Deaths of Mac Murrough and O’Connor and The “English Pale

Above: Picture of Sir John Talbot  

The  last years  of MacMurrough and O’Connor were spent in comparative peace, little disturbed even by the arrival of the able and vigorous Sir John Talbot as Lord Deputy.   In 1417, Art Mac Murrough died (it is suspecte from poison), and four years later his ally of Uf Failghe passed away.

Most of Leinster had been re-conquered.   A small portion near Dublin and a few isolated towns on the coast still remained to the Crown ; the Earl of Kildare still ruled from the Liffey to the Barrow ; Ormonde still occupied the lands around Wexford.  

But elsewhere Art had won back their ancient lands into the possession of the clans that obeyed the ” King of Laghin.”   He was ” the ablest, the most skilful, the most successful
chief whom Ireland had sent to combat the English.”

North, west and south, the English power had now been driven back into a thin strip of country, which stretched
from the south of Dublin to Dundalk, and whose greatest width  twenty miles.    Two-thirds of their old lands were occupied by the Irish ; most of the remainder were  ruled by the   three  Earls,  who professed  a nominal allegiance to   the English King, but who  weropractically independent.

Above: Map of Meath

In Meath alone no great noble stood between the Crown and the smaller nobility. Even in Meath the nobility of the western part followed the example of their Norman neighbours of Connacht, and like them threw off allegiance. But those on the east of the Boytie became, like the settlers around Dublin, the immediate dependents of the Crown {page 131), and formed with them the ” English Pale.” Only in that little district—equivalent to the modern counties of Dublin, Louth, and half of Meath—were English laws enforced or the orders of the English King obeyed.