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In the early Middle Ages Ireland was better known as a sanctuary of saints and scholars than a haven of heathens and heretics. The Irish practiced a form of Christianity distinctly different from the Roman, which won them both the admiration and the suspicion of those outside of Ireland. By the twelfth century, however, suspicion had begun to eclipse admiration as an array of internal and external forces worked to bring Ireland into closer conformity with the rest of Western Christendom. The turning point came around the year 1170, with the invasion of Henry lis Anglo-Norman forces. Henry came with the blessing of Rome, which had sanctioned invasion as a means to return Ireland to orthodoxy, in keeping with a common contemporary opinion that the Irish were, in the words of Bernard of Clairvaux, "Christians in name, pagans in fact."

Yet specific allegations of heresy or Irish apostasy did not surface during the Anglo-Norman conquest, and they are largely absent from the historical record until much later. Indeed, it isn't until the fourteenth century, a time of great upheaval, that reliable records attest to heresy trials in Ireland. Only one of these trials has received any significant scholarly attention: the sensational case of Alice Kyteler and her associates, prosecuted in 1324 by Richard de Ledrede, bishop of Ossory. Remembered today for its brazen accusations of heretical devil-worshipping witches, the Kyteler trial is regularly referenced by historians of European witchcraft, but due to its isolation in time and place (the witch hunts of Europe began in the fifteenth century, with few trials occurring in Ireland), they rarely offer it more than cursory consideration. Historians of Ireland, meanwhile, have been wary of placing much emphasis on the Kyteler case, as it seems so exceptional and did not provide a paradigm for witchcraft prosecutions in Ireland. Yet the trial stands at the center of several heresy trials on the island, all of which occurred within a fifty-year period in the fourteenth century. Two trials occurred in 1310, one involving the Templars and the other a canon of Holy Trinity Cathedral. Four heresy proceedings followed in the five years after the Kyteler case, three of them also initiated by Bishop Ledrede. The fourth, prosecuted against Adduce Dubh O'Toole for a heresy that amounted to systematic denial of the Catholic faith, was ultimately a tool used by colonists to try to persuade the pope to call a crusade against the native Irish, in their hopes of completing the conquest begun in the twelfth century. Despite this plea, and despite three successive popes' repeated instructions that the investigation of heretics Ledrede claimed to have discovered in Dublin and Ossory be continued, no more trials occurred in Ireland until 1353, and then in the diocese of Killaloe against two men of the MacConmaras (MacNamaras), tried like Adduce Dubh by colonists who had recently defeated them in war.

This book returns the celebrated Kyteler case to its original context of late medieval Ireland by considering it in relation to the island's other verifiable medieval heresy trials during the fourteenth century. It is my contention that exploring these trials together in one study brings significant issues to the forefront, such as the relations between the "three nations"—the English, the Irish, and the Anglo-Irish—and the role of the church in these relations; tensions within the ecclesiastical hierarchy and between secular and spiritual authority; Ireland's position within its European context; and the political and cultural aspects of the heresies. Gender also played a crucial role as revealed most notably in the Narrative of the Proceedings against Dame Alice Kyteler, which is heavily biased in Ledrede s favor and was probably written by him. Because the Kyteler case has been studied primarily in terms of its relevance to the Continent, its differences from and influence on Ireland's other heresy trials have not yet been sufficiently examined, nor have the trials been used as a means for approaching fourteenth-century Irish religious and gender history or for exploring the impact of heresy and witchcraft prosecution on a land that previously had little experience of either.

In the remainder of this introduction I set the context for my accounts of these heresy trials by providing some necessary background. First, I give an overview of Ireland's distinctive Christianity and cultural codes, considering how these differences became increasingly divisive after the Gregorian Reform and the Norman Conquest of England. I discuss issues of ethnic identity among and between the native Irish, the English, and those who would come to be known as the Anglo-Irish. I then consider heresy prosecution in medieval Europe more generally, highlighting Ireland's similarities with and contrasts from its broader European context.

Returning Ireland to Christendom

Ireland earned the epithet "isle of saints" through the devotion to Chris¬tian faith and learning exemplified by the Irish both at home and abroad. By the seventh century, however, questions were repeatedly raised about Irish orthodoxy, primarily concerning the date of Easter, for which Irish and Roman calculation differed. The Irish eventually conformed to the Roman observance of Easter, but they continued to practice a form of Christianity that varied significantly from the Roman, as Ireland had never been part of the Roman Empire. Before the turn of the millennium, the Irish church was more monastic than diocesan in organization, and bishops could be subject to abbots in administrative matters. Monastic discipline varied from house to house, a diversity generally accepted and even promoted by the Irish. Neither religious nor secular power was centralized in Ireland but was spread throughout a network of ruling families. The monasteries that dominated Irish religious life were often dominated in turn by these families; kinship to provincial kings was a virtual requirement for many abbots and abbesses, and abbacies frequently passed from father to son. The Viking raids, which began at the end of the eighth century, increased monastic dependence upon secular power and further isolated Ireland from the Continent; eventually what had been tolerated as differences became regarded as dangerous divisions. Abrupt changes came in the twelfth century as the Gregorian Reform movement took hold and Ireland was swept up in a broader effort to centralize and standardize the church throughout Western Christendom. Irish reformers, in concert with the English and Rome, worked to reshape Ireland in the mold of England and the Continent; in so doing, they initiated the history of heresy in Ireland.

The Gregorian Reform, named after Pope Gregory VII (1073—85) but extending beyond his reign, was abruptly introduced to Ireland by Archbishop Lanfranc of Canterbury (1070-89). He claimed his primacy included Ireland as well as Britain, a claim that speaks volumes about the changing fortunes of the two islands in the eleventh century. The Ostmen, the HibernoNorse who had established the cities of Dublin, Wexford, Waterford, and Limerick, accepted his claim, as did the O'Brien kings, who believed that a centralized church would help their faltering kingship, established earlier in the century by Brian Boru. Lanfranc lambasted the Irish church for its clerical abuses and the immorality and unspecified "pagan" offenses it tolerated among the laity, accusations continued by his successor Anselm and that thereafter remained the general impression of the Irish among English and Continental Christians. Indigenous Irish religious not initially associated with Canterbury, such as Saints Malachy (Maelmaedoc O Morgair) and Laurence O'Toole (Lorcan 0 Tuathail), also worked to bring their church into closer alignment with the Roman ideal. The twelfth century began with a reforming synod, the Synod of Cashel in 1101, and several more synods followed in the ensuing decades as the Irish voluntarily restructured their church according to the diocesan system, adopted foreign religious orders, and vowed to purge their church of secular influence and immoral practices.