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Economic Problems of the Church: Why the Reformation Failed in Ireland

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  07 April 2011

Steven G. Ellis
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Extract

The present paper is intended as a contribution to the recent debate on the failure of the Irish Reformation. It commences with a critical summary of the modern historiography of the subject which serves also to highlight a potentially significant imbalance between the early and later Reformation periods in the identification and exploitation of relevant source material by historians. Arguably, the nature of the evidence hitherto deployed goes far towards explaining the dimensions of the present controversy. The paper addresses this controversy mainly in two ways. First, it aims to draw attention to, and analyse, a neglected source compilation which is of central importance in assessing the reasons for the failure of the Irish Reformation. Second, and partly in order to.establish the full significance of this evidence, it seeks to develop a wider perspective from which to assess the potential for, and chronology of, religious change in Ireland.

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Articles
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The Journal of Ecclesiastical History , Volume 41 , Issue 2 , April 1990 , pp. 239 - 265
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Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1990

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References

1 I owe these points to conversations with Professor David Quinn about his recollections of the academic environment of Irish historians in the 1930s.

2 Church and Stale in Tudor Ireland: a history of the penal laws against Irish Catholics, 1534–1603, Dublin 1935.

3 Ibid. Cf. Jourdan, G. V., in Phillips, W. A. (ed.), History of the Church of Ireland, 3 vols, London 1933–1934.Google Scholar

4 See now Christopher Haigh, ‘The recent historiography of the English Reformation’, repr. in idem (ed.), The English Reformation Revised, Cambridge 1987, 21–6.

5 Cambridge 1974.

6 The Irish Constitutional Revolution of the Sixteenth Century, Cambridge 1979.

7 ‘The opposition to the ecclesiastical legislation in the Irish Reformation Parliament’, IHS xvi (1968–9), 285–303; ‘George Browne, first Reformation archbishop of Dublin, 1536–1554’, this JOURNAL xxi (1970), 301–26; ‘Cromwellian reform and the origins of the Kildare rebellion, 1533–4’, TRHS, 5th ser. xxvii (1977), 69–93.

8 ‘The Edwardian Reformation in Ireland’, Arch. Hib. xxvi (1976–7), 83–99; ‘The beginnings of modern Ireland’, in Farrell, Brian (ed.), The Irish Parliamentary Tradition, Dublin 1973, 68–87Google Scholar; ‘Fr. Wolfe's description of Limerick, 1574’, North Munster Antiquarian Journal xvii (1975), 47–53; ‘The Elizabethans and the Irish’, IHS xlvi (1977), 38–50; ‘Sword, word and strategy in the Reformation in Ireland’, Historical Journal xxi (1978), 475–502; “‘A treatise for the Reformation of Ireland, “554–5”’, Irish Jurist, NS xvi (1981), 299–315; ‘The Elizabethans and the Irish: a muddled model’, IHS xx (1981), 233–43.

9 Bradshaw, ‘Fr. Wolfe's description’, 50.

10 ‘Why the Reformation failed in Ireland: une question mal posée’, this JOURNAL XXX (1979). 423–50. esp. pp. 424–5.

11 This is not to say that nothing has since appeared on the Tudor Reformation in Ireland. Yet the most substantial new work, Alan Ford, The Protestant Reformalton in Ireland, 1590–1641, Frankfurt am Main 1985, is primarily concerned with the later period, and other works arc chiefly surveys, notably the articles by Dr Colm Lennon, ‘The Counter-Reformation in Ireland’, and DrFord, Alan, ‘The Protestant Reformation in Ireland’, in Ciaran Brady and Raymond Gillcspie (eds), Natives and Newcomers: the making of Irish colonial society, 1534–1641, Dublin 1986Google Scholar; and Corish, P. J., The Irish Catholic Experience: a historical survey, Dublin 1985, ch. iii.Google Scholar

12 Art. cit.

13 Bottigheimer, Karl, ‘The failure of the Reformation in Ireland: une question bien posée’, this JOURNAL xxxvi (1985), 196–207.Google Scholar

14 Ibid. 198–202; Corish, P. J., The Catholic Community in the Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries, Dublin 1981, 18–42Google Scholar; the works at n. II.

15 Ford, op. cit., see esp. ch. iv.

16 Ibid. 198.

17 Many of these have recently been listed in Edwards, R. D. and O'Dowd, M., Sources for Early Modern Irish History, 1534–1641, Cambridge 1985, esp. ch. iv.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

18 Mr James Murray of Trinity College, Dublin, is completing a doctoral dissertation on the Tudor diocese of Dublin. I am indebted to him for many stimulating conversations on this topic and for the point about the feasibility of a diocesan approach for other dioceses.

19 Caley, J. (ed.), Valor Ecclesiasticus temp. Henr. VIII, 6 vols (Record Commission, 1810–1834).Google Scholar

20 See especially Savine, A., ‘English monasteries on the eve of the Dissolution’, in Vinogradoff, P. (ed.), Oxford Studies in Social and Legal History, Oxford 1909, 1–303.Google Scholar

21 The Statutes at Large, Passed in the Parliaments Held in Ireland, 20 vols, Dublin 1786–1801, i. 96–9; Quinn, D. B., ‘The bills and statutes of the Irish parliaments of Henry VII and Henry VIII’, Anal. Hib. x (1941), 155Google Scholar; Ellis, S. G., Tudor Ireland: Crown, community and the conflict of cultures, 1470–1603, London 1985, 131–2, 194–5.Google Scholar

22 Published as Valor Beneficiorum Ecclesiasticorum in Hibernia: or the First-Fruits of all the Ecclesiastical Benefices in the Kingdom of Ireland, as taxed in the King's Books, with an Account shewing how this Royal Fund vested in Trustees, hath hitherto been disposed of, printed for Edward Exshaw, Bookseller on Cork-Hill, Dublin 1741, xiv + 26 pp. A corrected reprint of the Valor was issued in 1780. I have to thank Professor Gearóid Mac Niocaill, who first drew the printed version of the Valor to my attention.

23 Wood, H., A Guide to the Records Deposited in the Public Record Office of Ireland, Dublin 1919, 116Google Scholar, 127, 157–9; Ellis, op. cit. 175.Google Scholar The records included: three copies of the Valor, described as ‘Valor Beneficiorum 29 Hen. VIII-5 Car. I’ (1537–1630); some valuations of bishoprics and other benefices not already valued, dated 1591–2; some accounts of the clerk of the first fruits for the period 1564–1706; an account of the archbishop of Dublin for twentieths and subsidies, 1566–85; and some nineteenth-century copies and comparative valuations. In addition, the Chief Remembrancer's Office in the exchequer included another copy of the Valor and some original returns to a commission of 14 Jac. 1 (1616–17).

24 MS 567 (E. 3. 15). The return for Ossory diocese is printed from this in Moran, P. F. (ed.), Spicilegium Ossoriense, 1st ser., Dublin 1874, 10–12.Google Scholar

25 For instance, both are listed in the bibliography to Edwards, Church and State.

26 BL, Add. MS 4767, fo. 65V.

27 TCD, MS 567, supplies fuller information on this point: ‘Extentus beneficiorum et dignitatum ultra reprisas Ossoricnsis diocesis captus apud Kilkenny die Mercurii proxime ante festum S. Patricii episcopi anno Regni Regis Henrici 8vi xxix per Walterum Cowly et Jacobum White, commissarios’: fo. 5V. William Brabazon's account as under treasurer, 1537–40, also notes a reward paid to James White of Waterford, Walter Cowley, and Walter Archer of Kilkenny for taxation of first fruits and twentieths in Cos Wexford, Waterford, Kilkenny and Tipperary (presumably the dioceses of Ossory, Ferns, Cashel and Waterford), Letters and Papers, Foreign and Domestic, Henry VIII, London 1862–1932, xvi. no. 777.

28 BL, Add. MS 4767, fo. 65V.

29 Williams, Glanmor, The Welsh Church from the Conquest to the Reformation, Cardiff 1962, 285Google Scholar; Heath, Peter, The English Parish Clergy on the Eve of the Reformation, London 1969;Google ScholarHaigh, Christopher, Reformation and Resistance in Tudor Lancashire, Cambridge 1975, esp. chs i-iii.Google Scholar

30 Valor i. 100; ii. 2, et passim.

31 Williams, op. cit. 273, 285.

32 Williams, Glanmor, Welsh Reformation Essays, Cardiff 1967, esp. pp. 22–3.Google Scholar

33 CSPI, 174.

34 Valor v. 287.

35 Bradshaw, , ‘Opposition’, 285–303Google Scholar; Ellis, , Tudor Ireland, 131–2, 194–5.Google Scholar

36 Ibid. 175; BL, Add. MS 4767, fo. 73. For instance, immediately after the monastic dissolutions, in 1541–2, the yield was IR £287 2s. 1½d., PRO, SP 60/10, fo. 45, LP xviii. no. 553(2).

37 White, N. B. (ed.), Extents of Irish Monastic Possessions, 1540–41, Dublin 1943.Google Scholar Bradshaw correlated White's edition with the originals, PRO, SP 65/1/2, 65/2, 65/3/1, 3, 65/4/1–3. 65/5; SC 11/795–6, and made pencilled corrections to the copy in Cambridge University Library. This saved me from some slips.

38 White, op. cit. 376; Williams, , Welsh Church, 348.Google Scholar

39 White, op. cit. 376, et passim; PRO, SP 65/1/2 (which corrects White in the case of Llanthony); Williams, , op. cit. 348–9.Google Scholar

40 Ellis, , Tudor Ireland, 201, 204, 210, 218Google Scholar; BL, Add. MS 4767, fo. 73.

41 Valor, 9–10; CSPI, 169–70.

42 Valor, 9; PRO, SP 65/1/2. See also the archbishop of Dublin's allegations that Undertreasurer Brabazon had defrauded the king of over £100 St. on his account of the profits of the archbishopric, PRO SP 60/4, fo. 71, LP xii/I. no. 1077.

43 Memoranda rolls, 15 Henry VIII m. II, PROI, Ferguson Collection iv. fos 80–2; 23 Henry VII m. 4, PROI, RC 8/43, 213–14; 28 Henry VIII m. 23d, PROI, Ferguson Coll. iv. fo. 201; Valor, 4, 9. See also Ellis, S. G., Reform and Revival: English government in Ireland, 1470–1534, London 1986, 128–9.Google Scholar

44 PRO, SP 63/216, no. 20 I, CSPI, no. 267; SP 63/216, no. 20 II, CSPI, no. 268; CSPI, nos 266, 407.

45 CSPI, nos 223, 267.

46 PRO, SP 63/216, no. 20 II, CSPI, no. 268.

47 See especially Hill, Christopher, Economic Problems of the Church from Archbishop Whitgift to the Long Parliament, Oxford 1956, 109–12.Google Scholar

48 Ford, , Protestant Reformation, 68.Google Scholar

49 Healy, J., History of the Diocese of Meath i, London 1908, 198–9.Google Scholar

50 PRO, SP 63/216, no. 20 II, CSPI, no. 268. See also Ford, ‘Protestant Reformation’, and Lennon, , ‘Counter-Reformation’, 61, 84.Google Scholar

51 Ford, , Protestant Reformation, 88.Google Scholar

52 Healy, , op. cit. i. 198–9Google Scholar; CSPI, nos 213, 407.

53 This figure includes half of Armagh and Limerick and counts separately some dioceses, such as Down and Connor, which had long been united.

54 Ford, op. cit. ch. iv, on which also the following calculations are based.

55 Ellis, S. G., ‘John Bale, bishop of Ossory, 1552–3’, Journal of the Butler Society ii/3 (1984), 283–93Google Scholar; Canny, , ‘Why the Reformation failed’, 431–2.Google Scholar

56 Ellis, , Tudor Ireland, ch. vii, esp. pp. 192–3.Google Scholar

57 For a convenient summary, Ibid. 192–205.

58 Haigli, ‘Recent historiography’, lists and summarises the more important works on these developments.

59 See Lennon, , ‘Counter-Reformation’, 75–92, esp. p. 91.Google Scholar

60 Ellis, , Tudor Ireland, 142, 281Google Scholar; Lennon, Colm, ‘Recusancy and the Dublin Stanihursts’, Arch. Hib. xxxiii (1975), 101–10Google Scholar; idem, ‘Counter-Reformation’, 84–5.

61 Williams, , Welsh Church, 284, 339–46Google Scholar; Nicholls, K. W., Gaelic and Gaelicised Ireland in the Middle Ages, Dublin 1972, 91–101Google Scholar; Mooney, C., The Church in Gaelic Ireland Thirteenth to Fifteenth Centuries, Dublin 1969, 53–60Google Scholar; Bradshaw, , Dissolution, ch. i.Google Scholar

62 Williams, Essays, esp. ch. i. See now also idem, Recovery, Reorientation and Reformation: Wales c. 1415–1642, Oxford 1987, chs v, xii-xiii.

63 Ibid.

64 Ellis, , Tudor Ireland, ch. viiGoogle Scholar, and the references there cited.

65 Williams, , Essays, 14, 18, 207–19Google Scholar; Roberts, P. R., ‘The union with England and the identity of Anglican Wales’, TRHS, 5th ser. xxii (1972), 63–70Google Scholar; Canny, , ‘Why the Reformation failed’, 438–9Google Scholar; Ford, , ‘Protestant Reformation’, 51, 64–6Google Scholar; Ellis, , op. cit. 218–19.Google Scholar

66 Roberts, , art. cit. 63–70Google Scholar; Williams, , op. cit. 183–5, 207–19Google Scholar; idem, Recovery, 290–2, 295–9, 314–15, 322–5, 331.

67 Roberts, , art. cit. 49–51Google Scholar; Williams, , Essays, 24, 191–205Google Scholar; idem, Recovery, 295–9, 314–15, 322–5.

68 Ellis, , Tudor Ireland, 218, 220.Google Scholar

69 Williams, , op. cit. 13–14, 18.Google Scholar

70 Canny, N. P., The Formation of ike Old English Elite in Ireland, Dublin 1975Google Scholar, passim; Williams, , Recovery, 307Google Scholar; Ford, , ‘Protestant Reformation’, 50–74.Google Scholar

71 Williams, , Essays, 25–7, 55–8Google Scholar; idem, Welsh Church, 271; idem, Recovery, 316–21.

72 See especially Haigh, Christopher, ‘From monopoly to minority: Catholicism in early modern England’, TRHS, 5th ser. xxxi (1981), 129–47.Google Scholar

73 Lennon, , ‘Counter-Reformation’, 83–4, 88–9Google Scholar; Ellis, , Tudor Ireland, 215–16.Google Scholar

74 Quoted in Lydon, J. F., The Lordship of Ireland in the Middle Ages, Dublin 1972, 241.Google Scholar On the towns, see now also Bradshaw, Brendan, ‘The Reformation in the towns: Cork, Limerick and Galway’, in Bradley, John (ed.), The Medieval City, Dublin 1989, 220–52.Google Scholar

75 A good general survey is Anthony Sheehan, ‘Irish towns in a period of change, 1558–1625’, in Brady, and Gillespie, , Natives and Newcomers, 93–119.Google Scholar

76 Cowan, I. B., Regional Aspects of the Scottish Reformation, London 1978.Google Scholar

77 Moody, T. W., Martin, F. X. and Byrne, F.J. (eds), A New History of Ireland, III: Early modern Ireland 1534–1691, Oxford 1976, ch. i.Google Scholar

78 Hammerstein, Helga, ‘Aspects of the Continental education of Irish students in the reign of Elizabeth I’, Historical Studies viii (1971), 137–53Google Scholar; Ellis, , Tudor Ireland, 222Google Scholar; Lennon, , ‘Counter-Reformation’, 83.Google Scholar

79 I am grateful to Dr Colm Lennon for drawing my attention to the significance of the chantries in the maintenance of urban Catholicism. See in general ibid. 78, 84; Ronan, M. V., ‘Religious customs of Dublin medieval gilds’, Irish Ecclesiastical Record, 5th ser. xxvi (July-Dec. 1925), 228–30Google Scholar; Webb, J.J., The Guilds of Dublin, Dublin 1929Google Scholar; Niocaill, Gearóid Mac ‘A register of St. Saviour's priory, Waterford’, Anal. Hib. xxiii (1966), 135–224.Google Scholar Many of the surviving records of Dublin guilds were published by H. F. Berry in successive issues of the Journal of the Royal Society of Antiquaries of Ireland between the years 1900 and 1918.

80 The clearest indication of this is the case of the guild of St Anne in St Audoen's parish, Dublin, which supported six chantry priests. The guild's property and lands were rented to Catholics, and the profits presumably supported the priests. The arrangement went undetected until 1611, when court proceedings commenced against the guild and also St Sythe's Gild. In 1634 a commission of inquiry reported that the guild's annual rents were worth £289 15. 7d., but the guild was not finally suppressed until 1740. See Lennon, Colm, ‘Civic life and religion in early seventeenth century Dublin’, Arch. Hib. xxxviii (1983), 114–25Google Scholar; Ronan, , art. cit. 379–85Google Scholar; Berry, H. F., ‘History of the religious guild of St. Anne’, Proceedings of the Royal Irish Academy xxv (1904), sect, C, 21–106.Google Scholar For indications of a trade guild continuing to support Catholicism, see especially Webb, op. cit. 85–6 (payments for a priest, a wake, and tolling bells at a month's mind).

81 Lennon, , ‘Counter-Reformation’, 79–90Google Scholar; Bottigheimer, , ‘Failure’, 196–207.Google Scholar

82 Ford, , Protestant Reformation, ch. iii.Google Scholar As this paper was being written, a review article appeared by Professor Canny, in which he restated some of his arguments about the Reformation, ‘Protestants, planters and apartheid in early modern Ireland’, IHS xxv (1986–7), 105–15. Canny remains unconvinced by Ford's findings and argues that his primary purpose was to undertake ‘the task of supplying supporting evidence for the theory first propounded by his mentor’, Dr Bradshaw (p. 107). In the face of Ford's evidence, Canny asks us to believe that the ‘Irish protestant leaders of the seventeenth century’ ought to be regarded as ‘the most reform-minded group in Europe with the possible exception of the catholic reformers in the Austrian Habsburg lands’: ibid. 109–10. Perhaps I may also be permitted here to record my disagreement with the purported summary of my views about the significance of the Reformation's failure in Professor Canny's latest synthesis, Kingdom and Colony: Ireland in the Atlantic world, 1560–1800, Baltimore 1988.Google Scholar I regard the failure of the Irish Reformation as a consequence of the weakness of Tudor government in Ireland and of the strained relations between Crown and community. I do not see it as ‘the factor that most contributed to the disequilibrium between state and society from which stemmed the bitter antagonisms that makes [sic] the political history of Ireland in the late Elizabethan period so different from that of England’: ibid. 9.

83 Brady, Ciaran, ‘Conservative subversives: the community of the Pale and the Dublin administration, 1556–1586’, in Corish, P.J. (ed.), Radicals, Rebels and Establishments: Historical Studies XV, Belfast 1985, 11–32.Google Scholar