340 Proceedings of the Boyal Irish Academy. 



IX. The orw an Recoeds. — The pre-Norman sources for the history 

 of the Limerick churches are scanty and often doubtful ; much of the 

 "Annals," the " Wars of the Gaedhil with the Gaill," and the "Lives 

 of the Saints," are either brief entries, or, in the latter stories, state- 

 ments of legends, many doubtless of late and valueless origin. When, 

 however, we reach the English period, we get a mass of very full and 

 valuable information from the Rolls, State Papers, and the Register of 

 the Deans of Limerick, called the " Black Book." The usual statement 

 is that this was copied after 1400 by Bishop Cornelius O'Dea; palaeo- 

 graphers rather incline to put the earlier handwriting at least twenty 

 years sooner. It commences in the time of Bishop Brictius (1192-1194) 

 with several deeds (two of the greatest importance) of the succeeding 

 prelates. The main collection of deeds belongs to the times of the 

 Bishops Hubert, Robert, and Geoffrey (1223-1307). After these we 

 find a few isolated deeds of Bishops Robert and Eustace (1307-1336) ; 

 none of their immediate successors, save one of the bishops, Stephen, are 

 represented. Then we find at the end several important surveys and 

 documents of Bishop Cornelius (1400-1420), and a few deeds of the 

 early sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries, ending with Bishop 

 Bernard, to 1619. The last Protestant bishop who held the book was 

 Dr. George "Webb ; he died in Limerick Castle, which was besieged 

 by the Confederates, into whose hands the Black Book passed^ at the 

 capitulation, 1642. It was eventually lent by the Roman Catholic 

 Bishop of Limerick, Dr. Ryan, to Dr. Renehan, for the latter' s History 

 of the Bishops, from whom it passed to the safe keeping of the Library 

 of Maynooth. It is a well-preserved volume of parchment, the pages 

 10 inches by 7 inches, with usually twenty-six lines in each page in the 

 earlier, and thirty-three in the later, portion. - 



The documents from O'Dea down are much defaced ; fortunately 

 Adams' copies, now in possession of the Protestant bishops, seem very 

 correct, so far as I can check them with Dr. Reeves' copy of the por- 

 tions legible in the original. 



Several important documents relating to Xilmallock are undatable. 

 They give minute details of the streets and grounds in the town. If 

 we consider certain persons as identified with others in other deeds in 

 the same collection, the Kilmallock deeds may date about 1280. 



^ See K.S.A.I., xxxiv., pp. 176, 186. It is interesting to note that the Con- 

 federates allowed the inhabitants of Askeaton Castle to take half their books. 

 11. S.A.I. , xxxiii., p. 168. 



2 See Third Report of Hist. MSS. Commission, p. 434. 



