6 How to govern Ireland without leaving your armchair
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Nicholas Popper
Abstract
This chapter takes up the question of how English courtiers and policy-makers attained their knowledge of Ireland and its peoples. Most denizens of Whitehall had no first-hand experience of Ireland and had to rely on written reports. But did any of those writing the ‘reform treatises’ that poured into English governing circles possess any firmer knowledge of Ireland than those they wished to influence? Robert Beale, Clerk of the Privy Council, was the policy-makers’ chief conduit for information on Ireland. But much of what he provided his peers was derivative work penned by those who were parroting earlier reports and more concerned about the generic requirements of advice giving and ill-informed of the subject on which they wrote.
Abstract
This chapter takes up the question of how English courtiers and policy-makers attained their knowledge of Ireland and its peoples. Most denizens of Whitehall had no first-hand experience of Ireland and had to rely on written reports. But did any of those writing the ‘reform treatises’ that poured into English governing circles possess any firmer knowledge of Ireland than those they wished to influence? Robert Beale, Clerk of the Privy Council, was the policy-makers’ chief conduit for information on Ireland. But much of what he provided his peers was derivative work penned by those who were parroting earlier reports and more concerned about the generic requirements of advice giving and ill-informed of the subject on which they wrote.
Kapitel in diesem Buch
- Front Matter i
- Contents v
- List of contributors vii
- Series editors’ preface x
- Acknowledgements xi
- Abbreviations xiii
- Introduction – Contiguous court societies 1
- I Indigenous court society in Ireland 27
- 1 Bouncers, stewards and gatecrashers 29
- 2 Court society in the south of Ireland, c.1430–c.1620 45
- 3 The Gaelic court and Irish country-house poetry 65
- 4 Latin letters and Renaissance civility in sixteenth-century Ireland 86
- II Made in Whitehall 103
- 5 Debating Irish policy at the court of Elizabeth I, c.1558–80 105
- 6 How to govern Ireland without leaving your armchair 123
- 7 Court discourse, the mid-Elizabethan polity and Ireland, 1571–75 142
- 8 Magnificence and massacre 166
- 9 Counsel in extremis 195
- III Positioning Ireland in the Renaissance court world 213
- 10 Our men in Scotland 215
- 11 Ireland’s militarised itinerant court and the Tudor state 238
- 12 ‘Winning hearts and minds’ 261
- 13 From court to courtliness 278
- Index 297
Kapitel in diesem Buch
- Front Matter i
- Contents v
- List of contributors vii
- Series editors’ preface x
- Acknowledgements xi
- Abbreviations xiii
- Introduction – Contiguous court societies 1
- I Indigenous court society in Ireland 27
- 1 Bouncers, stewards and gatecrashers 29
- 2 Court society in the south of Ireland, c.1430–c.1620 45
- 3 The Gaelic court and Irish country-house poetry 65
- 4 Latin letters and Renaissance civility in sixteenth-century Ireland 86
- II Made in Whitehall 103
- 5 Debating Irish policy at the court of Elizabeth I, c.1558–80 105
- 6 How to govern Ireland without leaving your armchair 123
- 7 Court discourse, the mid-Elizabethan polity and Ireland, 1571–75 142
- 8 Magnificence and massacre 166
- 9 Counsel in extremis 195
- III Positioning Ireland in the Renaissance court world 213
- 10 Our men in Scotland 215
- 11 Ireland’s militarised itinerant court and the Tudor state 238
- 12 ‘Winning hearts and minds’ 261
- 13 From court to courtliness 278
- Index 297
