We use cookies to distinguish you from other users and to provide you with a better experience on our websites. Close this message to accept cookies or find out how to manage your cookie settings.
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 31 March 2016
Mary’s endeavours to restore Catholicism in England have attracted much scholarly attention and not a little controversy, primarily because of her bloody response to the scale and persistence of the Protestant challenge she faced there. Her endeavours in Ireland, by contrast, have been relatively overlooked. Yet the Marian restoration in Ireland ought to be recognised as an integral part of Mary’s religious programme for her dominions. It offers interesting points of comparison for the implementation of the queen’s programme in England, and it was significant in its own right, not as a decisive watershed but, as a time when religious controversies were crystallised and definite decisions were made that proved significant in the subsequent survival of Catholicism as the religion of the people of Ireland.
1 Jefferies, Henry A., The Irish Church and the Tudor Reformations (Dublin: Four Courts Press, 2010), 75 Google Scholar.
2 Ibid., 82–7.
3 Ibid.
4 Ellis, Steven, ‘Economic Problems of the Church: Why the Reformation Failed in Ireland’, Journal of Ecclesiastical History 41 (1990): 257–269 CrossRefGoogle Scholar.
5 Bradshaw, Brendan, The Dissolution of the Religious Orders in Ireland under Henry VIII (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1974), 66–205 Google Scholar.
6 Jefferies, Irish Church, 86.
7 Gwynn, Aubrey, The Medieval Province of Armagh (Dundalk: Dundalgan Press, 1946), 248–253 Google Scholar.
8 National Archives, State Papers, Ireland (hereafter cited as SP), 61/1/133: Bradshaw, , ‘The Edwardian Reformation in Ireland’, Archivium Hibernicum, 26 (1976–7): 84 Google Scholar.
9 Shirley, E.P., Original letters and papers … of the Church in Ireland under Edward VI, Mary and Elizabeth (London, 1851)Google Scholar, no. x.
10 Ibid., no. xxiii.
11 SP 61/2/47, no. xiv; Bradshaw, ‘Edwardian Reformation’: 86.
12 Ronan, Myles V., The Reformation in Dublin, 1536–1558 (Dublin: Longmans, Green and Co., 1926), 356 Google Scholar.
13 Shirley, , Original letters, no. xix Google Scholar.
14 Ibid., no. xvi.
15 Ibid., no. xx.
16 Jefferies, , Irish Church, 96 Google Scholar.
17 Shirley, , Original letters, no. xxi Google Scholar.
18 Calender of the patent and close rolls of Ireland, Henry VIII, ed. James Morrin (Dublin, 1861) (herafter cited as CPCR), Elizabeth, i, 244 (91). Casey was condemned for his Protestant convictions by David Wolfe, SJ, who resigned as dean of Limerick at that time: Morrisey, T.J., ‘Wolfe’ in Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, ed. H. C. G. Matthew and Brian Harrison (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2004)Google Scholar (herafter cited as ODNB). Patrick Walsh, dean of Waterford, was promoted as bishop of Waterford & Lismore on the recommendation of his chapter: CPCR, i, 244 (92, 93); Jefferies, Irish Church, 126.
19 SP 61/3/45.
20 SP 61/4/28.
21 Bale, John, The Vocacyon of John Bale, Bishop of Ossory, in Harleian Miscellany, 6, ed. T. Park (London, 1813)Google Scholar, passim. See also, Walsh, Katherine, ‘Deliberate Provocation or Reforming Zeal? John Bale as First Church of Ireland Bishop of Ossory (1552–3)’ in Ciarán Brady, ed., Worsted in the Game: Losers in Irish History (Mullingar: The Lilliput Press, 1989), 49–55 Google Scholar.
22 Ellis, , ‘John Bale, Bishop of Ossory, 1552–3’, Journal of the Butler Society 2 (1984): 288 Google Scholar.
23 Bale, Vocacyon, 451.
24 Ibid., 453.
25 Ibid., 450.
26 SP 61/4/28.
27 Jefferies, Irish Church, 102–4.
28 Shirley, Original letters, no. xxiii.
29 Ibid., no. 822.
30 CPCR, i, Patent roll 1 Mary, no. 2.
31 Hughes, J.F. and eds, P.L. Larkin, Tudor Royal Proclamations, vol. 2 (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1969), 390 Google Scholar.
32 Bale, Vocacyon, 454.
33 Thomas Mayer, Reginald Pole: Prince and Prophet (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000), 210; Mayer, The Correspondence of Reginald Pole, 1500–1558 (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2002, et seq.), no. 765.
34 Ibid., no. 831.
35 CPCR, i, Patent Roll 1 Mary, no. 77.
36 Ibid., no. 79.
37 Harris, Walter ed., The whole works of Sir James Ware concerning Ireland (Dublin, 1764)Google Scholar (herafter cited as Ware, ‘Annals of Ireland’), vol. 1, ‘Annals’, s.a. 1553.
38 CPCR, i, Patent Roll 1 Mary, no. 77.
39 Ware, ‘Annals of Ireland’, s.a. 1553.
40 Lennon, Colm, An Irish Prisoner of Conscience of the Tudor Era: Archbishop Richard Creagh of Armagh, 1523–86 (Dublin: Four Courts Press, 2000)Google Scholar.
41 Ibid.
42 CPCR, i, Patent roll Mary 1, no. 77.
43 CPCR, i, 1 Mary, no. 4; Jefferies, , Priests and Prelates of Armagh in the Age of Reformation (Dublin: Four Courts Press, 1997), 138–167 Google Scholar; Jefferies, , ‘Primate George Dowdall and the Marian Restoration’ in Seanchas Ard Mhacha 17 (1998): 1–6 Google Scholar.
44 Ware, ‘Annals of Ireland’, s.a. 1558.
45 Brady, W. Maziere, The episcopal succession in England, Scotland and Ireland, 1400–1875, (Rome, 1876), 1 Google Scholar, 218. It was Cardinal Reginald Pole’s personal friend, Cardinal Morone, who promoted Dowdall’s cause before the Roman curia.
46 CPCR, i,, 1 Mary, no. 4.
47 CPCR, i, Patent Roll 1 Mary, nos 4, 65.
48 CRP, no. 831.
49 Ibid., no. 794.
50 Mayer, , Prince and Prophet, 214 Google Scholar.
51 Ware, ‘Annals of Ireland’, s.a 1554; CPCR, i, 1 & 2 Mary & Philip, no. 59; TCD, MS F.I.18, f. 2; Jefferies, ‘Primate George Dowdall’, 10.
52 CPCR, i, Patent roll 1 & 2 Mary & Philip, no. 3.
53 Ware, ‘Annals of Ireland’, s.a. 1554; CPCR, i, Patent roll 1 & 2 Mary & Philip, nos 3, 4, 5, 13, 14.
54 Bradshaw, , ‘George Browne, First Reformation Archbishop of Dublin, 1536–1554’ Journal of Ecclesiastical History 21 (1970): 323 CrossRefGoogle Scholar.
55 Shirley, Original letters, no. xxxi.
56 CRP, no. 962.
57 CPCR, 1 & 2 Philip and Mary, i, no. 59; Brady, Episcopal succession, 1, 235. David Edwards reckoned that Walsh secured a papal provision, despite the doubts expressed on the matter: ‘William Walsh’, David Edwards, ODNB.
58 ‘William Walsh’, David Edwards, DNB
59 c.f., CRP, vols 1–3, passim.. Pole seems to have given little thought to the north of England either. He commented to Bishop Gardiner that ‘almost all’ the people in England lived in the ecclesiastical province of Canterbury (see CRP, no. 1054), and he may have forgotten to summon the northern convocation of the English Church to the legatine synod of London, see Mayer, Prince and prophet, 236. At the same time, he was aware that the people in the north of England and Cornwall were the most obedient Catholics in England, and the least heretical: CRP, no. 815.
60 ‘Curwen’, Helen Coburn-Walshe, ODNB.
61 CRP, no. 1099.
62 Jefferies, , ‘The Irish Parliament of 1560: The Anglican Reforms Authorised’ in Irish Historical Studies, 26 (1988): 137 CrossRefGoogle Scholar, 139–40.
63 Ware, ‘Annals’, s.a. 1555.
64 Brady, Episcopal succession, 1, 351.
65 Jefferies, , ‘Irish Parliament of 1560’: 129, 137–138 Google Scholar.
66 Jefferies, , Irish Church, 127–128 Google Scholar, 135, 146, 151, 167, 183, 198.
67 Mayer, Prince and Prophet, 225.
68 Ibid., 254–68.
69 Ibid., 268.
70 Ibid., 271.
71 CRP, no. 1208.
72 Ibid., nos 1229, 1230.
73 Ibid., no. 1236.
74 Ibid., no. 1390.
75 Moran, Patrick F., A history of the archbishops of Dublin since the Reformation, vol. 1 (Dublin, 1864), 53–54 Google Scholar.
76 CRP, nos 1136, 1398. From the same time there are copies in Dowdall’s register of dispensations granted by Pole to two couples in Armagh diocese who had secured faculties from Canterbury during the time of schism to allow them to marry despite the impediment of consanguity: Public Records Office of Northern Ireland, MS DIO 4/2/12, ‘Dowdall’s register’, 83–8 (74, 75).
77 Ibid., no. 1314.
78 Mayer, Prince and Prophet, 271. See his note to CRP, no. 1959.
79 Mayer, Prince and Prophet, 261.
80 CRP, no. 1445.
81 Ibid., nos 1374, 1311.
82 Ibid., nos 1277, 1634.
83 CRP, no. 1109.
84 Calendar State Papers, Rome, ii, 240–1.
85 CRP, nos 1376, 1377, 1378; J. Hogan, ‘Miscellanea Vaticano-Hibernica, 1520–1631’ in Archivium Hibernicum, iv (1915), 217; Edwards, R.D., Church and State in Tudor Ireland: a History of Penal Laws against Irish Catholics (Dublin: Talbot Press, 1935), 164 Google Scholar, quoting Quirini, Epistolarum Reginaldi Poli, vol, 5, 41.
86 SP 62/1/22.
87 CRP, no. 1544.
88 CPCR, i, 1 & 2 Philip & Mary, nos 33–8.
89 CRP, no. 1020.
90 Scott, Brendan, Religion and Reformation in the Tudor Diocese of Meath (Dublin: Four Courts Press, 2006), 109 Google Scholar.
91 Claude Hamilton, Hans (ed.), Calendar of the State Papers relating to Ireland, i, 1509–1573 (London: Longman, Green, Longman and Roberts, 1860)Google Scholar (hereafter cited as CSPI, Mary, I), no. 62.
92 CSPI, Mary, I, no 42.
93 SP 62/2/9.
94 Bradshaw, Dissolution, 151, 163–9.
95 CSPI, Mary, I, nos 58, 59.
96 CSPI, Mary, I, nos 66, 65.
97 The hospital was subsequently dissolved again by Elizabeth and its assets seized by the crown. Ware, ‘Annals’, s.a. 1557, 1559.
98 Pogson, R.H., ‘Revival and Reform in Mary Tudor’s Church: A Question of Money’ in Christopher Haigh ed., The English Reformation Revised (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1988), 140–152 Google Scholar.
99 Pogson, ‘Mary Tudor’s Church’, 16; Loades, David, The Reign of Mary Tudor: Politics, Government and Religion in England, 1553–1558 (London: Longman, 1979), 82 Google Scholar.
100 Pogson, ‘Mary Tudor’s Church’, 11; Loades, The Reign of Mary Tudor, 82.
101 Duffy, Eamon, The Stripping of the Altars: Traditional Religion in England, 1400–1580 (Yale: Yale University Press, 1993), 526–528 Google Scholar.
102 Duffy, , Fires of Faith: Catholic England Under Mary Tudor (Yale University Press, New Haven and London, 2009)Google Scholar, passim.
103 Jefferies, Irish Church, 120.
104 Haigh, Christopher, Reformation and Resistance in Tudor Lancashire (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1975), 207–208 Google Scholar.
105 James Murray, ‘The Tudor diocese of Dublin: episcopal government, ecclesiastical politics and the enforcement of the Reformation, c.1534–1590’ (unpublished PhD thesis, Trinity College Dublin, 1997), 174; see also Murray, , Enforcing the English Reformation in Ireland: Clerical Resistance and Political Conflict in the Diocese of Dublin, 1534–1590 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2009), 220 CrossRefGoogle Scholar.
106 Murray, , Enforcing the English Reformation, 56 Google Scholar, 80.
107 Jefferies, ‘The Irish Parliament of 1560’: 128–41.
108 Jefferies, , ‘Elizabeth’s Reformation in the Irish Pale’, Journal of Ecclesiastical History 66 (2015): 524–542 CrossRefGoogle Scholar.
109 Jefferies, Irish Church, 128–30.
110 Ibid., 131–6.
111 Shirley, Original letters, no. liv.
112 SP 63/207, pt. 4/3; Jefferies, Irish Church, 246.
113 Shirley, Original letters, no. xliv.
114 SP 63/10/42; Shirley, Original letters, no. lxx.
115 Ibid., no. liv.
116 State papers concerning the Irish church in the time of Queen Elizabeth, ed. W. Maziere Brady (London: Longmans, Green, Reader & Dyer, 1868), no. 5.
117 Jefferies, Irish Church, 139–41; Jefferies, ‘Elizabeth’s Reformation’: 528–30.
118 CPCR, i, 489–90.
119 Jefferies, Irish Church, 139–40.
120 Shirley, Original letters, no. lxxvii.
121 Morrisey, ‘Wolfe’, ODNB.
122 Jefferies, Irish Church, p. 77.
123 Ibid., 147.
124 Ibid., 149–50.
125 Ibid., 178–80.
126 Lennon, Colm, The Lords of Dublin in the Age of Reformation (Dublin: Irish Academic Press, 1989), 130 Google Scholar, 142–51, 156–7, 163, 186, 215; see also Lennon, , ‘Mass in the Manor House: The Counter-Reformation in Dublin, 1560–1630’ in James Kelly and Dáire Keogh eds., History of the Catholic Diocese of Dublin (Dublin: Four Courts Press, 2000), 117–118 Google Scholar; Jefferies, Irish Church, 189–90, 177–8.
127 Brady, State Papers, no. lxix.
128 Ibid., no. liii.
129 Ibid., no. lxxiii.
130 Ibid., no. lxxxii.
131 SP 63/56/27; SP 63/55/59.
132 SP 63/94/37; Ciaran Brady, ‘Conservative Subversives: The Community of the Pale and the Dublin Administration, 1556–1586’ in P.J. Corish ed., Radicals, Rebels and Establishments: Historical Studies 25 (Belfast: Appletree Press, 1985), 11.
133 Marshall, Peter, Reformation England, 1480–1642 (London: Bloomsbury, 2003), 111 Google Scholar. That observation was reiterated in a stronger manner when Marshall described the place of Mary’s reign in the English Reformation as ‘its central crux and crisis, and that it set the tone of much of what was to follow’; see also , Marshall, ‘Confessionalization,Confessionalism and Confusion in the English Reformation’ in Thomas Mayer ed., Reforming Reformation (Farnham: Ashgate, 2012), 15 Google ScholarPubMed.
134 Duffy, Fires of Faith, passim.
135 Jefferies, Priests and Prelates of Armagh, 165–70; Jefferies, Irish Church, 104–21.
136 Jefferies, ‘Elizabeth’s Reformation’, passim.
