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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 20 May 2025
This article explores how the language barrier reinforced the Manx church’s peripheral position by its effect on the course of Protestant reform on the Isle of Man. It considers the nature of this barrier, focusing on the lack of published Manx translations of the Bible and the Book of Common Prayer, and outlines how this affected the course taken by reform. Lack of access to Manx texts and education militated against the emergence of a body of theologically aware laity, while the necessity for parish clergy to be bilingual restricted the pool of potential candidates, hindering the infusion of new personnel and ideas from elsewhere. Educational and economic factors combined with language to exacerbate these problems and retard the impact of new patterns of clergy recruitment and training. The consequence was to limit the Manx church’s participation in developments shaping the Church of England, and to complicate attempts by later seventeenth-century bishops to overcome this.
I wish to thank Alan Ford and Crawford Gribben for their comments on an earlier draft of this article, as well as the peer reviewers and the audience at the EHS Summer Conference in 2023. 26 Fairway Drive, Ramsey, Isle of Man, IM8 2BB.
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8 See, for example, Calendar of State Papers Domestic: Elizabeth, Addenda, 1566–79, ed. Mary Anne Everett Green (London, 1871), 362 (examination of Henry Simpson, 8 October 1571), BHO, at: <http://www.british-history.ac.uk/cal-state-papers/domestic/edw-eliz/addenda/1566-79/>, accessed 5 April 2018; Calendar of State Papers, Scotland, 5: 1574–81, ed. William K Boyd (London, 1907), 70–1 (Advertisements to the Earl of Leicester, 1574), BHO, at: <http://www.british-history.ac.uk/cal-state-papers/scotland/vol5/pp68-83>, accessed 1 November 2018; Calendar of State Papers Domestic: Elizabeth, 1581–90, ed. Robert Lemon (London, 1865), 633 (information from John Waren, 11 December 1589), BHO, at: <http://www.british-history.ac.uk/cal-state-papers/domestic/edw-eliz/1581-90/pp631-637>, accessed 1 November 2018; Calendar of State Papers, Scotland, 10: 1589–1593, ed. William K. Boyd and Henry W. Meikle (Edinburgh, 1936), 688–93, at 690 (no. 694), BHO, at: <http://www.british-history.ac.uk/cal-state-papers/scotland/vol10/pp681-711>, accessed 6 April 2018; ibid. 828–9 (no. 783, Robert Bowes to [Burghley], 1 January 1593), BHO, at: <http://www.british-history.ac.uk/cal-state-papers/scotland/vol10/pp820-833>, accessed 6 April 2018; Calendar of State Papers, Scotland, 11: 1593–1595, ed. Annie I. Cameron (Edinburgh, 1936), 116–18, at 117 (no. 85, Robert Bowes to Burghley, 7 July 1593), BHO, at: <http://www.british-history.ac.uk/cal-state-papers/scotland/vol11/pp114-136>, accessed 6 April 2018; Calendar of State Papers, Ireland, 1592–1596, ed. Hans Claude Hamilton (London, 1890), 126, BHO, at: <http://www.british-history.ac.uk/cal-state-papers/ireland/1592-6/pp120-136>, accessed 1 November 2018.
9 On the later medieval diocese, see Woolf, Alex, ‘The Early History of the Diocese of Sodor’, and Davey, P. J., ‘Medieval Monasticism and the Isle of Man c.1130–1540’, in Duffy, Seán and Mytum, Harold, eds, A New History of the Isle of Man, 3: The Medieval Period, 1000–1406 (Liverpool, 2015), 329–48 and 349–76Google Scholar, respectively.
10 ‘An Act for dissevering the Bishoprick of Chester and of the Isle of Man from the Jurisdiction of Canterbury to the Jurisdiction of York’, 1541 (33 Henry VIII, c. 31).
11 Ashley, Anne, ‘The Spiritual Courts of the Isle of Man, especially in the 17th and 18th Centuries’, EHR 72 (1957), 31–59, at 3610.1093/ehr/LXXII.CLXXXII.31CrossRefGoogle Scholar. The name of the diocese changed gradually during the seventeenth century.
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14 A. W. Moore, ed., Notes and Documents from the Records of the Isle of Man (Douglas, n.d.), 26 (citing the Liber Scaccarii for 1610, but reference not traced); Gumbley, K. F. W., ‘Church Legislation in the Isle of Man’, Ecclesiastical Law Journal 3 (1994), 240–610.1017/S0956618X00005858CrossRefGoogle Scholar, online at: <http://www.gumbley.net/article.htm#return6>, accessed 1 December 2021.
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20 Heal, Felicity, Reformation in Britain and Ireland (Oxford, 2003), 283 10.1093/0198269242.001.0001CrossRefGoogle Scholar n. 124; compare eadem, ‘Mediating the Word’, 280.
21 Sharpe and Dickinson, ‘Courts, Crime and Litigation’, 158.
22 Dickinson, Lordship of Man, 10. In the 1690s, William Sacheverell calculated it at about 16,000, which was probably an over-estimate: Preston, Lancashire Archives, Kenyon of Peel Hall Papers, DDKE/Box 84/79, ‘Mr Sacheverell’s Computation about the Isle of Man’.
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24 Christopher Lewin, e-mail to the author, 7 August 2023. A variation of this argument is offered by Ellis, Steven G., ‘A View of the Irish Language: Language and History in Ireland from the Middle Ages to the Present’, in Isaacs, Ann K., ed., Languages and Identities in Historical Perspective (Pisa, 2005), 67–78, at 70–1Google Scholar, who asserts that the Protestant Reformation contributed to a decline in the mutual comprehensibility of Scottish, Irish and Manx Gaelic. Welsh was related most closely to Cornish and Breton; there were thus two ‘families’ of Celtic languages.
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28 Jenkins, Geraint, ‘From Reformation to Methodism 1536–c.1750’, in Morgan, Prys, ed., Wales: An Illustrated History (Stroud, 2001), 167–209, at 193Google Scholar; Hazlett, W. Ian P., The Reformation in Britain and Ireland (London, 2003), 79–80 Google Scholar.
29 The lack of any study of Phillips is a significant lacuna in the historiography of the Manx church.
30 Phillips to the Earl of Salisbury, 1 February 1611, in MNHL, MS 00559C, ‘A Booke containing the Answers of the Officers, Deemsters, Vicars General and 24 Keys to certaine Articles objected by John now Bishop of this Isle against John Ireland Esquire Lieutenant and Captain of the Isle of Man’, 1610 (early eighteenth-century copy); quoted in Moore, A. W., assisted by Rhŷs, John, eds, The Book of Common Prayer in Manx Gaelic: Being Translations made by Bishop Phillips in 1610, and by the Manx Clergy in 1765 , 2 vols, Manx Society 32, 33 (Douglas, 1893), 1: xiiGoogle Scholar.
31 Moore, Sodor and Man, 136.
32 Hoy, Michael John, ‘Isaac Barrow: Builder of Foundations for a Modern Nation: The Church, Education and Society in the Isle of Man, 1660–1800’ (PhD thesis, University of Liverpool, 2015), 76 Google Scholar.
33 Heal, ‘Mediating the Word’, 280; compare Marshall, Peter, The Catholic Priesthood and the English Reformation (Oxford, 1994), 29–30 CrossRefGoogle Scholar.
34 Thomson, Robert Leith, ‘Early Manx: A Contribution to the Historical Study of Manx Gaelic Arranged as a Supplementary Volume to the Moore-Rhys Edition of the Phillips Prayer Book (1610)’ (BLitt dissertation, University of Glasgow, 1953), 9–10 Google Scholar.
35 Williams, ‘Unity of Religion or Unity of Language?’, 215–16; Heal, ‘Mediating the Word’, 274. Hazlett describes it as Latinized: Hazlett, Reformation in Britain and Ireland, 81.
36 Foster, Joseph, ed., Alumni Oxonienses 1500–1714 (Oxford, 1891), s.n Google Scholar. ‘Phillips, John’, BHO, at: <http://www.british-history.ac.uk/alumni-oxon/1500-1714>, accessed 7 February 2018. I owe this suggestion to Professor Max Wheeler.
37 MNHL, MSS 00003, 00004 (2 vols). For the dating, see Thomson, ‘Early Manx’, 4.
38 Another fragment, from the Benedicite, was at one time in Moore’s possession: Paul Rogers, ‘Padjer Moghrey’ (2023), unpublished document, in private hands.
39 MNHL, MS 00220A, A. W. Moore, ‘Old Manx Families’ (1889), 41. The parish’s register of baptisms from this period has not survived.
40 MNHL, MS 09782, Castle Rushen Papers, Ecclesiastical Courts, Box 2, Bishop Barrow, report on the condition of the diocese (1663). See also Craine, ‘Bible in Manx’, 542.
41 Sacheverell, William, An Account of the Isle of Man, its Inhabitants, Language, Soil, remarkable Curiosities, the Succession of its Kings and Bishops, down to the present Time (London, 1702), 8 Google Scholar.
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43 Chaloner, James, A Short Treatise of the Isle of Man, ed. and intro. Cumming, J. G., Manx Society 10 (Douglas, 1864), 9 Google Scholar. For the date of Chaloner’s work, see Callow, John, ‘“In so shifting a Scene”: Thomas Fairfax as Lord of the Isle of Man, 1651–60’, in Hopper, Andrew and Major, Philip, eds, England’s Fortress: New Perspectives on Thomas, 3rd Lord Fairfax (Abingdon and New York, 2016), 21–52, at 31Google Scholar.
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45 The readings appointed for morning and evening prayer, however, were not translated; this would have entailed an almost complete translation of the Bible.
46 The Book of Common Order was the first book published in Gaelic: MacCulloch, Diarmaid, Reformation: Europe’s House Divided, 1490–1700 (London, 2004), 381 Google Scholar. However, the Book of Common Prayer did not appear until 1794: Griffiths, Bibliography, 498.
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49 The New Testament in Irish appeared in 1603: Heal, ‘Mediating the Word’, 263.
50 Bottigheimer and Lotz-Heumann, ‘Irish Reformation’, 284.
51 Milton, Anthony, ‘Introduction’, to idem, ed., The Oxford History of Anglicanism, 1: Reformation and Identity, c.1520–1662 (Oxford, 2017), 1–27, at 2–310.1093/acprof:oso/9780199639731.001.0001CrossRefGoogle Scholar.
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55 Hoy, ‘Political or Pastoral’, 764, following Clamp, Peter G., ‘English Schooling in the Isle of Man, 1660–1700: The Barrovian Design’, Journal of Educational Administration and History 20 (1988), 10–21, at 11Google Scholar.
56 For Barrow’s educational achievements, see Hinton Bird, An Island that Led: The History of Manx Education, 2 vols (Port St Mary, [c.1990]), 1: 9–15.
57 See the records of imports in MNHL, MS 10058, Ingates, Outgates, Licences etc., Ramsey, 4 April 1648, 13 January 1693, 8 March 1694, 7 March 1695, 11 October 1695.
58 Moore, History, 1: 361.
59 For example, MNHL, MS 10194, Diocesan presentments, Arbory, 13 April 1673 and 7 June 1674 (Samuel Robinson for only reading an English homily); ibid., Ballaugh, 18 November 1685 (Henry Lowcay for not preaching in either Manx or English).
60 See, for example, MNHL, MS 09756, ‘Bishop Foster’s Visitation 1634’, response from the parish of German; and the presentments of Samuel Robinson in the 1670s (see previous note).
61 Lewin, Christopher, ‘A Manx Sermon from 1696’, Zeitschrift für celtische Philologie 62 (2015), 45–96 10.1515/zcph.2015.004CrossRefGoogle Scholar, online at: <https://doi.org/10.1515/zcph.2015.004>, accessed 5 November 2024. There is a considerable corpus of early Manx manuscript sermons, mostly held by MNHL.
62 Such published (and some unpublished) material as there was, can be found online at: <http://corpus.gaelg.im>, accessed 5 November 2024.
63 MNHL, MS 10194, Diocesan Presentments 1678. It would be incautious to read developed Protestant sentiments into this utterance: more probably it was expressing opposition to the increasing use of English as the language of incomers. The case was recorded in English, but we do not know the extent to which Manx was used in proceedings.
64 MNHL, MS 14425, Archidiaconal Wills 1684–8 (transcription by Joyce M. Oates, 2017), 70.
65 Williams, Renewal and Reformation, iv.
66 For the similar case of Orkney and Shetland, see Methuen, Charlotte, ‘Orkney, Shetland and the Networks of the Northern Reformation’, Nordlit 43 (2019), 25–53, at 46Google Scholar, online at: <https://septentrio.uit.no/index.php/nordlit/issue/view/398>, accessed 8 February 2024.
67 Oxford, Bodl., MS Tanner 28, fol. 175, Levinz to Archbishop Sancroft, 12 September 1688.
68 On the continued popularity of practices which may represent an attempt to fill the gap left by the loss of the supernatural in worship, see Hutton, Ronald, ‘The English Reformation and the Evidence of Folklore’, P&P 148 (1995), 89–116 Google Scholar; idem, ‘The Changing Faces of Manx Witchcraft’, Cultural & Social History 7 (2010), 153–69; Sharpe, Jim, ‘Witchcraft in the Early Modern Isle of Man’, Cultural & Social History 4 (2007), 11–28 10.1080/14780038.2007.11425735CrossRefGoogle Scholar.
69 These figures are based on my research, which includes the compilation of a prosopography of all those known to have ministered on the island between 1540 and 1698; approximately one hundred and seventy individuals have been identified. This has now been deposited as MNHL, MS 15879, ‘Clergy on the Isle of Man, 1540–1698’, typescript, 2024.
70 Green, I. M., ‘Teaching the Reformation: The Clergy as Preachers, Catechists, Authors and Teachers’, in Dixon, C. Scott and Schorn-Schütte, Luise, eds, The Protestant Clergy of Early Modern Europe (Basingstoke, 2003), 156–75, at 16010.1057/9780230518872_8CrossRefGoogle Scholar.
71 For the catalogue, which ran to over two hundred titles, see MNHL, MS 09782, Castle Rushen Papers, Castle Accounts I, Box 7, ‘A Catalogue of ye books sent from my lord ffayrefax for ye library in ye Isle of Mann’ (1659).
72 Ashley, ‘Spiritual Courts’, 42.
73 For 1541, see Quayle, ‘Precedent Book’, 32 (regarding the archdeacon and the other two rectors). For 1696, see MNHL, MS 09864, GR1/21, Statute book, reproduced in Bray, Gerald, ed., Records of Convocation, 1: Sodor and Man 1229–1877 (Woodbridge, 2005), 114 Google Scholar; Dickinson, Lordship of Man, 345.
74 For example, in a dispute about the fruits of Michael vicarage, see MNHL, MS 10071/5/2, Liber Cancellarii, 1604–5. For the case of a cleric accused of conducting a marriage in Malew without banns or licence, see MNHL, MS 10194, Diocesan Presentments, 1690.
75 Most notably by Barrow: see MNHL, MS 09782, Castle Rushen Papers, Ecclesiastical Courts, Box 2, Barrow’s report.
76 For these patterns, see O’Day, Rosemary, The Clerical Profession: The Emergence and Consolidation of a Profession 1558–1642 (Leicester, 1979), 6, 159–60Google Scholar.
77 By this period, Trinity’s early puritan orientation had given way to a more high-church outlook, which would have been congenial to Barrow: see Luce, John Victor, Trinity College Dublin: The First 400 Years (Dublin, 1992), 28 Google Scholar.