Leinster (Marshal)

Who he is

Name

William Marshal, with Isabel de Clare, countess of Pembroke and heiress of Leinster

Title

Lord of Leinster in right of his wife; earl of Pembroke (girded 27 May 1199)

Since

Marriage, August 1189; seisin of Leinster won from John only about 1192, after John (then lord of Ireland) had held it and made grants out of it

Born

About 1146-47; Isabel about 1172

Family

Isabel is the daughter of Richard de Clare (Strongbow, d. 1176) and Aoife, daughter of Diarmait Mac Murchada, so Leinster comes to her from both the conqueror and the last Irish king of Leinster. Children on 1 January 1200: William (about 10), Richard (about 9), Maud (about 6), Gilbert (about 3), Walter (about 1); Isabel is born 9 October 1200.

Confidence

high

The Marshal has never been to Ireland. He is in France with John that winter, engaged in the defence of Normandy. Leinster is governed by his seneschal, Geoffrey FitzRobert (in office from about 1192), whose own fee is Kells in Ossory.

Overlord

King John (as lord of Ireland)

What it holds

• Demesne: Kilkenny (castle and town), Carlow, Kildare, Wexford (town, castle and port), Old Ross, the castle of Dunamase in Leix
• Overlordship of the Leinster baronies: Offaly, Maynooth and Rathmore (Gerald FitzMaurice); Naas (William FitzMaurice); Bray and Omurethy with Kilkea and Castledermot (Walter de Riddlesford); the Duffry and Enniscorthy (Philip de Prendergast); Idrone (the heirs of Raymond le Gros, the Carews); Fernegenal (the Roches); Bargy and Shelburne (Hervey de Montmorency, now a monk, and his heirs); Leixlip and the north Kildare fee (Adam de Hereford); Kells in Ossory (Geoffrey FitzRobert, the seneschal); Leix (Meiler FitzHenry)
• Arklow, held by Theobald Walter under a grant from John made while John held Leinster (the Marshal had to accept John's grants in the settlement of about 1192)
• The overlordship of the Irish of Leinster: Mac Murchada of Ui Chennselaig, Ua Tuathail, Ua Broin, Ua Mordha, Ua Diumasaig, Mac Gilla Patraic of Osraige (tribute and service when it can be taken)
• The patronage of the Leinster sees (Ferns, Leighlin, Ossory, Kildare) shared and contested with the crown
• Port customs at Wexford

How it was acquired

Strongbow's marriage to Aoife (1170) and Henry II's grant of Leinster (1171-73); held in wardship by the crown after Strongbow's death in 1176; given with Isabel to the Marshal by Richard I in August 1189; John, as lord of Ireland, held on and made grants until a compromise about 1192 under which the Marshal held Leinster of him and his grants stood.

Allies and rivals

The Marshal's men in Leinster are his Geraldine and Welsh-Norman barons and his seneschal; his rivals are the justiciar Meiler FitzHenry, who answers to John, and John himself, who has never liked the settlement of 1192.

How things stand that morning

Held through the seneschal Geoffrey FitzRobert. The lord is absent in Normandy and has never seen Leinster; the baronies are firm in the river valleys, while the Wicklow uplands, north Wexford, Leix and upper Ossory are Irish country that pays only when pressed.

Wealth

The Barrow, Nore and Slaney valleys are the best farmland in the colony; the port of Wexford; the towns of Kilkenny and Kildare; the wool and grain of the valley manors; tribute in cattle from the Irish.

Military

The knights' fees of the Leinster barons (the full servicium is not pinned for 1200); mottes and early stone works at Kilkenny, Carlow, Kildare, Wexford, Dunamase and the baronial castles; Welsh and Flemish settlers in south Wexford.

Threats

• An absentee lord: the justiciar and John meddle in the vacuum
• The Wicklow Irish raiding the Kildare and Dublin plains
• John's habit of granting Leinster lands and offices to his own men

What the year holds

What happened next, if nothing in play changes it. Each event carries what it depends on and what would stop it.

1. 1200 (not pinned)The Marshal may make a first short visit to Leinster, landing at Bannow after a storm and vowing the abbey of Tintern Minor; most historians put his real arrival in 1207, and one local account dates a stay from September to December 1200.Depends on: Leave from John and quiet in Normandy Stopped by: The French war
2. About 1200-07 (not pinned)The foundation of New Ross by the new bridge over the Barrow, beside Old Ross; its charter is dated to the Marshal's stay of 1207.Depends on: The Marshal's investment in Wexford Stopped by: War or the lord's absence

Places of note

• Kilkenny castle: Caput of Leinster: Strongbow's motte, burnt by Domnall Mor Ua Briain in 1173 and rebuilt; the Marshal's stone castle comes after 1207
• Carlow castle: Motte on the Barrow (Hugh de Lacy, about 1180); demesne manor
• Dunamase: Rock castle in Leix, Strongbow's and the Marshal's
• Wexford: Port and castle
• Old Ross: Demesne manor and motte on the road to the Barrow

Where the sources disagree

Evidence: The Marshal's tenure and family are thick; the list of Leinster baronies follows the Song of Dermot and later evidence and is fair for 1200; the seneschal's dates are thin.

On the map: Only the Marshal's demesne is drawn here; the whole liberty is the province record Liberty of Leinster, and his barons have their own records.

Primary sources for Lordship of Ireland

Chronicles, registers, sagas and inscriptions written in or near 1200 that cover this entry. Each has its own page with editions, translations and where to read it.

• Annals of Clonmacnoise, Anonymous; English translation of a lost Irish chronicle by Conall Mac Geoghegan (medieval original lost; translated 1627). A midland chronicle, tied to Clonmacnoise and the kings of Meath and Connacht, surviving only in a 1627 translation. Read online
• Annals of Inisfallen, Anonymous (monks of Inisfallen, Kerry, and earlier of Emly and Lismore) (the manuscript was written in 1092 and continued at Inisfallen in many contemporary hands to 1450). The Munster chronicle, written in Kerry in a hand close to the events. Read online
• Annals of Loch Ce, Various (compiled for the Mac Diarmada of Moylurg) (compiled 1580s from older annals; the medieval section rests on a Connacht chronicle). The fullest Connacht account of the year: Cathal Carrach's seizure of the kingship, Cathal Crobderg's flight north, the Connacht expedition of de Courcy and the Ui Neill on Crobderg's behalf and its defeat, William de Burgh's role, and the devastation of the province's churches, with the names of the Connacht nobles and clergy who died. Read online
• Annals of the Kingdom of Ireland by the Four Masters, Various; compiled by Micheal O Cleirigh and others (1632 to 1636, from medieval annals now partly lost). A seventeenth century compilation but it draws on lost medieval annals, so its 1200 entries add names and incidents missing elsewhere: the Connacht war and the English of Meath and Munster, the deaths of Irish kings and churchmen across the island, and raids in Thomond and Desmond. Read online
• Annals of Ulster, Various; compiled by Cathal Mac Maghnusa (compiled about 1498 from much older annals; the entries for 1200 derive from contemporary record). The most reliable Irish annal for the north. Read online
• Chronicle of Roger of Howden, Roger of Howden (about 1192 to 1201). The fullest single narrative for the year. Read online
• Mac Carthaigh's Book (Miscellaneous Irish Annals), Anonymous (a Munster compilation) (compiled in the later Middle Ages from Munster annals; manuscript of the 17th century). A Munster annal with a Mac Carthaig and Desmond slant, giving for the years around 1200 the kings of Desmond and Thomond, their wars with each other and with the English of Cork and Limerick, and the castles the settlers were building. Read online
• The History of William Marshal, Anonymous (a poet called John, writing for the Marshal family) (about 1224 to 1226). A knight's view of the Angevin succession: the council at Vaudreuil in April 1199 where the Marshal and Hubert Walter argued for John over Arthur, the Marshal's crossing to secure England, John's coronation, and the Marshal's part in Normandy in 1199 and 1200 as holder of Longueville and Orbec and a go-between with Philip. Read online

7 more in the sources library for The British Isles.