514 Proceedings of tlie Royal Irish Academy. 



Viceroys so eminent as the Earl of Surrey and Lord Leonard Grey. 

 It may, however, be collected from the recitals prefixed to the statutes 

 of the last-named Deputy, that Parliament at this time resumed the 

 provincial sessions, which had been the rule rather than the exception 

 in earlier times. Grey's Parjiament held as many as eight sessions 

 between May 1st, 1536, and December 20th, 1537. Of these the first 

 four were held successively in Dublin, Kilkenny, Cashel, and Limerick 

 — a fact which seems to refute the description applied by Dr. Kichey to 

 this Parliament, of " the last colonists, or Pale Parliament held by an 

 English Viceroy in Ireland." In thus moving the seat of the Legisla- 

 ture beyond the limits of the Pale, the Deputy appears to have violated 

 the law, and doubts seem to have arisen as to the validity of the 

 measures passed by his Parliaments. Eor we find that one of the first 

 measures passed by the Parliament called in 1541 by Sir Anthony 

 St. Leger, was an Act by which an old statute under which the seat of 

 Parliament had been limited to the towns of Dublin and Drogheda 

 was declared void, and this enactment was given a retrospective 

 application. The Parliament of 1541 likewise held as many as eight 

 sessions between its first meeting on 13th June, 1541, and its dissolu- 

 tion on 19th I^ovember, 1543. One of its most important sessions 

 was in Limerick, and it also sat in Trim. These perumbulatory habits 

 were followed in the Parliament called by Sussex in 3rd & 4th Philip 

 and Mary, which sat in Limerick and Drogheda as well as in Dublin. 

 IBut this is the last instance of the despatch of Parliamentary business 

 elsewhere than in the capital. For although the Parliament of 

 11th Elizabeth was prorogued by Sir Hemy Sydney from Dublin to 

 Drogheda at the close of its first session, the sitting there on 

 February 13th to 15th, 1569-70, was merely formal, and the subse- 

 quent sittings of this Parliament were held in the capital. Sir John 

 Perrott likewise prorogued the Parliament of 1585-6 from Dublin to 

 Drogheda. But the sittings were again formal, and Parliament was 

 prorogued to meet in Dublin ; "in respect," as Perrott reported, of 

 the inability of that town to bear the train of a Parliament."^ 



It is with the famous Parliaments of 1536 and 1541, in the latter 

 of which Henry VIII. assumed, for the first time, the title of King of 

 Ireland, that the history of the Irish Parliament — from a constitutional 

 point of view — may be said to begin. But before considering the 

 features to which these Parliaments owe their importance, it will be 



1 Cal. S. P. (Ireland), 1586-88, p. 30. Perrott to Walsingham, Feb. 20th, 

 1386-6. 



