Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Henry of Marlborough
HENRY of Marlborough or Marleburgh (fl. 1420), annalist, was, from his name, conjectured by Sir James Ware to have been a native of Marlborough in Wiltshire. Henry officiated as a chaplain in Dublin and its vicinity in the reign of Richard II. In the early part of the fifteenth century he was connected with the priory of the Holy Trinity, now Christ Church, Dublin. Under it he held the vicarages of Balscaddan and Donabate in the county of Dublin. Two Latin deeds, concerning house property in Dublin, were executed by Henry of Marleburgh at Dublin, 6 June 1418. The original documents in vellum are in the possession of the writer of the present notice. To them are attached the seal of Henry of Marleburgh, with his initials, and the official seal of the Dublin mayoralty. Marleburgh compiled annals of England and Ireland in Latin (in seven books, extending from 1133 to 1421), under the title of ‘Cronica excerpta de medulla diversorum cronicorum, præcipue Ranulphi, monachi Cestrensis, scripta per Henricum de Marleburghe, vicarium de Balischadan, unacum quibusdam capitulis, de cronicis Hiberniæ: Incepta anno Domini 1406, regis Henrici quarti post conquestum septimo.’ The first part is mainly a transcript from previous English writers and Anglo-Irish annalists; the latter and more original portions of the annals, as printed, chiefly deal with affairs of the English settlers in Ireland. Excerpts in Latin from Marleburgh's compilation beginning in 1372 were published by Camden as ‘Descripta e chronicis manuscriptis Henrici de Marleburgh’ (1607). Archbishop Ussher referred to Henry's annals. Sir James Ware, in 1633, published ‘Henry Marleburgh's Chronicle of Ireland,’ fol., and it was reprinted at Dublin in 1809, 8vo. Marleburgh's death is recorded in the old obituary of the congregation of the priory of the Holy Trinity, Dublin, under date of 12 May, but without mention of the year. Manuscript copies of Marleburgh's annals are extant in the Bodleian (excerpts by Ware in MS. Rawlinson, B. 487), British Museum (MS. Cott. Vitellius, E. v. 197), and in the library of Trinity College, Dublin (No. 424 in Bernard's ‘Catalogus MSS. Angl. et Hib.’).
[Patent Rolls, Chancery, Ireland, Richard II, Henry IV, and Henry V; De Scriptoribus Hiberniæ, 1639; Historical Library, by Nicholson, 1724; Writers of Ireland, 1746; Martyrology of Christ Church, Dublin, 1844; Ussher's Works, 1848.]