[coryNE] THE TALBOT PAPERS 21 
INTRODUCTION. 
The Honorable Thomas Talbot, Founder of The Talbot Settlement. 
Li; 
THE TALBOTS OF MALAHIDE, 
Malahide Castle is nine miles from Dublin. Its situation, com- 
manding an excellent view of the town and bay of the same name, and 
the Islands of Ireland’s Eye and Lambey; its Gothic porch and lofty 
circular towers; its carved oak ceilings and wainscottings; its Vandyke 
portraits, its altar-piece by Diirer, once the property of Queen Mary; 
and the remains of its ancient church, for ages the place of burial of 
the proprietors of the Castle; are strong attractions for the tourist and 
the artist. 
The lordship of Malahide has remained in the Talbot family in 
the male heirs and name of the original grantee for more than seven 
centuries. One of William the Conqueror’s barons was a Richard 
de Talbot, and it is claimed that his estates antedated the conquest. 
It was his grandson, Richard de Talbot, who, accompanying Henry IT 
to Ireland, received from him a grant of the barony and castle of Mala- 
hide in the year 1174. Three centuries later, in 1475, King Edward IV 
granted and confirmed to Thomas Talbot, Esquire, the castle and lord- 
ship, with many feudal rights and privileges. The instrument refers 
to Talbot as already holding “the manor or Lordship of Malahide in 
our Land of Ireland of us in Chief by Knight’s Service.” It is wit- 
nessed by many great officers in church and state, including Cardinal 
Bourchier, Archbishop of Canterbury, his brother, Lord Essex, who was 
the King’s uncle by marriage; the King’s brothers, George, Duke of 
Clarence, and Richard, Duke of Gloucester; Earl Rivers, Thomas 
Stanley of Stanley, and Lord Hastings, names familiar to students of 
Shakespeare and English history. 
At that time few names were better known throughout western 
Europe than that of Talbot. What reader of Shakespeare is ignorant 
of the famous John Talbot, Earl of Shrewsbury? The chronicles of 
the time are full of his prowess and his victories. He was the terror 
of France. At the sound of his name alone the enemy despaired and 
fled. For ages French mothers silenced their children by the threat 
that Talbot would come. It was his lineal descendant, Talbot, Earl of 
Shrewsbury, who, at the coronation of His Majesty King Edward VII, 
took rank and precedence as premier Earl of the United Kingdom. 
King ‘Edward IV himself is said to have been betrothed to Elizabeth 
