xxviii COMPLETE PEERAGE but few, though his successor (1437-60) James II [S], created a good many, but many Barons even at that period, who attended the meetings of the estates, were not Lords of Parliament.' The distinction between the Greater Barons [S] (who were Lords of Pari.), and the Lesser Barons (who were not such Lords) is emphasised in the creation (14 Apr. 161 6) of Sir David Carnegy in Bcironem Majorem et Dominum Parliamenti [S]. As TO Ireland, where no comprehensive account of the entire Peerage exists, and where one cannot (as in England) be guided by the writ of summons (which in Ireland was merely incidental to, and not creative of the Peerage), (°) the Editor has not attempted to deal with any title of honour in that kingdom, which may have existed as an hereditary Peerage of parliament and have become extinct prior to the reign of Henry VII, other than with such among them as had been created, before that period, by patent or charter, (of which there appear altogether to have been but twelve), and with the Earldom of Cork, which in all probability was so created. C') In addition to these, and to such Peerages as were existing in the reign of Henry VII, and (of course) such as thereafter were created, some account will be given of the few feudal Baronies which had developed before that reign, into the hereditary Peerages then existing, such as those of Slane, Howth, i^c. Of the twelve Peerages created by patent before the reign of Henry VII as above-mentioned, the holders of five were among the fifteen Irish Peers (") who were summoned by that King in 1489 (") The case of the Barony of La Peer (or Power of Curraghmore) is but an apparent contradiction to this statement, for the decision concerning it (in 1767) was grounded on the erroneous report of the Attorney and the Solicitor General for Ireland, that this ancient feudal Barony (of which the Peerage dignity was created hy patent, 33 Hen. VIII, to Richard Power, the then feudal Lord, " et haeredihus mascuin de corpore exeuntiius ") was a Barony created hy writ, and, consequently, one in fee. With this anomaly, the entire Irish Baronage is composed exclusively of the male heirs of the Peers recognised in 1489 by Henry VII, and of those since ennobled by letters patent. So clearly was the fact recognised (even at so late a time as the end of the 1 7th century) that no writ of summons created a Peerage of Ireland, that when James II, shortly after the revolution, wished to confer a liereditary Irish Peerage, he (being then unwilling, in those troublous times, to rely solely on letters patent) intro- duced express words to that effect in the writ of summons, which otherwise would have been (like the Irish writs of his predecessors) merely personal. C") These were seven Earldoms (which, with the Earldom of Cork, were appar- ently, all that ever existed before that date), four Baronies, and one Viscountcy, viz. the Earldoms of Ulster (1205); Carrick (1315); Kildare (1316) ; Louth (1319); Ormonde (1328) ; Desmond (1329) and Waterford (1446). The Baronies of Trimleston (1461/2) ; Pordester (1461/2) ; Ratowth (1468) and Rathwire * (1476) j also the Viscountcy of Gormanston (1478).
- As to the existence of Rathwire as a peerage title see Appendix A., p. 458, note
" a " in this volume. V.G. (") Viz., three Earls, i.e., Kildare, Ormonde and Desmond (all three Earldoms having been created by patent) ; three Viscounts, /.(•., Buttevant, Fermoy and Gormanston (of which the last alone had been, in 1478, created by patent), and nine Barons, i.e., Athenry, Kingsale, Kerry and Lixnaw, Slane, Delvin, Killeen, Howth,
