{"id":112,"date":"2021-04-03T11:23:23","date_gmt":"2021-04-03T11:23:23","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/legalblog.ie\/?p=112"},"modified":"2021-04-03T11:41:34","modified_gmt":"2021-04-03T11:41:34","slug":"elizabethan-ireland","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/legalblog.ie\/elizabethan-ireland\/","title":{"rendered":"Munster Plantation"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"ez-toc-container\" class=\"ez-toc-v2_0_63 counter-hierarchy ez-toc-counter ez-toc-grey ez-toc-container-direction\">\n<div class=\"ez-toc-title-container\">\n<p class=\"ez-toc-title \" >Table of Contents<\/p>\n<span class=\"ez-toc-title-toggle\"><a href=\"#\" class=\"ez-toc-pull-right ez-toc-btn ez-toc-btn-xs ez-toc-btn-default ez-toc-toggle\" aria-label=\"Toggle Table of Content\"><span class=\"ez-toc-js-icon-con\"><span class=\"\"><span class=\"eztoc-hide\" style=\"display:none;\">Toggle<\/span><span class=\"ez-toc-icon-toggle-span\"><svg style=\"fill: #999;color:#999\" xmlns=\"http:\/\/www.w3.org\/2000\/svg\" class=\"list-377408\" width=\"20px\" height=\"20px\" viewBox=\"0 0 24 24\" fill=\"none\"><path d=\"M6 6H4v2h2V6zm14 0H8v2h12V6zM4 11h2v2H4v-2zm16 0H8v2h12v-2zM4 16h2v2H4v-2zm16 0H8v2h12v-2z\" fill=\"currentColor\"><\/path><\/svg><svg style=\"fill: #999;color:#999\" class=\"arrow-unsorted-368013\" xmlns=\"http:\/\/www.w3.org\/2000\/svg\" width=\"10px\" height=\"10px\" viewBox=\"0 0 24 24\" version=\"1.2\" baseProfile=\"tiny\"><path d=\"M18.2 9.3l-6.2-6.3-6.2 6.3c-.2.2-.3.4-.3.7s.1.5.3.7c.2.2.4.3.7.3h11c.3 0 .5-.1.7-.3.2-.2.3-.5.3-.7s-.1-.5-.3-.7zM5.8 14.7l6.2 6.3 6.2-6.3c.2-.2.3-.5.3-.7s-.1-.5-.3-.7c-.2-.2-.4-.3-.7-.3h-11c-.3 0-.5.1-.7.3-.2.2-.3.5-.3.7s.1.5.3.7z\"\/><\/svg><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/a><\/span><\/div>\n<nav><ul class='ez-toc-list ez-toc-list-level-1 ' ><li class='ez-toc-page-1 ez-toc-heading-level-3'><a class=\"ez-toc-link ez-toc-heading-1\" href=\"https:\/\/legalblog.ie\/elizabethan-ireland\/#Context\" title=\"Context\">Context<\/a><\/li><li class='ez-toc-page-1 ez-toc-heading-level-3'><a class=\"ez-toc-link ez-toc-heading-2\" href=\"https:\/\/legalblog.ie\/elizabethan-ireland\/#Desmonds_Rebellion\" title=\"Desmond&#8217;s Rebellion\">Desmond&#8217;s Rebellion<\/a><\/li><li class='ez-toc-page-1 ez-toc-heading-level-3'><a class=\"ez-toc-link ez-toc-heading-3\" href=\"https:\/\/legalblog.ie\/elizabethan-ireland\/#Plantations\" title=\"Plantations\">Plantations<\/a><\/li><li class='ez-toc-page-1 ez-toc-heading-level-3'><a class=\"ez-toc-link ez-toc-heading-4\" href=\"https:\/\/legalblog.ie\/elizabethan-ireland\/#Forfeitures\" title=\"Forfeitures\">Forfeitures<\/a><\/li><li class='ez-toc-page-1 ez-toc-heading-level-3'><a class=\"ez-toc-link ez-toc-heading-5\" href=\"https:\/\/legalblog.ie\/elizabethan-ireland\/#Grants_to_Planters\" title=\"Grants to Planters\">Grants to Planters<\/a><\/li><li class='ez-toc-page-1 ez-toc-heading-level-3'><a class=\"ez-toc-link ez-toc-heading-6\" href=\"https:\/\/legalblog.ie\/elizabethan-ireland\/#Terms_Conditions\" title=\"Terms &amp; Conditions\">Terms &amp; Conditions<\/a><\/li><li class='ez-toc-page-1 ez-toc-heading-level-3'><a class=\"ez-toc-link ez-toc-heading-7\" href=\"https:\/\/legalblog.ie\/elizabethan-ireland\/#Process_of_Division\" title=\"Process of Division\">Process of Division<\/a><\/li><li class='ez-toc-page-1 ez-toc-heading-level-3'><a class=\"ez-toc-link ez-toc-heading-8\" href=\"https:\/\/legalblog.ie\/elizabethan-ireland\/#The_Plantation_in_Practice\" title=\"The Plantation in Practice\">The Plantation in Practice<\/a><\/li><\/ul><\/nav><\/div>\n<h3><span class=\"ez-toc-section\" id=\"Context\"><\/span>Context<span class=\"ez-toc-section-end\"><\/span><\/h3>\n<p>Elizabeth I came to the throne in 1558 succeeding her half-sister Mary.\u00a0 She was confirmed by Act of Parliament as head of the established church. An Act of Uniformity required the use of the new Book of Common Prayer by all clergy. Non-attendance at official church was an offence punishable by fine.\u00a0 In practice a significant degree of toleration was allowed.<\/p>\n<p>Elizabethan England was one of the strongest mercantile and acquisitive powers in Europe.\u00a0 It had been forced out of the last continental possession Calais and faced France and Spain as belligerent opponents. In the Northeast was the McDonalds and MacDonnells dominated a Hebridean Irish lordship independent of the Scottish, \u00a0English and Irish governments.<\/p>\n<h3><span class=\"ez-toc-section\" id=\"Desmonds_Rebellion\"><\/span>Desmond&#8217;s Rebellion<span class=\"ez-toc-section-end\"><\/span><\/h3>\n<p>The lieutenancy of Sir Henry Sidney, 1566-1571 saw an increase in a military approach to control over the island.\u00a0 Sidney installed provincial l presidencies in Munster and Connacht.\u00a0 They were intended to introduce government to those areas equivalent to that in the Pale.\u00a0 Connacht was shired at this time. The 1570s saw the arrival of gentleman adventurers and claimants under dubious old titles.<\/p>\n<p>The Earl of Desmond was imprisoned in 1567.\u00a0 His kinsman James FitzGerald took up arms ostensibly to safeguard the Earl&#8217;s rights and was joined by the Butlers who were enraged regarding a judgment in favour of Sir Peter Carew who claimed to be an heir harking back numerous years, to a substantial part of the Kavanagh and Butler land.\u00a0 The revolt was put down in brutal fashion, with the \u00a0wholesale slaying of garrisons.<\/p>\n<p>In 1570 Queen Elizabeth was excommunicated by the Pope and who recognized her cousin Mary, Queen of Scots as Queen.\u00a0 James FitzMaurice&#8217;s child, who had fled to Europe after the earlier rebellion landed in Dingle with a small Spanish force and a papal bull which purported to deprive Elizabeth of both England and Ireland.\u00a0 FitzMaurice&#8217;s appeal was answered by the family of the Earl of Desmond but opposed by others.\u00a0 After a number of skirmishes FitzMaurice was killed.<\/p>\n<p>There were several further uprisings in Munster and in the pale itself. The campaign in Munster was one of siege and scorched earth which devastated most of the province.\u00a0 In 1583 the government forces led by Lord Grey with the assistance of the Earl of Ormond had reasserted control.\u00a0 The Earl of Desmond entered the rising late was killed in Kerry in 1583.The southwest of the country and Munster was reduced to a wasteland due to the savagery of the campaign.<\/p>\n<p>The recurring rebellions placed a large burden on the treasury .Almost half-a-million acres of the best land was confiscated and the first large-scale colony in Ireland was attempted.<\/p>\n<h3><span class=\"ez-toc-section\" id=\"Plantations\"><\/span>Plantations<span class=\"ez-toc-section-end\"><\/span><\/h3>\n<p>In the early 16th century plantations were being established rapidly through the newly discovered America.\u00a0 Many \u00a0argued that plantations were justified in spreading civilization into barbaric areas.\u00a0 Adventurers in the scheme were given the title, &#8216;colonel&#8217; both because of military functions but also because of their responsibility to lead colonies \u00a0\u00a0in order to populate the country with \u201dcivilised\u201d persons brought up in the law of England. Colonels and none of their soldiers were to marry the \u201cwild\u201d \u00a0Irish and social interaction was to be restricted.<\/p>\n<p>The Munster Plantation of the 1580s was \u00a0instituted after the Desmond Rebellions, when the Geraldine Earl of Desmond had rebelled against English interference in Munster. The Desmond dynasty was annihilated in the aftermath of the Second Desmond Rebellion (1579\u201383) and their estates were confiscated by the Crown.<\/p>\n<p>There were differing views as to the appropriateness of plantation within the English administration.\u00a0 One group favoured plantation on the basis that it was the only means of subduing native lordships. Another group, particularly under the Earl of Ormond, a cousin of the Queen sought to minimize plantation and offer greater accommodation.<\/p>\n<p>There was also the practical necessity of rewarding officials and soldiers involved in the wars with the land to be forfeited and confiscated from the Earl of Desmond after the suppression of its rebellion.<\/p>\n<h3><span class=\"ez-toc-section\" id=\"Forfeitures\"><\/span>Forfeitures<span class=\"ez-toc-section-end\"><\/span><\/h3>\n<p>It was argued that only the demesne \u00a0lands of the deceased Earl and his associates had been forfeited. \u00a0Ormond encouraged native owners to pursue challenges to titles claimed by the Crown in relation to some of the lands previously occupied by Desmond and his supporters.\u00a0 It was argued by the government that some of the lands were enjoyed by freeholders by extortion rather than by right by the former Earl.<\/p>\n<p>In 1584 the newly appointed governor had been specifically commissioned to re-people the dis-peopled province of Munster so that the land distributed could be inhabited with obedient subjects.\u00a0 Ormond yielded to the inevitable and sought to shape rather than frustrate the projected plantation of Munster.\u00a0 He claimed part of the Desmond&#8217;s lands for himself and persuaded the authorities that the captains and officials who had served the \u00a0Crown lacked the resources necessary to populate the land, given the waste.<\/p>\n<p>He referred to the experience at the recent plantation on the forfeited estates in Laois and Offaly which had essentially failed in their objective.\u00a0 He sought to promote the claims of Munster Lords to escheated lands who had remained loyal to the government during the Desmond rebellion.<\/p>\n<p>However, his exhortions were essentially rejected and no recognition was given to the claims of Irish Lords.\u00a0 The Privy Council decided to pursue a policy of plantation and the attraction of planters to plant and take control of the land, rather than farm them out to natives.<\/p>\n<h3><span class=\"ez-toc-section\" id=\"Grants_to_Planters\"><\/span>Grants to Planters<span class=\"ez-toc-section-end\"><\/span><\/h3>\n<p>Persons enjoying substantial resources and social prestige in England would be welcomed as planters.\u00a0 They would receive seignories of between 12,000 to 4000 profitable acres and would undertake to establish 91 English families for every grant of 12,000 acres with a proportionate numbers on lesser holdings.<\/p>\n<p>Each full seignory was to be divided by the head-lord into six freeholds and each freeholder would farm 300 acres.\u00a0 Six farmers would each lease 400 acres. 42 copyholders would each call 100 acres and 36 lesser tenants would be granted small holdings or be settled on an estate village.\u00a0 This contemplated a settler population of about 12,000 on the escheated Munster lands. The plantation was also had a religious element in seeking to bring the Reformation to Ireland.<\/p>\n<p>The conditions were set out in grants made to the grantees.\u00a0 Villages comprising at least 26 families were to include two gardeners, a wheelwright, a smith, mason, carpenter, thatcher, tailor, shoemaker, butcher, miller, victualler \u00a0and parish clerk.\u00a0 Each village was to have a vicarage for a minister who would have \u00a0land and other income to the value of a 100 Marks a year.\u00a0 Each estate for this would have a windmill and watermill and a leet court.\u00a0 The colony would have to be able to defend itself from rebels.<\/p>\n<h3><span class=\"ez-toc-section\" id=\"Terms_Conditions\"><\/span>Terms &amp; Conditions<span class=\"ez-toc-section-end\"><\/span><\/h3>\n<p>62 seignories \u00a0were contemplated.\u00a0 In Munster, each model seignory was to be of nine.\u00a0 The proprietors in each cluster of nine seignories worked collectively to provide one market town place.\u00a0 It may be in the midst of the other eight and \u00a0furnished with merchants, retailers and artisans and populated by 200 English families.\u00a0 There was to be a place in the town for a Minister excelling the rest in learning with an income of \u00a3100 \u00a0per year which would be collected from all nine seignories. The model was being employed in the Americas and was aimed at providing a microcosm of English society.<\/p>\n<p>Title to the property was established by Act of Attainder of the deceased Earl of Desmond and his associates.\u00a0 This was passed in the Irish Parliament in 1585.\u00a0 A campaign was undertaken to find appropriate undertakers in England.\u00a0 The scheme was published in England by Justice of the Peace in the various shires.<\/p>\n<h3><span class=\"ez-toc-section\" id=\"Process_of_Division\"><\/span>Process of Division<span class=\"ez-toc-section-end\"><\/span><\/h3>\n<p>Lists were compiled of potential undertakers and acreages for which they contracted.\u00a0 They were to negotiate with appropriate tenants and artisans who might accompany them to Munster. Over 100,000 acres were surveyed.\u00a0 It became apparent that the available land were not sufficient to meet the requirements of those already assigned property as undertakers.<\/p>\n<p>The area of lands available was reduced as Irish owners established that a significant part of the lands on which Desmond had charged rents had not been his property and therefore should not have been forfeited and included in the plantation scheme. The government ordered that disputed ownership should be resolved by an investigation of exactions claimed by the Earl of Desmond.\u00a0 The investigation took several years and relied on information from locals whom the government felt to be unreliable.<\/p>\n<p>There was allegations of favouritism in the assignment of property. Favoured undertakers were given prominence.\u00a0 The plantation developed a distinctly militaristic aspect.\u00a0 This coincided with the threat of \u00a0Spanish invasion culminating in the failed Armada in \u00a01588. Sir Walter Raleigh took possession of three-and-a-half seignories of prime land near Youghal.<\/p>\n<p>There were conflicting assignments and disputes arose between undertakers as to the lands assigned. Some undertakers were discouraged by what confronted them when they arrived, the general waste of the country and dilapidated state of property.<\/p>\n<h3><span class=\"ez-toc-section\" id=\"The_Plantation_in_Practice\"><\/span>The Plantation in Practice<span class=\"ez-toc-section-end\"><\/span><\/h3>\n<p>The quality of planters varied from those who took their undertakings seriously to those whose primary aim was to make a quick profit.\u00a0 Officials in both England and Ireland pressed them to meet their obligations so as to achieve the objectives of the plantation.\u00a0 About 4, 000 people had settled by the end of the 16th century in Munster under the plantation. Ultimately the plantation established a series of pockets of English settlements where none had previously existed.<\/p>\n<p>Some who came to accept intended tenancies from particular planters took tenancies on better terms from native Lords.\u00a0 The settlers effectively gravitated towards the most desirable parts of the province. Some intended planters spilled over beyond the intended confines of the \u00a0plantation and settled in more remote regions.<\/p>\n<p>The Munster plantation ultimately was different in outcome and effect than that originally envisaged. The plantation was concentrated in particular estates and parts of the province.<\/p>\n<p>More conscientious undertakers did create model settlements aspiring to create exclusively English enclaves.\u00a0 In some cases, the lands were scattered, and holdings became dispersed.\u00a0 Irish owners recovered substantial amounts of land that had been confiscated, through the courts.<\/p>\n<p>The effect of the more limited plantation was to create a network of planter landowners who achieved a virtual monopoly on the office of sheriff and Justice of the Peace. The provincial councils became an instrument of planter power.<\/p>\n<!--themify_builder_content-->\n<div id=\"themify_builder_content-112\" data-postid=\"112\" class=\"themify_builder_content themify_builder_content-112 themify_builder tf_clear\">\n    <\/div>\n<!--\/themify_builder_content-->\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Context Elizabeth I came to the throne in 1558 succeeding her half-sister Mary.\u00a0 She was confirmed by Act of Parliament as head of the established church. An Act of Uniformity required the use of the new Book of Common Prayer by all clergy. Non-attendance at official church was an offence punishable by fine.\u00a0 In practice [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[30],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/legalblog.ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/112"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/legalblog.ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/legalblog.ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/legalblog.ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/legalblog.ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=112"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/legalblog.ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/112\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":117,"href":"https:\/\/legalblog.ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/112\/revisions\/117"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/legalblog.ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=112"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/legalblog.ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=112"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/legalblog.ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=112"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}