the remainder was entirely in the hands of the Irish.
Of course during this long period a certain amount of assimilation of the two races had taken place. Inter-marriages had become fairly frequent. A very large number of the settlers had adopted Irish laws and manners, and ruled their lands after the fashion of the Celtic chiefs. Nearly all of them had learned the Irish tongue, having in many cases completely abandoned the French or English of their forefathers.
Here and there, too, we find Irish landholders in the districts occupied by the settlers. There were such under the Butlers in south and mid Tipperary, under the Desmonds in Limerick, under the Barrys in Cork.[1] But the number of these was few, and it is noteworthy that the "degenerate" Anglo-Norman Burkes of Mayo and Galway had left scarcely any native landowners in the districts subject to them.[2]
And as regards the mass of the Irish, those of them in the districts subject to English rule had obtained some at least of the rights of citizens. At any rate they could no longer be murdered with comparative impunity.[3]
But viewing the island as a whole, we may distinguish between districts in which all the landowners were of Anglo-Norman descent, and others
- ↑ This appears from the Books of Survey and Distribution, and other Cromwellian Records. In Tipperary O'Neills and O'Fogartys; in Limerick, MacInnarighs or MacEnerys and O'Hurleys may be cited.
- ↑ See Knox: History of Mayo.
- ↑ Bonn, Vol. I., pp. 138—9. At first the murder of an Irishman entailed as only penalty the payment of damages to the English lord of such an Irishman, if he had one.
