On December 4, 1154, Nicholas Breakspear, the first and only Englishman to ascend to the papacy, was unanimously elected the Catholic Church’s 107th pope. He chose Adrian IV, a posh name for a pope who proved deadly for the pesky isle across the sea, Ireland.
Quite unfairly, in 12th-century Europe, Ireland, a country steeped in spirituality, learning, and illuminated manuscripts, had developed an image problem. The country, isolated and far north, was thought of – if thought of at all – as barbaric: the natives went into battle naked, fought endless (literal) turf wars, and, worse, held a stubborn adherence to Celtic, not Roman, Catholicism.
In How the Irish Saved Civilization, Thomas Cahill explains, “To the Irish, the pope…was like the high king a distant figure whose wishes were little known and less considered.” Word of this deviant attitude made its way back to the newly elected Pope Adrian IV, now a sycophant of fellow Englishman, King Henry II.
The Pope and the King conjured a false, twisted picture of the Irish people to rationalize an English invasion. Adrian was pope for only one year when he issued the papal Bull Laudabiliter, a.k.a. “The Donation of Ireland,” in which he granted King Henry II the right to invade and rule Ireland.
Henry, a most efficient land-grabber, had already conquered the other British islands and was casting a hungry eye on Ireland. To justify the takeover, the two Englishmen decried the island to the west as debauched, disorganized, and fostering a Celtic faith that was an outliner of the Roman tradition. Adrian was happy to comply with the King’s wishes, but he had ambitions of his own: to strengthen the ties between the papacy and the Crown.
The papal Bull addressed Henry II as “the most illustrious king of England.” He authorized him thusly, “You may enter that island and do there what has to do with the honor of God.… you want to subject its people to the laws, the boundaries of the Church, restrain vice, correct morals, implant virtues, checking the descent of wickedness, correcting morals and implanting virtues…”
While the Bull was in effect since 1155, Henry didn’t avail himself of the mandate (too busy warring and whoring) until ten years later. The King enlisted the formidable Earl of Pembroke, known as Strongbow. In 1170, Strongbow sailed to Ireland with a small army of Anglo-Norman knights and was victorious; in a short time, he and his knights had taken Dublin.
When Henry heard of Strongbow’s success, he became, for lack of a better word, jealous, worrying that the popular warrior would declare himself King. He was also at the most vulnerable point in his reign: this was 1170, the same year Henry’s knights – persuaded by his lament, “Will no one rid me of this turbulent priest?” – had just assassinated the archbishop, Thomas Becket.
The King was widely blamed for the murder and openly criticized, especially as miracles began to occur at Becket’s tomb. And he was at war with his wife and sons, saving his youngest, the fatuous John. What choice did he have, really, but to amass a powerful army and 400 ships to launch a full-scale invasion of Ireland? It was, after all, mandated by the pope.
In 1171, Henry II landed in Waterford, announcing he was “in the footsteps of Pope Adrian,” although Adrien had died 12 years earlier, having choked on a fly that was in his cup of wine. The superior forces of England quickly crushed the Irish, whose weapons were vastly inferior, and their armies scattered.
His arrival marked the beginning of centuries of English involvement in Irish affairs. He made alliances with local kings and bishops who paid tribute to the usurper, and he established English control, appointing his son John as Lord of Ireland. Only the Gaelic Irish chieftains offered any resistance but the Henry prevailed. He was the first English King to set foot in Ireland, but not the last.
Ireland’s bishops wasted no time in passing a resolution granting the Kingdom of Ireland to Henry and his heirs forever. Adrian’s successor, Pope Alexander III, responded, “You have wonderfully and gloriously triumphed over that people of Ireland, who, ignoring the fear of God, in unbridled fashion wander at random through the depths of vice.”
Leave a Reply