The Irish Penny Journal, Vol. 1 No. 11, September 12, 1840

by Various

THE IRISH PENNY JOURNAL.

Number 11.

SATURDAY, SEPTEMBER 12, 1840.

Volume I.

CLONTARF CASTLE, COUNTY OF DUBLIN.

There are few things that afford us a higher pleasure than to observe our metropolis and our provincial cities and towns, despite of adverse circumstances, increasing in the number and splendour of their public buildings, for they are sure evidences of the advance of civilization, with its attendant train of arts, amongst us, and that we are progressing to the rank and dignity of a great nation. Yet we confess we enjoy a still higher gratification when we see springing up around us great architectural works of another class—those erected by individuals of the aristocracy as residences for themselves and those who are to come after them. Such architectural works are not merely interesting from the gratifications they afford to the feeling of taste, and the epic dignity and beauty which they contribute to landscape scenery, but have a higher interest as pledges to the nation that those who have erected them have a filial attachment to the soil which gave them birth, and which supplies them, whether for good or evil, with the means of greatness; and that they are not disposed to play the part of unwise and ungrateful children. To us it little matters what the creed or party of such individuals may be; however they may err in opinions, their feelings are at heart as they should be. The aristocrat of large means, who is resident not from necessity but from choice, and who spends a portion of his wealth in the adornment of his home, is rarely, if ever, a bad landlord. Desiring to see art and nature combine to produce the sentiment of beauty in the objects immediately about him, he cannot willingly allow it to be associated with the unsightly and discordant emblems of penury and sorrow. To be indifferent about the presence of such accompaniments would be an anomaly in human character, and only an exception proving the general rule. It is this class of men that we want—men who seek happiness in their legitimate homes, and the diffusion of blessings among those to whom it is their duty to be protectors—lovers of the arts of refined society, not the gross and generally illiterate pursuers of field sports, which, by hardening the heart towards the lower animals of creation, prepares it for reckless indifference to the wants and sufferings of our fellow men. Had we more of such patriots—more of such domestic architectural buildings starting into existence, evidencing as well their refined tastes and habits as the sincerity of the love they bear their native land, we should soon see the face of our country changed, and peace and happiness smiling around us. We do not, however, indulge in any feelings of despondence for the future. Very many beautiful creations of the architectural art have recently been erected in Ireland, and we have little apprehension that they will not increase in number till our island shall rival any other portion of the empire in the possession of such characteristic features of civilization and beauty. Cheered by such pleasing anticipations, we shall endeavour to the best of our ability to make our readers familiar with the architectural styles of the chief residences of our nobility and gentry, as well as with the general features of the scenery in which they are situated; and, as a commencement, we have selected the seat of the Vernons—the recently re-erected Castle of Clontarf.

The name of this locality, which is situated on the northern shore of the Bay of Dublin, and about two miles from the city, must at least be familiar to most of our readers, being memorable in history as the scene of the most national and best contested battle ever fought in Ireland, when in 1014 the monarch Brian Boru obtained a decisive victory over the united forces of the Danish and Norwegian invaders of the British islands, assisted by the Irish troops of a recreant King of Leinster. This name signifies in English the lawn or recess of the bull, being formed from two Celtic words, cluain, a lawn or pastoral plain, and tarbh, a bull; the latter appellation expressing its contiguity to one of the two great sand-banks of the bay, now called the North and South Bulls, from the similitude of the sounds produced by the breaking of the sea upon their shores, to the roar of animals of that denomination.

As it is stated that a church or monastery was founded here as early as the year 550, it is probable that this name is of ecclesiastical origin, and that the site of that ancient church is still marked by the present parish one from which it was derived. But, however this may be, immediately after the settlement of the Anglo-Normans, the lands of Clontarf and Santry, constituting one knight’s fee, were granted by Hugh de Lacy, Lord of Meath, to one of his followers, named Adam de Feipo, or as the name is now written, Phepoe, by whom, as is generally supposed, the Castle of Clontarf was erected, and its lands created a manor. This manor, as well as its castle, appears, however, to have passed very soon after into the possession of the Knights Templars, by whom a commandery of the Order, dependent upon their splendid establishment at Kilmainham, was placed here. Upon the suppression of the Templars, their manor of Clontarf was granted, in 1311, to Richard de Burgo, Earl of Ulster, the religious edifices upon it remaining in the king’s hands as a royal house; and in 1326, Roger le Ken had a grant of the premises in Clontarf, which he had heretofore occupied at will, to hold henceforth to him and the heirs of his body. Towards the close of the same century, however, in obedience to the Pope’s decree in reference to the lands of the Templars, the manor passed into the possession of the Knights Hospitallers of St John of Jerusalem, on which Clontarf became a preceptory of that Order, and a chief seat of the Grand Prior of Kilmainham. It seems somewhat probable, however, that the descendants of Roger le Ken still continued to hold the manor as lessees of the Hospitallers till the dissolution of the Order, as, immediately previous to that event, on an inquisition taken, the Prior of Kilmainham was found seised of the manor, rectory, tithes, and altarages of Clontarf, subject, however, to a lease made in the year 1538 to Matthew King (a corrupted form perhaps of the name Ken) of all the town and lordship, with the appurtenances, and also the pool of Clontarf, and the island lying to the west side thereof, and all the said rectory, tithes, &c. to endure for nine years. In this demise it was provided that the lessee should repair the manor-house and maintain a sufficient person to administer all sacraments to the parishioners at their proper charges. On the suppression of the monastic order in the thirty-second year of Henry the Eighth, Sir John Rawson, the Prior of Kilmainham—a very distinguished man, who had at various periods held the office of Treasurer of Ireland—having, with the consent of his Chapter under their common seal, surrendered the hospital with its dependencies into the King’s hands, he was created Viscount of Clontarf in 1541, on a representation made to his majesty by the Lord Deputy, with a pension of five hundred marks, in right of which dignity he sat in the parliament of that year.

In the year 1600, the manor, territory, tithes, town, and lordships of Clontarf, as enjoyed by the Priors of Kilmainham, were granted by Queen Elizabeth to Sir Geoffry Fenton, who had filled the office of Secretary of State for Ireland; and on his death in 1608 these premises were further assured to his son Sir William, who had a confirmation of this manor in 1637, under the commission for the remedy of defective titles. Yet it appears that very shortly afterwards, the manor, however acquired, was again in the possession of a member of the King family; for, on the breaking out of the rebellion of 1641, the town, manor-house, &c. of Clontarf, then the property of Mr George King, were burnt by Sir Charles Coote as a punishment for the supposed participation of that gentleman in a plunder made of a cargo from a vessel which lay there, by Luke Netterville and his adherents. King was shortly afterwards attainted, a reward of £400 offered for his head; and his estates, comprising this manor, Hollybrook, and the island of Clontarf, containing, as stated, 961 acres statute measure, were bestowed by Cromwell on Captain John Bakewell, who afterwards sold the estate to John Vernon, a scion of the noble Norman family of the De Vernons, and from whose brother the present proprietor descends.

In 1660, Colonel Edward Vernon, the son of John Vernon, passed patent for this manor in fee, together with all anchorages, fisheries, creeks, sands and sea-shores, wrecks of the sea, &c.; which right was saved in subsequent acts of parliament, and still remains to his successors. And in 1675, the king further enlarged the jurisdictions, tenures, and courts of this manor, with a grant of royalties (royal mines excepted), power to empark three hundred acres, with free warren, privilege of holding two fairs, one on the 10th of April and the other on the 16th of October, with customs, &c. These fairs have, however, been long discontinued.