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This book examines the rise and fall of the aristocratic Lacy family in England, Ireland, Wales and Normandy. As one of the first truly transnational studies of individual medieval aristocrats, it provides a fresh look at lordship and the interplay between aristocracy and crown from 1166 to 1241. Hugh de Lacy (†1186), traded on his military usefulness to King Henry II of England in Wales and Normandy to gain a speculative grant of the ancient Irish kingdom of Mide (Meath). Hugh was remarkably successful in Ireland, where he was able to thwart the juvenile ambitions of the future King John to increase his powers there. Hugh was hailed by native commentators as ‘lord of the foreigners of Ireland’ and even ‘king of Ireland’. In this study his near-legendary life is firmly grounded in the realities of Anglo-Irish politics. The political career of Hugh’s less famous son and heir, Walter de Lacy (†1241), is in turn illuminated by surviving royal records and his own acta. Walter was one of the major actors in the Irish Sea province under Kings Richard I, John and Henry III, and his relationship with each king provides a unique insight into the nature of their reigns. Over the course of fifty-two years, Walter helped to shape the course of Anglo-Irish history. That history is recast in light of the transnational perspective of its chief participants. This book is a major contribution to current debates over the structure of medieval European society.
It was the advent of Queen Victoria’s Golden Jubilee which prompted the fifty-five year old twelfth Earl of Meath to write to The Times of London in December 1896: ‘A special effort should be made during the coming year to include the teaching of loyalty and patriotism in our system of national education. If sentiment be steadied by knowledge, we need not fear lest
at Weobley (Herefordshire). The Norman territories of the family were shared by the two brothers, so that from 1066 both branches of the Lacy family controlled territories either side of the English Channel. However, the Herefordshire branch was to extend itself even further. From the outset, the Herefordshire Lacys sought to control lands in Wales, being lords of Ewyas Lacy in the Welsh march. In 1172, however, King Henry II granted them the ancient Irish kingdom of Mide (henceforth known as the lordship of Meath). This meant that the Herefordshire Lacys
of the Dublin garrison, Miles de Cogan, raided eastern Connacht in alliance with Ruaidrí’s disaffected son, Murchad.5 Both expeditions were direct contraventions of the Treaty of Windsor, which had in theory limited colonial activities to Meath, Leinster and the south-east corner of Munster, and had assured Ruaidrí Ua Conchobair of the support of the English government. The Geraldines, the only settlers over whom William fitz Audelin was apparently able to exert firm control, chafed at their restraints, and their spokesman, Gerald of Wales, complained bitterly of
thirteenth centuries was a miscellany of varied realms with varying lordship structures. The king-centred hierarchy of authority in England contrasted with the pattern of lordship in other provinces, posing unique challenges to transnational aristocrats, not to mention those who study them. Hugh and Walter de Lacy did not deal with their lands in Herefordshire as they did those in Meath, where ‘English’ lordship had to be grafted on to pre-existing Celtic conditions, or even in Normandy, which had a pattern of lordship all its own. The preceding chapters have told the
also faced the possibility that his power was insufficient to meet the challenge of transnational lordship, including the indefinite allegiance that it could entail when forced to serve different overlords. In due course his 77 walter de lacy name was writ large on the Irish scene, as the lord of Meath was once again deputed to advance royal policy in the island. Walter also spent a substantial, though less attested, amount of time in England, Wales and Normandy. Either on his own or in the train of the royal court, Walter must have used these periods to administer
, Meath and Leinster. Prerogative wardship meant that they all reverted to the Crown and punched holes in three of the colony’s four provincial lordships. John’s second mandate commanded the justiciar to establish the boundary between Limerick and Cork (colonial Thomond and Desmond), as a preliminary to the shiring of the region.2 Meiler’s commission in 1206 was thus clearly aimed at limiting Briouze’s lordship in Limerick. At the same time, William de Briouze had his Welsh lordship of Brecon threatened through English litigation.3 John’s April initiatives put royal and
, the Legion of Frontiersmen, the National Service League, the Girls’ Patriotic League, the League of Empire, and the British Empire Union. 63 The ‘tradition’ was promoted with special determination by the tireless efforts of Reginald Brabazon, twelfth Earl of Meath (1841–1928) 64 through three social movements – the Lads’ Drills Association, the Duty and Discipline Movement and the Empire Day
of 1201, Walter de Lacy had been absent from Ireland for at least two years. During that time, Connacht gradually emerged as the battleground between the resident elites for pre-eminence in Ireland, with a protracted succession dispute providing the backdrop. The first rumblings reached the borders of Meath in 1199. In that year, Cathal Crobderg Ua Conchobair burned Meiler fitz Henry’s castle of Ardnurcher in Meath.46 This was the first act of aggression to come from Connacht since the 1195 Athlone meeting, and occurred while both Walter and his brother Hugh were
Delving into a hitherto unexplored aspect of Irish art history, Painting Dublin, 1886–1949 examines the depiction of Dublin by artists from the late-nineteenth to the mid-twentieth century. Artists’ representations of the city have long been markers of civic pride and identity, yet in Ireland, such artworks have been overlooked in favour of the rural and pastoral, falling outside of the dominant disciplinary narratives of nationalism or modernism. Framed by the shift from city of empire to capital of an independent republic, this book chiefly examines artworks by of Walter Frederick Osborne (1857–1903), Rose Mary Barton (1856–1929), Jack Butler Yeats (1871–1957), Harry Aaron Kernoff (1900–74), Estella Frances Solomons (1882–1968), and Flora Hippisley Mitchell (1890–1973), encompassing a variety of urban views and artistic themes. While Dublin is renowned for its representation in literature, this book will demonstrate how the city was also the subject of a range of visual depictions, including those in painting and print. Focusing on the images created by these artists as they navigated the city’s streets, this book offers a vivid visualisation of Dublin and its inhabitants, challenging a reengagement with Ireland’s art history through the prism of the city and urban life.