Byrne's Dictionary of Irish Local History (49 page)

primogeniture
. (L.,
primogenitus
, first born) The common law principle of succession to a family estate by the eldest son. The purpose of such preference was to retain estates intact and to prevent excessive subdivision, a practice which, if repeated widely, would dilute the economic and social power of individual families and weaken the whole fabric of landed society. Primogeniture also made it relatively easy to monitor the services and duties owed by chief tenants to the crown.
See Quia Emptores.

prison forte et dure
. A punishment imposed on a suspect to extract a confession or secure evidence,
prison forte et dure
consisted of perpetual imprisonment, starvation and ultimately death. From the time of Henry IV it was replaced by
peine forte et dure
or pressing to death.

privateer
. A privately-owned, armed ship, furnished with a letter of marque (government licence) to capture and plunder enemy merchant vessels.

privy council
. Originally an advisory body to the
chief governor
comprising a number of selected ministers, the privy council developed into the senior administrative and executive body in Ireland from 1534 until the
Act of Union
. It was distinct from the more general king's council (
curia regis
) which included lesser officials and peers. To curb over-powerful chief governors (such as Garret Mór FitzGerald), the Tudors, as they had done in England from the accession of Henry VIII, reserved the right to appoint those of its choosing to the council together with the six reserved appointments of chief governor,
lord chancellor, treasurer, master of the rolls
, secretary and keeper of the privy seal and chief justice. Moreover, the governor was required not to act against the members' advice. In the absence of the governor the council was presided over by the chancellor and empowered to conduct state business. Although up to 24 members could be nominated to the council usually only about half that number, largely senior officials, attended meetings. Under the Tudors the council began to exercise executive functions, advising, performing routine administrative business and implementing instructions from London. It continued to act in an appellate capacity after its judicial business was transferred to the court of
castle chamber
. Until legislative independence was conceded in 1782 the privy council exercised control over parliament through the powers granted it by
Poynings
'
Law
to amend, alter or veto bills prepared by parliament. Later it was completely eclipsed by the rise to prominence of the
chief secretary
.

privy seal
.
See
seals.

prisage, prizage
. Also known as butlerage, prisage was a tax on wine in Ireland and the hereditary perquisite of the Butlers of Ormond through the possession of the title of King's Butler.

probate
. The judicial process by which a will purporting to be the last will of a deceased person is declared legally valid. If so adjudged, the will is then admitted to probate and the executor can begin to dispose of the estate. From the twelfth century testamentary jurisdiction lay with the church (the Established church after the Reformation). Wills were proved in the
consistorial court
of the diocese in which the deceased had lived. If, however, the deceased had an estate worth £5 or more in a second diocese, testamentary jurisdiction lay with the
prerogative court
of the archbishop of Armagh. With the passage of the Probate Act in 1857 (20 & 21 Vict., c. 8) jurisdiction in the matter of wills was transferred to a civil court of probate in Dublin, the principal registry, and a nationwide network of eleven district registries.
See
nuncupative will, wills. (ffolliott and O'Byrne, ‘Wills', pp. 157– 80.

proctor
. 1: The Irish
parliament
before the Reformation comprised three houses, the lords, commons and the lower clergy or clerical proctors. The proctors paid a heavy price for their rejection of the Henrician ecclesiastical reforms for Henry directed parliament to legislate for their extinction (28 Hen. VIII, c. 12) 2: Attorneys in the admiralty court were known as proctors 3: For tithe-proctor
see
tithe-farmer.

proffers
. Twice yearly, at
Michaelmas
and Easter, sheriffs were required to present themselves at the court of
exchequer
to settle their accounts by paying whatever money they had collected during the preceding months. These payments were known as proffers and they were recorded in the
memoranda rolls
under the heading
proffra
.

prohibition, writ of
. A writ issuing out of
king's bench
commanding a judge or any party to a suit to cease from prosecuting a case on the grounds that the case did not belong to that jurisdiction.

promontory fort
. A fort located on a coastal headland or mountain spur, the landward approach to which is secured by a
fosse
and bank.

prône
. (Fr.,
prôner
, to address a congregation) A book of prepared sermons.

protection leasing
. A practice in Ulster in the eighteenth century whereby the head landlord guaranteed the leases held by undertenants from a
middleman
were the middleman's lease to be sold on. The undertenants were also relieved of any liability for arrears owed by the middleman.

Protectorate
. The title of the government of the British Isles and Ireland for the period 1653–59 when the successive heads of state, Oliver Cromwell (1653–58) and his son Richard (1658–9), were styled Lord Protector of the Commonwealth.

prothonotary
. 1: A chief clerk in the courts 2: An official in
common pleas
who reported to the court on matters referred to him by it. He taxed costs, informed the court of its practice and of the state of causes in it, received moneys paid into the court and disbursed them. In medieval times he entered pleas on the rolls, work later done by the master.

province
.
See
composition,
cúige
, custody, presidency, provincial councils.

provincial.
The superior of all the houses of a religious community within a given province or district.

provincial councils
. Provincial councils were established in Munster and Connacht in the late 1560s in an attempt to establish crown authority and extend common law jurisdiction. Headed by a president, the provincial councils included bishops, leading magnates and some lawyers. The president had a small military force and could impose martial law. Although charged with the task of drawing the local magnates closer to the crown and away from Gaelic customs and exactions, local conditions were not amenable to such a programme. Instead the presidents managed to undermine some lords, alienated others and rebellions broke out in the south and west. The expense of restoring order proved too great for Elizabeth and the councils were allowed to lapse. From 1575 Lord Deputy Sidney embarked on a new conciliar programme by which the original goal of extending common law and crown authority to all parts would be achieved by
composition
.

provost
. Prison-keeper,
prepositus
, mayor, one in charge, director.

provost-marshall.
Officer in charge of the provost guard or military police.

psalter
. A book of psalms. The earliest surviving Irish manuscript is the
Cathach Psalter
which dates from c. 560 ad and was written at Iona. It comprises 58 leaves and contains psalms 31 to 106. It is held by the
Royal Irish Academy
.

Public Instruction, Commissioners of
(1835). Just four years after a national system of primary education was introduced in Ireland commissioners of public instruction were appointed to investigate ‘the state of religious and other instruction and the means of affording the same'. They produced two reports. The first comprises a statistical inquiry into educational provision and the second contains details of existing schools in each benefice, their funding, school attendance and form of instruction. The impact of the introduction of national school system in 1831 on local educational provision can be charted by comparing parish entries in the commissioners' reports with those contained in the second report of the Irish Education Inquiry (1824– 7).
See
Education Inquiry (1824–27). (Public Instruction.)

public records
.
See
National Archives.

puisne judge
. (Pronounced ‘puny') A lesser-ranking judge below the lord chancellor, lord chief justice, master of the rolls and the lord chief justice of common pleas.

pur autre vie
. An estate held for the life of another person.

purchase of current rents
. The strength of the market in landed property can be gauged by calculating the multiples of annual yearly rent required to effect purchase. During the strong market conditions of the 1830s land sold for an average of 25 years purchase of current rents, i.e., the annual rent multiplied by 25. The post-famine collapse in the market value of land is reflected in the fact that land sold for as little as ten to 15 years purchase of annual rents in the 1850s.

Purchase of Land (Ireland) Act
(1885). Sponsored by Lord Ashbourne, the Irish lord chancellor, this was the first major statutory provision for land purchase. Under this legislation (48 & 49 Vict., c. 73), the
Irish Land Commission
received £5 million for the purchase of land by agreement. When an agreement to sell was reached the commission advanced the entire purchase price to the tenant, the loan to be repaid over 49 years by an annuity of 4%. The act proved unpopular with landlords because a deposit of one-fifth of the purchase price was retained by the commission until the annuities repaid by the tenant were equivalent to that sum. Only then was the deposit disbursed to the vendor. This defect was not remedied until the
Wyndham Act
was enacted in 1903.

Purchase of Land (Ireland) Act
(1891). The Purchase of Land (Ireland) Act (1891) and the Land Law (Ireland) Act (1896) are known as the ‘Balfour Acts' because they were introduced successively by the Balfour brothers, Arthur and Gerald, when each held the office of
chief secretary
. The acts proposed the introduction of a new system for underwriting the purchase of holdings by tenants. Under the first act (54 & 55 Vict., c. 48) the landlord was paid from a guaranteed land stock equal in value to the purchase price but repayment of the annuities was to be ensured by varying the amount of interest charged and by providing for additional insurance payments. £33 million was voted to finance the scheme but it proved unpopular with both landlords and tenants, the former because the value of the stock fluctuated and the latter because they found it difficult to calculate precisely their annual commitments. The 1896 amending act (59 & 60 Vict., c. 47) ameliorated these difficulties by increasing the repayment period to 73 years and by reducing the amount of the annuity at the end of each decade of the first 30 years repayment. Despite this, only £13 million was advanced from the fund and applications declined in 1898. Over 46,000 tenants purchased their holdings under the acts, almost double the number who had purchased under the land acts of 1885, 1887 and 1888. A notable feature of the Purchase of Land Act of 1891 was the establishment of the
Congested Districts Board
with the remit to relieve poverty in the west and south of the country.
See
Purchase of Land (Ireland) Act, 1885 and Land Law (Ireland) Act, 1887. (Pomfret,
The struggle
, pp. 263–271.)

puritanism
. A Calvinistic Protestant reform movement which flourished in England in the late sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. Puritans were so called because they wished to purge the Church of England of residual Catholic ritual, vestments and iconography. They believed in predestination, that they were God's elect and they sought to extend their vision and morality to embrace the nation. Their attempts to re-shape the Established church (and measures taken by Archbishop Laud to impose conformity) contributed to the outbreak of civil war in England in 1642 and the Puritan Revolution. Presbyterians, a puritan sect, were initially welcomed in Ireland by the Calvinist-leaning Church of Ireland and Presbyterian ministers were given church livings. In the 1630s they came under severe pressure from Wentworth, the lord deputy, who was intent on securing uniformity under the Established church and again after the Restoration when their refusal to give public assent to the revised
Book of Common Prayer
led to their expulsion. Other puritan sects also established themselves in Ireland to form a heterogeneous group known as non-conformists.
See
Uniformity.

purlieu
. A deforested tract on the margin of a royal forest.

purlins
. Horizontal beams that run the length of a roof. They are supported by the main rafters (trusses) or transverse walls and they, in turn, support the ordinary rafters.

purparty
. 1: Land held in purparty is land held jointly with someone else 2: A share of an inheritance.

purpresture, pourpresture
. An illegal encroachment upon or enclosure of public or private property.

pursuivant
. A junior
herald
and royal messenger. In Ireland there were four pursuivants: Athlone and St Patrick numbers 1, 2 and 3.

purveyance
. The crown right to requisition goods at a price below the market rate whether the seller was in agreement or not. Originally the right to pre-empt food and procure transportation, it was extended to Ireland to provision the chief governor's retinue.

putlock hole
(puthole, putlog hole). A hole intentionally left in the face of a wall under construction to permit the insertion of a small timber (putlock) as a support for scaffolding and not subsequently filled when the structure was completed.