CHRIST CHURCH CATHEDRALfinancial benefits in the form of compensation awarded
to foster relatives when unlawful injury was inflicted
on their fosterling or fellow-fosterling at any time of
life, was a further factor in sustaining relationships.
Much evidence attesting to this institution is found in
the literary sources, particularly within the saga liter-
ature and bardic poetry. In general, there is consensus
across the sources that a fosterage relationship should
bring prosperity to both households involved in the
process. Although the practice of fosterage was con-
demned by canon law in the Middle Ages, and
although legislation prohibiting its practice was issued
on several occasions in the late medieval period by the
secular authorities, the range of short- and long-term
benefits of fosterage played a large part in sustaining
the power of the institution into the early modern
period. It is a well-attested practice into the early mod-
ern period and affords an insight into childhood and
upbringing in general.
BRÓNAGH NÍ CHONAILL
References and Further Reading
Charles-Edwards, T. M. Early Irish and Welsh Kinship.Oxford:
Oxford University Press, 1993, pp 78–82.
Edwards, Nancy. The Archaeology of Early Medieval Ireland.
London: Batsford, 1991.
Kelly, Fergus. A Guide to Early Irish Law.Dublin: Dublin
Institute for Advanced Studies, 1988, pp 86–90.
See alsoEducation; Fosterage; Games; Society,
Functioning of Anglo-Norman; Society,
Functioning of Gaelic
CHRIST CHURCH CATHEDRAL
Dublin’s cathedral was dedicated to the Holy Trinity,
but the name “Cristchirche” emerged in 1444. The
cathedral was probably founded around 1028, the year
the Hiberno-Norse king, Sitriuc “Silkenbeard,” made a
pilgrimage to Rome. Due to canon law irregularities in
the organization of the Irish Church, Dublin was to
become a suffragan diocese of Canterbury from at least
1074, following the consecration of its second bishop,
Gilla Pátraic. With Muirchertach Ua Briain as secular
ruler of Dublin, together they laid the foundations of
what would become the twelfth-century church reform.
Gilla Pátraic introduced the first of the religious
orders to Holy Trinity: Benedictine monks, who
remained until their expulsion around 1100 by Bishop
Samuel. It was during his episcopate that the Dublin
diocese was subsumed into Glendalough under the
1111 synod of Ráith Bressail, and not until the synod
of Kells in 1152, under Bishop Gréne, did Dublin
diocese and Holy Trinity cathedral achieve archiepis-
copal and metropolitan status, respectively. Lorcán Ua
Tuathail, brother-in-law of Diarmait Mac Murchada,
succeeded in 1162 and established a priory of Augus-
tinian canons regular at the cathedral.
Following the Anglo-Norman invasion of Dublin in
1170, property granted to the cathedral priory by
former Irish and Hiberno-Norse kings was confirmed
by Henry II and his son John. This was an estimated
10,500 acres arranged under the manorial system,
including Grangegorman, Clonkeen, Glasnevin, and
Balscadden. Both Lorcán (d. 1180) and Richard de
Clare “Strongbow” (d. 1176) predeceased the
Romanesque rebuilding of the cathedral traditionally
attributed to them. Building work by English West
Country masons began in the mid-1180s under the first
Anglo-Norman archbishop, John Cumin. In 1216, under
his successor Henry of London, Holy Trinity became the
diocesan cathedral for Glendalough following its unifi-
cation with Dublin. By 1220, St. Patrick’s cathedral had
been founded by Henry, and the remainder of the century
saw an architectural and constitutional jostling for
supremacy between Holy Trinity’s regular and St.
Patrick’s secular chapter. A Gothic nave (1230s), par-
tially extant, and an extension to the chancel (1280s)
were built at Holy Trinity. However, the constitutional
wrangling ceased only when, in 1300, both signed a
composicio pacisacknowledging both as diocesan cathe-
drals, but Holy Trinity as the elder. Surviving fire in 1283
and the fall of the steeple in 1316, Holy Trinity was an
accustomed venue for the Irish parliament, which often
met, as in 1450, in the common hall. The belfry was
rebuilt by 1330, and by 1337 to 1342, the surviving
account roll gives a glimpse of the priory’s administra-
tion, the records of which are unusually plentiful for an
Irish medieval institution. Despite recurrent outbreaks of
plague from 1348, the next decades saw a choir extension
built by Archbishop John de St. Paul and the acquisition
of an English illuminated psalter by Prior Stephen de
Derby. In 1366, the Kilkenny statutes disqualified the
native Irish from membership of the chapter.
Richard II knighted four Irish kings in the cathedral
in 1395, while the coronation of the Yorkist pretender
Lambert Simnel as King Edward VI took place at
Christ Church in 1497.
St. Augustine’s rule defined the priory’s religious
life, enhanced by liturgical manuscripts such as the
martyrology, psalter, and a book of obits. These were
used in chantry chapels such as St. Lo (1332) and
St.Laurence O’Toole (1485) and were enhanced by a
choir of four choristers in 1480, whose education by
a music master was confirmed by Prior David
Wynchester in 1493. The most elaborate chapel was a
perpendicular gothic chantry dedicated to St. Mary,
built in 1512 by Gerald Fitzgerald, eighth earl of Kildare,
who was buried there the next year.
Holy Trinity also led the moral and religious
instruction of Dubliners. In 1477, the archbishop of