Anglo-French Expansion and the Irish Reaction

The expansion of the Anglo-French colony in Ireland continued under the Lordship of Prince John in the period 1170 to the end of the 1200s. The response of the Irish Kings was largely to submit to the more powerful invaders. However, the general populace was less enthusiastic and a whole area of folklore developed with retrospective predictions about the invasion and promises of a liberator who would come and free Ireland from the Anglo-French. The Anglo-French, in turn, had their own prophecies of the invasion and their destiny to succeed. The story of the expansion of the colony is largely made up of the actions of individual barons, with occasional input from the King.

By 1177, the Anglo-French ruled Leinster and Meath. The Lordship of Leinster was ruled by the King ever since Strongbow had died the previous year. The Liberty of Meath was ruled by Hugh de Lacy. The Carrickfergus Castle [11kB]expansion of the colony took off that same year when John de Courcy invaded and took over Ulaid (modern day Antrim and Down). The region became known as "Ulster", probably derived from the word "Ulaid" with the "-ster" appended to make it sound like the more prominent areas of Munster and Leinster. De Courcy founded the town of Carrickfergus the next year and began work on an elaborate castle there (see picture on the right of Carrickfergus Castle as it looks today).

To the south, in 1185, O'Brien's kingdom in eastern Munster was granted to Theobold Walter (who would found the Butler dynasty that was a key to many events in the years to come), Philip of Worcester and William de Burgh. This region of Ireland became known as "Ormond". Their armies took 8 years to subdue the region. Shortly afterwards, in 1201, William de Braose was granted land in Limerick. Meanwhile, back in Ulster, de Courcy fell out of favour with King John, who gave permission to Hugh de Lacy to invade, which he duly did, becoming Earl of Ulster himself. This title he retained apart from the period 1210-1227 when he himself fell out of favour with the King. His brother Walter de Lacy, who had inherited Meath, lost control of that lordship from 1210 to 1215.

The period 1226 to 1235 saw a protracted war in western Ireland when Richard de Burgh invaded the Irish Kingdom of Connacht. Perhaps surprised by how much the Irish had developed their military technology since the time of Strongbow, it was a hard war to win and while de Burgh did emerge with most of Connacht in his hands, it was not an easy victory. The conquest of Connacht was a famous event for several centuries. In this same period, another prominent family of the future - the FitzGeralds, or Geraldines - took possession of north Kerry and Waterford. In the 1240s they gained further land in the newly conquered lands of Connacht, Kerry and Fermanagh. They built a castle at Belleek in Fermanagh but they did not truly control the area and the local Irish lost little time in asserting their authority by burning the new castle. After that, Fermanagh reverted to Irish control.

By the middle of the 13th century, Hugh de Lacy of Ulster was dead and the Irish kings of Tyrone and Donegal stopped paying tribute entirely. When this caused little response from the English King, the Kings gained confidence and formed an alliance with the humiliated King of Connacht. In 1255 they launched a series of raids into Ulster, killing colonists and burning their towns. By 1259 the revolt had become more widespread, with the Irish of Munster revolting against the Anglo-French Lords there. In fact, in 1261, the Irish defeated an English army sent to avenge atrocities committed against colonists. However, the revolt fizzled out after this as some of the key leaders were killed. It was to be a century before the Irish would have another successful revolt against the English.

After the revolts had died down, the vacant Earldom of Ulster was granted to Walter de Burgh, who was also Lord of Connacht. When the Geraldines agreed to cede Sligo to de Burgh in 1296 it confirmed de Burgh as ruler of all of Connacht and all of Ulster, second only to the King of England in power. The territory of Thomond was granted to Thomas de Clare in 1275, the man who would eventually give his name to the modern county there. In the south, the two prominent families that were emerging were the Geraldines of Desmond (modern Cork and Limerick) and the Butlers of Ormond (modern Tipperary). The former territory of Leinster was by this stage divided into a multitude of smaller Lordships as families divided their land between heirs. Meath was divided into two - the two halves being called Trim and Meath. The Lordship of Leinster was divided into four, forming the liberties of Wexford, Kilkenny, Carlow and Kildare.

The map of Ireland around 1250 is shown by the map below. The map makes a strong distinction between Irish and Anglo-French (Norman) lands. However, it would be a mistake to believe that these regions were anything like modern frontiers, with border guards peering warily across no-mans land. In practice, the borders were blurred, with a lot of everyday movement of trade and persons to-and-fro. Anglo-French and Irish lords routinely signed agreements with each other against common foes. In later centuries, this interchange was to become so pronounced that it would be legislated against.

Ireland circa 1250

Anglo-French Government

As with almost everywhere else in Europe, the Anglo-French followed the Feudal system of government. This differed from the Irish method of government in fundamental ways. Under feudalism, the King owned all land. He granted this land to Lords in return for annual tribute in the form of money, soldiers or goods. Some Lords paid their tribute by becoming a Knight, an armed nobleman, to ride with the King into battle. The Lords, in turn, granted parcels of their lordships to Peasants (ordinary people) in return for money, a soldier at time of war or some goods. Many lords set up market towns in their lordships to encourage trade and to convert goods into money. At the bottom of the hierarchy were landless peasants who were granted a plot of land on another peasant's plot in return for manual labour on the farm. The Irish system, by contrast, saw no overall ownership of land, but rather each individual Lord had absolute ownership of their land. The commoners worked on the Lord's land in return for accommodation and food.

The Anglo-French introduced feudalism to Ireland, but the administration of government evolved with the expansion of the colony, and thus different parts were ruled in different ways. In Anglo-French society, rich landless men recruited armies and conquered land for their King, in the hope that the King would reward them by making them a Lord of some land somewhere, often the same land they conquered. This was the only way they could make themselves in the world and this was the motivation for much of the expansion of the colony in Ireland. It was a form of capitalist expansionism - privatised warfare.

The status of Ireland was clarified in 1199, when the Pope gave permission to King John of England to make Ireland into a Kingdom and to declare himself as King of it. In 1210, a decree was issued that made all laws passed in England valid in Ireland also, thus uniting the two legal systems.

At the head of government there evolved a "Great Council", which met in Dublin, where the King's royal officials and the chief noblemen met to make decisions concerning Ireland. The country itself was divided into a series of administrative units that had different degrees of autonomy. The liberties exercised a lot of self government, being governed by a seneschal (chief officer) who operated the courts and treasury. They had to swear loyalty to the King but the King's officials were not allowed into the liberty and the King could not collect taxes. Most liberties appeared towards the start of the Anglo-French period when there was not much financial stake in the colony. As the colony grew, the King increasingly created counties in preference because he could collect taxes there. Key liberties in 1250 included Meath, Trim, Kildare and Ulster. The counties (also known as shires) operated like liberties except that they were under Royal control. The King appointed a Shire Rief (origin of the word sheriff) to manage the county, its treasury and its court. The King took opportunities as they arose to get rid of the liberties and eventually, but not until the 1600s, all of Ireland's administrative units had become counties. The map above shows the liberties and counties that existed in 1250. The chartered territories were lands not under Anglo-French control, but rather under Irish Kings and Lords. These men and the King of England signed a charter that let them keep their lands as long as they submitted to the Anglo-French and collect taxes. Connacht was a chartered territory until it was invaded.

Changes in the Church

Throughout the medieval period, and indeed until the twentieth century, the church was of pivotal importance in Irish society and culture. With the church now divided across lands ruled by native Irish Lords and lands ruled by Anglo-French lords, it became difficult to administer the whole. Keen to assert control over the church as well as the land, the King of England repeatedly attempted to ensure that all dioceses in their lands should have Anglo-French bishops. A law passed in 1217 banning Irishmen from the post was abandoned after the Pope expressed his outrage at such discrimination.

The reform of the Irish church in the century before the Anglo-French came helped usher in the new monastic houses that were springing up across Europe. The Cistercians founded 33 monasteries across Ireland between 1142 and 1230 and also established a large number in Britain. They were very different from the preceding Irish monasteries, and reached the height of their success in the 1200s, before Monastic Changes in Ireland [24kB]declining after this time due to financial difficulties and general stagnation. Augustinian and Benedictine orders founded a large number of monasteries of their own. All of these orders had a lot of land but, unlike the earlier monasteries, they let the land out to members of the public. Such lands were called granges, a term that can still be found across Ireland.

As the diagram on the right shows, one of the most obvious differences with the new monasteries was their layout. While a 10th century monastery was quite spartan with a small church and individual huts, a Cistercian monastery had a huge, cross-shaped church along with a much more comfortable arrangement of rooms for relaxing and working. The remains of both of these monasteries can still be seen today.

Everyday Life in Anglo-French Ireland

Athough at the start, the Anglo-French were in Ireland to acquire power, this soon turned to a desire to make money. They had no overall plan, and each baron largely pursued whatever plan came to mind. Faced with a population explosion across medieval Europe, the Anglo-French barons intended to use Ireland to grow food to sell and, thereby, become rich and powerful. They established a feudal system of agriculture, under which peasants were employed in, and lived on, the estate as tenants. Some barons who had larger amounts of land tried a more adventurous approach. They set up a town with a market, and granted between 3 to 10 acres of land to each tenant. They used these market towns to sell their agricultural surplus. Many of these towns thrived and exist to the present day, for example Kilkenny, Trim and New Ross.

Towns A medieval town in Ireland had walls. Few of these have survived to the present, with the exception of Carlingford in county Louth whose medieval walls and gates are well preserved. Other walls, such as Derry's, date from much later and are not medieval. The wall was not really for defence, more as a status symbol although they did come in useful when the Irish raided them. Inside the town, people would have live in wooden two- or three-storey houses with wealthier merchants having stone houses. Streets were narrow and winding - today there is often not enough room for two cars to pass on these streets! The towns thrived on their markets, which were crowded, bustling and exciting affairs and most people would have had a trade, such as bakers, blacksmiths, tailors and shoemakers. Sanitation was a major problem, as people threw their waste onto the streets below and there was no sewering other than a drain in the road which only worked when it rained. A fabulous experience of what it was like to live in a town in Ireland around 1300 can be had by visiting the Geraldine Experience in Tralee, county Kerry. Visitors to the centre ride in small vehicles through a reconstruction of 14th-century Tralee complete with sights, sounds and even smells! Well worth travelling to visit.

Countryside A medieval villein (peasant) and his family lived in a one-room house made from a wooden frame with a thatched roof and wattle-and-daub walls. There were no windows. Cooking was done in an open fire in the middle of the house and the smoke escaped through a hole in the roof. A fence in the middle of the house separated the animals from the people, because animals usually spent the night indoors. The concept of sleeping people and animals separately was a post-medieval idea, so this did not seem odd at the time. Some houses had a platform in the roof space for sleeping on. People slept on straw-stuffed mattresses and the only other furniture would have been a table with stools. Surrounding the house were perhaps 20 to 30 other houses. Surrounding this community (called a village because it was occupied by villeins) were two or three large fields, up to 200 acres in size, where the villeins grew crops. Each villein was allocated a number of strips in each field which they could farm. Most of the crop was given to the lord as rent, with the remainder being kept for food. Usually the village had a forest where fallen wood could be collected for fires and pigs could be grazed. An area of land that nobody owned (called a common) could be used by everyone for grazing. The people were not rich and their coarse clothes were holey and must have been cold.

The Norman decline.

Despite their superior fighting capability and successful conquests, the Norman colony in Ireland began to decline after 1250 AD. Firstly, there were not enough dedicated Normans to occupy all the land they had acquired. Secondly, after 1216, the Norman Kings back in England had lost interest in Ireland and no longer sent military assistance to defend the Norman Lords in Ireland. Thirdly, the Normans had begun to be 'Irishised' and many had married Irish people and had learned the Irish language and traditions. Lastly, many Normans who had come to seek their fortune on the 'new frontier' became tired of Ireland and left again.

The more anti-Norman Irish lords began to realise that they had a chance against the Normans again. Aided by hired mercenaries from Scotland, called the 'Gallowglasses', they began to attack the property of the Norman Lords. In 1261, the Normans of Kerry were defeated and the O'Connors defeated the Normans of Connaught in 1270. And in 1274, the Normans of Wicklow were defeated. By 1300, large chunks of Ireland were once again ruled by the Irish Lords. The Norman King did not regard Ireland as strategically important (aside from trading goods) and was not prepared to waste his forces protecting the Normans there.

Until this point, the Norman kingdom consisted only of England and the lands in Ireland. In 1296, however, King Edward 1st of England sought to expand northwards and invaded Scotland. He took control, and removed the Stone of Scone (an important royal treasure of the Scottish Royal family that was finally returned 700 years later in 1996). For 10 years the English-Normans ruled the Scots. In 1306, however, a Scot named Robert Bruce hatched a plot to regain Scottish independence and with help of some Scottish lords, he defeated the English at Bannockburn in 1314. The victorious Robert Bruce then became King of Scotland.

The Irish Lords in Ulster, O'Neill and O'Donnell, were impressed by this turnaround in Scotland and wondered if Bruce could help them defeat the remaining Normans in Ireland. Robert Bruce knew that the English got many supplies from Ireland so the two sides worked out an agreement whereby Robert's brother, Edward Bruce, would become High King of Ireland in return for military assistance. Edward landed at Larne in Ulster (just north of present day Belfast) in 1315 with a large army, rapidly defeated the Normans of Meath and then continued southwards. However, many Irish didn't like him because he disrespected the Irish peasants and damaged their property by marching through it rather than going around it. Edward, nonetheless, was crowned King of Ireland in May 1316. Edward was joined by Robert Bruce later that year, and the brothers marched on the Normans of Limerick, Tipperary and Kilkenny and plundered their property. Robert returned to Scotland but Edward was finally defeated and killed by the Normans on 14 October 1318. Although the Bruces were gone, the Normans were weakened and the Irish now felt able to defeat them themselves. The pestilence of the Black Death of 1348 merely added to the decline of the Normans.

In 1360, King Edward 3rd finally realised that he was on the verge of losing control of the last Norman parts of Ireland and sent his son Lionel to try to reverse the declining trend. He arrived in Dublin in 1361 with an army and recruited local Normans. He then launched a series of unsuccessful offensives into Leinster and Munster. Faced with no good news to come home with, he held a conference in 1366 called the "Parliament of Kilkenny". This conference was designed to pass legislation for the Norman-controlled parts of Ireland, and attempted to reverse the trend of Norman decline by separating Irish and Norman culture. The laws passed banned Normans from marrying Irish, speaking Irish, using Irish law or dress, and listening to Irish music or stories. However, few Normans obeyed the laws - the families of many had been in Ireland for 2 centuries, and no longer felt patriotism towards England. Lionel died in 1367, with not much success to his name.

Richard 2nd became King in 1377. He landed at Waterford with a massive force of 10,000 men and a new invention: artillery. Faced with such a force, many major Irish Lords submitted to the English. Richard let these men hold their land if they promised loyalty to the English king. The Irish Lords of Leinster, however, were evicted from their estates and plans were made for English Lords to be set up instead. The land was temporarily left unoccupied, but as soon as Richard left in 1399 war broke out. The Irish Lords of Leinster returned to their land in Leinster and Richard's viceroy was murdered. Not long afterwards Richard was murdered by his cousin Henry who took the throne of England as Henry 4th.

The Norman decline continued for the next half century. By 1450, English control in Ireland had been reduced to a 20 mile wide strip around Dublin, known as the Pale. The English defended this land, and the Irish were unable to completely drive the English off the island. The Pale was surrounded with a fence to keep out the Irish. (This is where the phrase 'Beyond the Pale' comes from.) The 3 major English Lords whose estates were within the Pale continued to exist, and formed alliances with the neighbouring Irish and became very powerful. Outside the Pale (particularly Munster), former Norman Lords had practically become Irish, and many of them joined with the native Irish in their hatred of the English.