Surrender and regrant

In the history of Ireland, "surrender and regrant" was the legal mechanism by which Ireland was converted from a power structure rooted in clan and kin loyalties to a semi-feudal system under the nominal control of the crown of England during the Tudor re-conquest of Ireland in the period 1540-1603. The intent was to involve the clans within the English polity and to guarantee their property under English law as distinct from Brehon law.

Policy

Surrender and Regrant was led by King Henry VIII (ruled 1509-47) in a bid to extend and secure his control over the island of Ireland. This policy was prompted by the Geraldine rebellion (1535-39) and his subsequent creation of the Kingdom of Ireland in 1541-42. Gaelic chiefs were actively encouraged to surrender their lands to the king and have them regranted (returned) if they swore loyalty to him. Those who surrendered were expected to speak English, wear English-style dress, remain loyal to the Crown, pay a rent and follow English laws and customs. In return they would be protected from attack and could enter the Irish parliament.

The inititive of "surrender and regrant" was launched in the 1540s under the new English Governor of Ireland, Anthony St. Leger. Essentially St. Leger's idea was to transform and assimilate Gaelic Ireland into something akin the political and constitutional system of England.

Clans who partook in the process included the O'Neills of Tir Eoghain who were created the earls of Tyrone and as such sat in the Irish House of Lords from 1542. In 1543 the O'Briens of Thomond were created lords Inchiquin. The Mac Aonghusa / Magennis clan in county Down became knights, and the O'Byrnes of Wicklow, the Kavanaghs of Wicklow (lords Balyan), the O'Donnells of Donegal and the FitzPatricks of Ossory (lords Castletown) were others who accepted the system. However other clans such as the O'Mores of Laois and the MacMahons of Monaghan did not. The O'Donnell chief was created an earl briefly in 1603-07.

Many of the regranted clan chiefs remained Roman Catholic, which, after the final split between England and Rome in 1570, meant that their new legal status was still rather tangential in the eyes of conformist officials.

Conflict with Gaelic law

The Gaelic "derbfine" elective kingship method in Gaelic law clashed with surrender and regrant, as male relations as distantly related as great-grandsons of a former chief or king were eligible to be elected to succeed as chief. This would inevitably lead to problems with the new system as under the new policy it was only possible for these individuals to become tenants of their chiefly cousin who had adopted surrender and regrant. Often the latter had an elected tánaiste, or deputy chief, who was pushed aside as the next chief by the son of the chief, under the system of primogeniture. This caused internal feuding, which was often exploited by English officials based in Dublin, seeking to limit a clan's power or to take some or all of its lands.

This also led to the ultimate failure of the poicy of Surrender and Regrant in Ireland. These tensions within clans, the new religious division between Catholics and Protestants, intrusion by royal officials and the lack of royal protection from continuing raids by other clans that had not accepted the new system, all made the policy frequently unworkable. Given the wars of 1595-1603, 1641-53 and 1689-91, few of the surviving clans emerged with their lands intact by 1700. By 2007 only the MacDonnell Earl of Antrim and the O'Brien Baron Inchiquin had retained much of their ancestral (pre-1500) lands.

Surrender and regrant, despite its initial success, ultimately failed in the long term because of religious differences; it had been a serious attempt to overcome the ethnic differences that existed before 1500.