Falkiner — The Phcenix Park, its Origin mid early History. 471 



This repurcliase of tlie lands of Kilmainham was eSected by 

 Sir Oliver St. John, afterwards Lord Grandison, who in 1616 had 

 succeeded Chichester as Deputy, and who, almost immediately after 

 Pisher's surrender, took up his abode at " His Majesty's House at 

 Kilmainham called the Phenix."^ The house is first described by 

 that name in an order for payment of moneys disbursed in repairs in 

 February, 1619, and thenceforward it is constantly used. With respect 

 to the origin and derivation of this name, I cannot presume to meddle 

 in Gaelic etymology ; but I understand that there is no reason to ques- 

 tion the explanation offered by our local historians and expanded by 

 Dr. Joyce, which refers the name to a corruption of the word Fionn (or 

 Phion) uisf^ signifying 'clear' or 'limpid water,' and denoting a 

 spring well of singular transparency situate within the park.^ 



It was in the time of St. John's successor, the first Lord Falkland, 

 that the notion, not carried out till forty years later, of turning the 

 lands into a deer park, seems to have been first entertained. In 1623 

 a king's letter directed that one William Moore should be employed 

 about His Majesty's park, which was to be enclosed near Dublin for 

 the breeding of deer and the maintenance of game. But although the 

 office of Master of the Hawks and Game had been constituted in 1605, 

 and was at the time held by the Vice-Treasurer, Sir Thomas Eidge- 

 way, afterwards Earl of Londonderry, it does not appear that any- 

 thing was done to enclose any part of the lands of the Phcenix or to 

 stock it with game. At any rate no new Master was appointed on 

 Eidgeway's death in 1631. 



For forty years from the time of its acquisition by the Crown ' ' the 

 House of the Phoenix " remained the principal residence of the rulers 

 of Ireland and their favouiite resort. Strafford and Ormond, Fleet- 

 wood and Henry Cromwell, were among its successive occupants in the 

 thirty troubled years that preceded the Eestoration. Situated on the 

 eminence now occupied by the magazine fort, commanding the fine 

 prospect of the Dublin hills and of the vaUey of the Liffey in one 

 ■direction, and a far stretching expanse of almost entirely unoccupied 

 land in another, it was an almost ideal spot for the recreation of jaded 



1 Irish State Papers, Cal. 1615-1625. 



2 " Irish Names of Places," vol. i., p. 21. 



2 The writer of this paper is not satisfied that Dr. Joyce is correct in fixing the 

 site of this spring as close to the Phoenix Pillar and the entrance to the Viceregal 

 grounds. It is submitted that the spring at that spot, would not have been on the 

 lands originally held with the Phcenix house. It seems more probable that the name 

 derives from a spring in the vicinity of the Magazine. 



