1536. Parliament in Dublin introduces the OATH OF SUPREMACY to the King and 
he is given the privilege of taking the first-fruits of all ECCLESIASTICAL LIVINGS. Quite 
different in the doing, however, and the subsequent insurrections were directed, 
among other things, against the Oath. Refusal to take the OATH OF SUPREMACY was 
high treason in Ireland just as in England (Murphy, p. 249).> 

16th Saeculum. Edward VI and Mary 

Confiscations in Queen’s and King’s Counties. During the reign of Edward VI, the 
O’Moores of Leix and the O’Connors of Offaley carried on a feud with some lords 
of the Pale,¢ 

as was usual in Ireland. 

The government qualified this as rebellion. General Bellingham, later Lord 
Deputy, was sent against them and forced them to submit. They were advised to see 
the King and submit to him in person as O'Neill had done successfully in 1542.4 
O’Moore and O’Connor, unlike O’Neill, were imprisoned and their estates 
confiscated. But that was not the last of the clans. The inhabitants declared that the 
land belonged to the clans, not to the chiefs, who therefore could not forfeit it, and 
were, at most, liable to forfeiting their private domains. They declined to move out. 
The government sent troops, and had,the land cleared after unintermittent 
fighting and extermination of the population (Murphy, p. 255). 

This was the pattern for all subsequent confiscations under 
Elizabeth and James. The Irish were denied all rights against the 

Anglo-Irish of the Pale, with resistance treated as rebellion. From 
then on that sort of thing became usual. 

By Acts in the 3rd and 4th years of the reign of Philip and Mary, c. 1 and 2, 
the Lord Deputy, the Earl of Sussex,? was endowed with “full power and authority 
[...] to give and to grant to all and every Their Majesties’ subjects, English or Irish 
[...], at his election and pleasure, such estates in fee simple, fee tail,54 leases for 
term of years, life or lives” in these two counties “as for the more sure planting or 
strength of the countries with good subjects shall be thought unto his wisdom and 
discretion meet and convenient” (Murphy, p. 256). 

16th Saeculum. Elizabeth 

English policy under Elizabeth: to keep Ireland in a state of 
division and strife. 

“Should we exert ourselves,’ the English Government averred, “in reducing 
Ireland to order and civility, it must soon acquire power, consequence and riches. 
The inhabitants will be thus alienated from England; they will cast themselves into the 
arms of some foreign power, or erect themselves into an independent and separate 
state. Let us rather connive at their disorders, for a weak and disordered people 
can never attempt to detach themselves from the Crown of England.” Thus Sir 
Henry Sidney and Sir John Perrot, successive LORD DEPUTIES (the last-named the 
best that they ever had, held the post in 1584-87), describe this HORRID POLICY, against 
which they protest (Leland, Vol. HU, p. 292> and Murphy, p. 246). Perrot’s intention 
of granting the Irish equal rights with the Anglo-Irish and obviating confiscations was 
blocked by the English party in Dublin. 

(Yet he it was who had O’Donnell’s son* brought aboard a ship, 
filled with drink and borne away.) 

Tyrone’s rebellion, among other things, against religious persecution: “He and 
other lords of Ulster entered into a secret combination, about this time, that they 
would defend the Roman Catholic religion ... that they would suffer no sheriffs nor 
garrisons to be within the compass of their territories, and that they would [...] 
jointly resist all invasions of the English” (Camden).3°° The conduct of Deputy 
Mountjoy in this war is described by Camden: “He made incursions on all sides, 
spoiled the corn, burnt all the houses and villages that could be found, and did so 
gall the rebels, that, pent in with garrisons and streightened more and more every day, 
they were reduced to live like wild beasts, skulking up and down the woods and 
deserts”” (Murphy, p. 251). 

See Holinshed, Chronicles? (p. 460) on how Ireland was laid waste 
in this war. Half the population is said to have perished. 

According to the RETURNS for 1602 by John Tyrrell, the Mayor of Dublin, prices 
there climbed: wheat from 36/- to 180/- the QUARTER, barley malt from 10/- to 43/- 
and OAT MALT from 5/- to 22/- the BARREL, peas from 5/- to 40/- the PECK, oats 
from 3/4 to 20/- the BARREL, BEEF from 26/8 to 160/- the CARCASS, MUTTON ditto 
from 3/- to 26/-, VEAL ditto from 10/- to 29/-, lamb from 1/- to 6/-, and a pig from 
8/- to 30/- (Leland, Vol. IH, p. 410). 

Desmond was deprived of his estates in all counties of Munster except Clare, and 
also in Dublin. They were worth £7,000 per annum. The Irish Parliament of 1586 
expropriated 140 landowners by confiscation in Munster alone under the Act of the 
28th year of Elizabeth’s reign, c. 7 and 8. MacGeoghegan lists the names of the 
GRANTEES of Desmond’s ESTATES *; some of these families are still, and up to 1847 
nearly all were, in possession. 

(2? probably cum grano salis). 

The annual Crown rent on these ESTATES was 2d to 3d per acre, with no 
indigenous Irish admitted as TENANTS and the government undertaking to keep 
adequate garrisons. 

Neither provision was observed. Some estates were abandoned by the GRANTEES 
and reoccupied by the Irish. Many of the UNDERTAKERS stayed in England and 
appointed AGENTS, “ignorant, negligent, and corrupt” (Leland, Vol. III, p. 311). 

17th Saeculum. James I 

Penal Laws against Catholics (Elizabeth, in the 2nd year of reign, 
1560, c. 1, Irish [ Statutes, Vol. I, p. 275])*°° are applied more and 
more from the very beginning of the reign of James I, it 
becoming dangerous to practise [Catholicism]. 

Under Elizabeth 2 c.1, the FINE of 12d was imposed for every NON-ATTENDANCE 
AT PROTESTANT CHURCH and, in 1605, under James, imprisonment was added by 
ROYAL PROCLAMATION alone and, hence, unlawfully. This did not help. Besides, in 
1605 all Catholic priests were ordered out of Ireland in 40 days on pain of death. 

SURRENDERS OF ESTATES AND REGRANTS (see Davies, 7>).357 These followed the 
pronouncement of TANISTRY and GAVELKIND 958 as unlawful by the Court OF KING's 
BENCH 399 in the HILARY TERM in the third year of the reign of James I. A Royal 
Proclamation stipulated SURRENDER [of estates] and REGRANT under new valid titles. 
Most Irish chiefs came forward to receive incontestable title at last, but this was 
made conditional on their giving up the clan relationship in favour of the English 
LANDLORD-TENANT relationship (Murphy, p. 261). 

This in 1605 (see “Chronology” *°”). 

PLANTATION OF ULSTER. According to Leland, Irish UNDERTENANTS and SERVANTS 
were TACITLY EXEMPTED from the OATH OF SUPREMACY, whereas all the other 
planters were compelled to take it. 

Carte says! that all Irish settlers and the natives who were 

allowed part of their land were exempted, but this was irrelevant 

because it [the taking of the Oath] could not be enforced anyway. 
The Scottish Presbyterians in Ulster also refused to take the Oatu or 
Supremacy, and this was suffered by the authorities (Murphy, p. 266). 
That may have been useful for the Irish as well." 

Carte estimates the number of English settlers in Ulster in 1641 at 20,000 and 
of Scottish settlers at 100,000 (Ormonde, Vol. I, p. 177).> 

Sir Arthur Chichester, LORD DEPUTY, was rewarded for his services in this 
PLANTATION with the territory of Innoshowen (?) “and all the lands possessed by 
O’Dogherty, a tract of country far exceeding the allotments generally made to 
nothern undertakers” (Leland, Vol. II, p. 438). As early as 1633 these ESTATES 
were valued at £10,000 per annum (Strafford’s State Letters“ Vol. Il, p. 294). 
Chichester was the ancestor of Marquis of Donegal, who would have had £300,000 
per-annum for his Belfast estate alone, if one of his ancestors had not surrendered 
it to others under long LEASES (Murphy, p. 265). 

The prantation Of Ulster culminated the first period, with a new 
means discovered for confiscation: perective Tittes. This is effective 
under James and Charles, until Cromwell renews the invasion. See 
extracts from Carte [Ormonde], 2*°°*** 

Another nice pretext for confiscation was that 

old Crown rents, long forgotten by Crown and landowners, were still due from 
many ESTATKS. These were now pulled out and, wherever unpaid, the ESTATE was 
FORFEITED, Nor receipts existed, and that was enough (Murphy, p. 269). 

Concerning the attempt to confiscate Connaught (see “Chronol- 
ogy”, and O’Conor, Catholics), recall James’ dirty trick: 

when the people of Connaught SURRENDERED their titles to a specially appointed