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SOME NOTICE OF THE
considering the value of money in the twelfth and thirteenth
MaurU-e centuries. Thus Maurice MacOtere, on the 9th December,
Philip Mac-
Guthmund.
1289 (18th of Edward I.),an Ostman dwelling (as he describes
himself) at the end (or back) of the world in Ireland (in fine
mundi in partibua Hibet-nice), petitioned the king in par-
liament on behalf of himself and 300 of his race, that they
might enjoy the liberties of Englishmen, granted him by
letters patent, under the King's Great Seal of Ireland
enrolled in Chancery " letters by which the king gained
three thousand pounds in one day." But as these rights
were denied him, he prays to have the Irish patent con-
firmed under the Great Seal of England. 1
For the lords of Ireland it seems were very much opposed
to these grants, as appears as well by the instance just given
as the following petition of Philip MacGuthmund, presented
also to the king in Parliament on the 23rd of April, 1296.
-^e describes himself as Philip MacGuthmund " Ostman and
Englishman of our Lord the King of the City of Waterford,"
and complains that for the sake of the five marks payable
for every Irish(man) killed, the grasping lords of Ireland,
the kings' rivals, would make the petitioner and over 400
of his race Irish. He therefore prays in behalf of himself
and 400 of his race, for God's sake, and for the sake of the
king's father, that he may enjoy the liberties his ancestors
enjoyed, and that of Englishmen and Ostmen, they be not
made Irish, adding that it was better for the king, that there
should be more English than Irish. And in proof of his claim
that he and his ancestors had enjoyed these lights, tenders
the letters patent of the bailiffs and commons of Waterford,
2
and prays the king's letters to confirm his English liberty.
1 Petitions to the King in Par- Keeper of Public Records. Folio,
liamcnt (in England) in the eigh- London, 1844.
teenth of Edward the First " Docu- * Ibid. Sir John Davys L
ments illustrative of English His-
'
many similar instances in hi.s Distory,
in the 13th and 14th centuries, coverie why Ireland was not sooner
from the Records of the Queen's reduced to complete obedience than
Remembrancer of the Exchequer," in King James the First's reign."
p. 69. By Henry Cole, Assistant The following from the King's