Ancient Irish Deeds and Writings, chiefiy relating to Landed 

 Property, from the tioelfth to the seventeenth century, with 

 Translations, Notes, and a Preliminary Essay. By James 

 Hardiman, Esq., M. R. I. A. 



Read February ar, 1826. -• ^ 



1 HE abolition of the ancient tenures of Ireland, and the conse- 

 quent deduction of title from the crown of England, during the 

 sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, rendered deeds and writings 

 in the Irish language, particularly those relating to landed pro- 

 perty, in a great degree useless. Other combining circumstances, 

 but chiefly the policy and care of successive English grantees to 

 destroy all evidence of previous right and possession in the natives, 

 caused those domestic documents to become so scarce, that the 

 few which escaped the general wreck are, at the present day, 

 esteemed valuable rarities, when to be found in the cabinets of the 

 curious. In fact so rare did they become, that Mr. O'Halloran, 

 in the Introduction to his History of Ireland, has given a transla- 

 tion, accompanied by an elaborate description, of a single Irish deed, 

 which he notices as a matter of great curiosity, though not much 

 older than the beginning of the fourteenth century. This is a loss 

 much to be regretted, but particularly so in an historical point of 

 view ; for, next to the publication of the remains of the Brehon 

 law, the written instruments in use under that code would serve 

 to convey more accurate information of the state of society in Ire- 

 land, and of the manners, customs and ordinary transactions of the 



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