Preface to Gilbert's "History of Dublin."

Preface

The first account of Dublin given to the public was a brief and meagre notice, containing little more than the names of the streets and public edifices of the city, contributed by Richard Stanihurst to the English Chronicles, printed under the superintendence of Raphaell Holinshed in 1577 and 1586.

Another, but much shorter notice of the city, written for Camden’s “Britannia’ by Stanihurst’s nephhew, Dr. James Ussher, continued for a considerable period the only generally known description of Dublin, and was several times reprinted, almost verbatim, by writers who, down to the early part of the 18th century, published works purporting to describe Ireland and its principal towns.

In the reign of Charles II., Robert Ware, son of the learned Sir James Ware, commenced the compilation of a history of Dublin, to which in 1681 he makes the following allusion:

“As for a farther description of this Cathedral (of Christ Church), we shall omit it; having reserved the same for a large narrative of the said Cathedral, in a book which is ready for the press, entitled, The Antiquities of the City of Dublin, which wanteth only the liberality of lovers of antiquities and learning to contribute to the cutss which are intended for the same.”

In 1683 Robert Ware issued the following advertisement, with the approbation of several persons of learning and quality:”

“That whereas the antiquities of the most antient, famous and loyal city of Dublin, importing a full history of the same, as well ecclesiastical as civil, from the first foundation thereof, is intended to be printed in large folio, with a good character, containing above an hundred sheets and near forty copper plates: a fuller account will be had in a specimen which shall be printed for that purpose: It being a work of more than ordinary charge, to furnish the same with sculptures fit to represent the beauty, state and scituation, and many noblepersoms in several ages relating thereto; it is humbly offered, that, who shall please to subscribe three and twenty shillings shall have one book in quires, which otherrise will not be sold under thirty shillings: and those that subscribe for six shall have seven. William Norman, bookbinder to his Grace the Duke of Ormond, being undertaker thereof will give receipts for such money as he shall receive.”

Robert Ware, being mainly occupied with religious polemics, made but little progress in the projected history, the manuscript of which subsequently came into the possession of Walter Harris, who married his grand-daughter.

The numerous errors and inaccuracies of the edition of Sir James Ware’s Treatises and Annals, published by Robert Ware, demonstrate the incompetency of the latter to produce any historical work requiring learning or research; but it is to be regretted that he did not leave us a description of the city as it stood in his own nine.

Harris, who describes Robert Ware’s manuscript as “unfinished and very imperfect,” appears to have projected the compilation of a history of Dublin in conjunction with another author; and writing in 1747, he observes:

“The antient and present state of the city of Dublin, ecclesiastical and civil, as also of the county of Dublin, are under the care of two gentlemen, who hope to put the last hand to it before the end of the ensuing year.”

Of this undertaking the public heard nothing further until 1766 - five years after the death of Harris - whose unfinished and incomplete collections for the history were then published under the following title:

“The History and Antiquities of the City of Dublin, from the earliest accounts: compiled from authentic memoirs, offices of record, manuscript collections, and other unexceptionable vouchers. By the late Walter Harris, Esq.; with an appendix containing an history of the Cathedrals of Christ Church and St. Patrick, the first university, the hospitals and other public building.

This work consists of 509 largely printed octavo pages, nearly one half of which is composed of a reprint of those portions of Sir James Ware’s Annals which relate to Dublin. The notices appended of public buildings, and other important portions of the city, are so meagre, that the account of Christ Church occupies only five pages, while but four pages are allocated to the Cathedral of St. Patrick and eighteen other churches.

In the introduction we are told that Harris “was possessed of many useful and interesting materials, in no hands but his own; particularly the manuscript history of Robert Ware, Esq., son of the celebrated annalist, from which everything, whether of value or curiosity, has,” adds the editor, “been culled and transplanted into the following work.”

The preface to Harris’ volume concludes with the following observations:

“The public are here only to expect what was intended as part of a more extensive design, in which our author [Harris] had engaged himself, with two gentlemen of known abilities in the respective departments which they had undertaken. The whole was to have been entitled, ‘The Antient and Present State of the City and County of Dublin, Ecclesiastical as well as Civil, and also the Natural History of the same County.’ The civil history and antiquities alone are here*** ***presented, and we cannot say to what accident or cause the disappointment of the remainder is to be charged. As to these papers, some judicious friends pronounced them valuable, and it was thereupon determined that they should see the light. We would not be thought to recommend even what is here offered as an unexceptionable production; on the contrary, we are of opinion it never received the author’s last hand, and that much more might have been said on so fruitful an occasion; but as that gentleman has furnished the contour, this publication may, nay, probably will, be productive of this happy effect (besides the pleasure afforded to every lover of Irish antiquities) to prove an incitement to some able writer, to set about the completion of a piece on so entertaining and useful a subject.”

The only important contribution to the history of Dublin, from the appearance of the work of Harris to the conclusion of the same century, was the meagre account of the ancient Abbeys of Dublin, included in the “Monasticon Hibernicum” or Mervyn Archdall, who was necessitated to epitomize this portion of his compilation in order to compress the monastic history of the entire of Ireland within the limits of a single volume.

That the want of a history of the city was generally recognised, appears from the following note appended by an anonymous writer to some observations on the Irish Statutes, contributed in 1793 to the “Anthologica Hibernica:”

“The foregoing are extracts from a new history of Dublin, which has long engaged the writer’s attention, and which if executed with proper care, cannot fail to be an interesting and very curious work. Very little use is made of Harris, who is full of gross errors an a misrepresentations.”

No further account of this project is, however, to be found, and the work of Harris continued to be the only History of Dublin extant till the publication, at London, in 1818, of two quarto volumes of 1460 pages, with the following title:

“History of the City of Dublin, from the earliest accounts to the present time; containing its annals, antiquities, ecclesiastical history, and charters; its present extent, public buildings, schools, institutions, &c.: to which are added biographical notices of eminent men, and copious Appendices of its population, revenue, commerce, and literature. By the late J. Warburton, Deputy Keeper of the records in Birmingham Tower; the late Rev. J. Whitelaw, M. R. I. A., Vicar of St. Catherine’s; and the Rev. Robert Walsh, M. R. I. A.”

Of this work the following account is given in the preface, written by the Rev. Robert Walsh:

“The History of Dublin was originally undertaken by Mr. Warburton, Keeper of the Records of Birmingham Tower, in the Castle of Dublin, and the Rev. James Whitelaw, Vicar of St. Catherine’s. Mr. Warburton furnished for the ancient history such documents as he, from his employment, had access to, and it was proposed, that Mr. Whitelaw should methodize and arrange them, and add an account of modern Dublin. The death of Mr. Warburton consigned to Mr. Whitelaw an unfinished account, which he was proceeding to complete, when his lamented death also consigned it to another person. On inspecting the state of the work, the last editor [Rev. R. Walsh] discovered the arduous task he had undertaken to perform. He found 650 pages of it printed, and materials for about a hundred more; but this did not comprehend half the intended publication, and he had no alternative but to publish the valuable but unfinished fragment or Mr. Whitelaw in the state in which be found it, or to endeavour to fill up the plan he had pointed out, and render the work, as far as his exertion could make it, more worthy the memory of a valued friend, and a more full and satisfactory picture of the capital of Ireland.

“The only History of the city of Dublin hitherto [1818] published was that of Harris. Its antiquities were highly valuable, and were made ample use of by Mr. Warburton; but the modern part was notoriously deficient. It had been a. posthumous publication of a work left incomplete by its author, and another hand had added a very brief and imperfect sketch of the then state of a few public institutions. This, with some notice of the metropolis in the statistical histories of the county, and a few remarks of casual travellers, was all the last editor found to guide his enquiry in completing the work. His* **principal sources of information, therefore, were not books, but oral authorities. *Those only who have engaged in a similar pursuit can be competent judges of the tedious process of such an undertaking, where a date or a number was sometimes the enquiry of a month, and the apparently trifling value of the information bore no proportion to the time and trouble consumed in acquiring it.”

Those volumes, although put forward as the result of orignal and lengthened research, will, on analysis, be found to consist of inaccurate reprints of various previous publications, including the entire of Harris’ History and a very large portion of Archdall’s “Monasticum,” while nearly all the notices of the public buildings of the city were copied almost literally from the superficial accounts published in collections of a “Views in Dublin,” issued towards the close of the last century. Hence, the work does not possess even the merit of giving an accurate account of the city at the period of its publication; and, consequently, readers unacquainted with the manner in which it was compiled have fallen into the error of receiving as descriptive of the town in 1818 passages which originally formed portions of the publication of Harris in 1766, whence they were abstracted, without acknowledgement, by Whitlaw, Warburton, and Walsh, who likewise copied from various un- authentic compilations their meagre biographical notices of eminent natives of Dublin, without making any effort to test their accuracy or correct their errors.

A very large number of the churches and other important public edifices of the city has been totally unnoticed in the bulky publication of Whitelaw, Warburton, and Walsh; while the avowed sources of the information of its last editor being solely oral authority, the majority of the work is consequently replete with inaccuracies and statements unverified by documentary evidence. The only one of the three editors who appears to have been even slightly conversant with documents bearing upon the subject was Mr. Warburton, who contributed brief extracts from various records to which he had access, but which. as printed by him, are replete with errors and ludicrous typographical inaccuracies.

During the first half of the present century the sole reputable publication illustrative of any portion of the history of the city of Dublin was Mr. Mason’s elaborate work on the Cathedral of St. Patrick, the research and erudition displayed in which form a striking contrast to the inaccurate compilation of Whitelaw, Warburton, and Walsh

Although within the last fifteen years various important archaeological works have issued from the Irish press, no prospect appeared of any contribution being made to the history of Dublin worthy of comparison with Mr. Cunningham’s valuable “Handbook of London,” or the publications of a cognate character upon other European cities.

To call attention to the importance of supplying this generally recognised deficiency, the author of the present volume, after having made considerable researches upon the subject, contributed to a local periodical - with which he was for a short time connected

• a series of historic papers entitled The Streets of Dublin, the favourable reception of which by the Press, and the large amount of additional information subsequently acquired, from many hitherto unprinted documents, led to the commencement of a work, the first portion of which - now published - embraces the topographic history of nearly the entire of the ancient city within the walls, with the exception of the Castle, an account of which, embodying the general history of the Metropolis of Ireland, is in preparation.

The production of a topographical history of Dublin, including multifarious minute archaeological, biographical, and literary details, involved the examination of all accessible manuscripts and printed documents extant in connexion with the subject; and throughout the present work will be found numerous extracts from records hitherto unpublished, and comparatively unknown. [The Author has to acknowledge his obligation to the Rev. J. H. Todd, D.D., S.F.T.C.D.; Rev. B. Dickson, F.T.C.D.; Rev. E. S. Abbott; Rev. J. H. Mason; Rev. K. G. Abeltshauser; and Rev. J. V. Monahan, for the facilities afforded him in consulting the various MSS. in their custody. For the communication of several original documents he is indebted to Aquilla Smith, M. D., Hon. Treasurer of the Irish Archaeological and Celtic Society; John O’Dnoovan, LL.D.; J. F. Ferguson, Esq.; Eugene Curry, Esq.; and Robert Lemon, Esq.]

It way, moreover, be added, that, owing to the inaccuracy, neglect, and meagreness of previous writers, the investigator is, at the present day, in his researches among unpublished and unindexed original documents, obliged to encounter difficulties and obstacles unknown to those who are not conversant with the neglected state of various departments of the historic literature of Ireland.

It is, however, to be hoped, that Government will, ere long, adopt measures for the publication of the ancient unpublished Anglo-Irish public records, numbers of which, containing important historic materials are now mouldering to decay; while the unindexed and unclassified condition of those in better preservation renders their contents almost unavailable to literary investigators. These observations apply more especially to the Statutes and enactments of the early Anglo-Irish Parliaments, upwards of twelve hundred of which still remain unpublished, Although the ancient legal institutes of England, Scotland and Wales, have been long since printed at the public expense The most valuable illustrations of the history of the English government in Ireland are derivable from those Anglo-Irish Statutes, one of which, enacted A. D. 1479-1480, will be found, printed for the first lime, at page 421 of the present volume.

While in other countries the publication of the national records and the labours of previous diligent investigators have facilitated the inquiries of topographical historians, the total absence of such aids in connexion with the subject of the present work imposed upon the author the double task of deciphering and collating ancient documents, and essaying thence to construct a narrative, which it is trusted will be found sufficiently minute in details to satisfy the archaeologist, without repelling the general reader by the aridity which too frequently characterizes local histories.

Villanova, Black Rock, Dublin

9th December, 1854.

To Chapter 1. Gilbert Index