A contemporary narrative of the proceedings against Dame Alice Kyteler, prosecuted for sorcery in 1324, by Richard de Ledrede, bishop of Ossory / edited by Thomas Wright.
- Date:
- 1843
Licence: Public Domain Mark
Credit: A contemporary narrative of the proceedings against Dame Alice Kyteler, prosecuted for sorcery in 1324, by Richard de Ledrede, bishop of Ossory / edited by Thomas Wright. Source: Wellcome Collection.
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![poralities were again confiscated, or, to speak in a law phrase, seized into the King's hands,* because he had unjustly excommunicated [ William Bromley ], Treasurer of Ireland, [ who was hastning in the King's debts in the town of Kilkenny ; by which means the King's affairs were obstructed ], and had also given abusive language to the Chief Justice of the Common Pleas, sitting in court [by telling him, he was a false traytor, and had given false counsel to the lord justice. For which, and for many other seditious practices he had been indicted, and by false suggestions had ob- tained the King's pardon. But on the 20th of March, 1351,t the King revoked and made void his pardon: because he had been subtily circum- vented and deceived in granting it. Yet these proceedings did not humble this prelate. For] a little after one Thomas Fitz Gilbert (as appears in the publie records) plundered and set fire to the castle of Moycobir, and slew Hugh le Poer in it. Ledred was brought to trial as an accomplice in the fact ; and I do not find that he in any other manner purged himself than by pleading the King's pardon. The King afterwards [as before] declared this pardon void, as being obtained surreptitiously and by fraud. [Iam apt to think that this and the pardon before-mentioned, and the revocation of it, were one and the same. For that was a pardon for all homicides, thefts, robberies, conspiracies, &c. which he had no occasion for, if it were only to screen him from the contempts to the treasurer and justice. But the facts are so blended together, that it is hard to separate them. ] However, about the close of the year 1354 he was received into favour ; the storm blew over, and he passed the remainder of his life in great tranquility. Of his beautifying the cathedral, see before p. 399. He obtained the King's leave for demolishing three churches without the walls, and employed the stones in building an episcopal palace near the cathedral, [at his own expense, in which he erected T an altar, dedicated to the three saints, whose churches he had demolished ; and obliged the collegiate vicars to celebrate service there, whenever the bishop should require them ; whom he also endowed with an orchard]. He died in a very advanced age in the year 1360 [having sat about forty-two years in this see], and was buried in his own church, on the Gospel side of the high altar. P. 1. Diversis utentes sortilegiis.—lIn Holinshed's Chronicle of Ireland, p. 69, we have the following aecount of these arts of sorcery, containing particulars not mentioned in our text. 1323. In the eighteenth yere of King Edward II. his reigne, the Lord John Darcie came into Ireland, and to be lord justice, and the Kings lieute- nant there. * King's Collect. p. 107. T Collect, Ibid, Rot, 25 Ed, 2. 1 Collect, M.S. D. 42,](https://iiif.wellcomecollection.org/image/b33096831_0097.jp2/full/800%2C/0/default.jpg)
