there developed between them a correspondence of thought, and a softening of attitudes and a drawing together of the two groups is evident as the decades of the early seventeenth century proceeded. Relatively few historians have considered the question of political thought and ideas among the Gaelic Irish and this is probably due to the set of assumptions in historiography alluded to above. Breandán Ó Buachalla has been the only one to have addressed it in an extensive corpus of work derived from the evidence of the bardic poetry and the annals. For instance, he has shown how effusively the poets welcomed the Stuart king, James I, to the throne, quickly providing him with a Gaelic validation and a genealogy stretching back to the Irish king Fergus who went to Scotland c. 300 BC. He 1 Colm Lennon, Sixteenth century Ireland: the incomplete conquest (Dublin, 1994) passim. 2 T. W. Moody, F. X. Martin & F. J. Byrne (eds), A new history of Ireland, iii: early modern Ireland, 1534- 1691 (Oxford, 1976). 2 has also examined the Gaelic concept of kingship and how the native Irish accommodated their traditional beliefs to the reigns of the Stuarts.3 Historiography on the Old English side, on the other hand, has been better served. Aidan Clarke has written extensively about the Old English community.4 His article, ‘Ireland and the general crisis,’ reveals how adversity in the late sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries led them to re-examine and develop their sense of identity.5 Nicholas Canny also traced the development of the ideology of the Old English of the Pale in the second half of the sixteenth century, showing them initially espousing a strong attachment to the idea of commonwealth civility and, by the end of the century, combining this with a committed adherence to a Tridentine Catholicism.6 Ciaran Brady likewise addressed this progression of the Old English to a synthesis of politics and religion, resulting in them adopting their political philosophy of loyalty to their monarch while retaining their Catholic religion.7 Moreover, all three historians agreed that a conscious decision to separate themselves from the native Irish formed part of this construction of an identity for the Old English in the late sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries.