By Brian Igoe
By Brian Igoe
One (perhaps prejudiced!) commentator on these early Geraldines wrote: 'When they tasted of the pure milk of Gaelicism they never forgot its savour, so they became kindly Irish of the Irish, root and branch.' The 4th Earl of Desmond even wrote verse in Irish. The Annals of the Four Masters record that he was 'A nobleman of wondeful bountie, mirth, cheerfulness in conversation, charitable in his deeds, easy of access, a witty and ingenious composer of Irish poetry, and a learned and profound chronicler; and, in fine, one of the English nobility that had Irish learning and professors thereof in greatest reverence of all the English in Ireland, died penintently after receipt of the sacraments of the holy church in proper form'. We have a translation of one of the poems he wrote 'Mairg adeir olc ris na mnibh' (translated as 'In Defence of Women'):
Speak not ill of womankind,
'Tis no wisdom if you do.
You that fault in woman find,
I would not be praised of you.
That is the first paragraph of the chapter, which then goes on to look at:
Normans, Saxons, Ireland, 'more Irish than the Irish themselves', English Common Law, The Geraldines, Gerald Fitzgerald who was Castellan of Pembroke Castle in Wales around 1170. His eldest son, Maurice Fitzgerald, 1366, Thomas Jefferson, Earldom of Kildare, Earldom of Desmond, the Butlers, Earls of Ormonde, James Butler, Statutes of Kilkenny, Plantagenet English Kings, Count Geoffrey of Anjou, William the Conqueror's grand daughter Matilda, 'The Hundred Years War', Agincourt, John of Gaunt, Peasants' Revolt, Wat Tyler's Rebellion, Wales, Owen Glendower, Wars of the Roses, Anglo Irish Earls, Geraldine Earls, Desmond, Kildare, Statutes of Kilkenny, fosterage, alterage, Brehon Laws, 8th Earl of Kildare, Gearoid Mr, The Great Earl, 1478, Lord Grey, Edward IV, Richard III, Henry VII, Henry VIII, Lambert Simnel, Roger Simon, Edward, Earl of Warwick, Christchurch Cathedral, Archbishop Fitzsimons, Sir Thomas Fitzgerald, Battle of Stoke Fields, Perkin Warbeck, Galway, Sir Edward Poynings, 'Poynings' Law', Tower of London, 1496, Lord Deputy of Ireland, Clanricards, Holinshed, O'Carrolls, 1513, Kilkea, Nuala O'Faolin, Earl Kildare, 'Silken Thomas', Elizabeth I, Lord Edward Fitzgerald, the O'More's, the O'Connors.
The Book is called 'The Story of Ireland'.
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