#FiantFriday
Selections from the Fiants of Tudor Monarchs

In 1557, in recognition of his obediance, Mary I demanded William owre O'Kearowell to pay £12 a year, alongside 80 ''Scottici'' and 120 fat beasts. (Image: Bibliothèque publique et universitaire de Neuchâtel / Flickr)

Sir Edm. Dowyne is granted 'custody, mastership and oversight of the spittle houses or magdaleines of Leghlin and Balligawran (in Co. Carlow), for relief of the poor leprous people dwelling in those places'. (Image: National Library of the Netherlands)

Wycliffites?! Hussites?! Waldensians?! This fiant is a 1557 pardon pertaining to heresies and abettings of hereties and lollards! (Image: John Wycliffe (c. 1330-1384), oil on canvas painting by Thomas Kirkby, c. 1828, University of Oxford)

This fiant from 1557 sees Laurence Hamond, constable of the castle of Trim, pardoned for 'the escape of certain prisoners'. (Image: William Murphy, CC BY-SA 2.0)

This fiant features the landmark establishment of the 'The Guild of the Blessed Mary Magdalene', which saw the merging in 1577 of the formerly distinct societies of Barbers and Surgeons 'for the preservation of health'. (Image: National Library of the Netherlands)

This fiant from 1581 'recites that a controversy was heard at Rosspont, between the bishop of Waterford and many of the citizens, relative to plundering the cathedral of Christ Church in Waterford, and that it appeared that the bishop was most unjustly accused by them' (Image: BL Royal Manuscript Collection)

This fiant recites 'that the Flemish patentees are skilled in the planting and dressing of woad and madder, and of rape and linseed for making oil, that they have learned that some parts of the soil of Ireland are very apt for the purpose' (Image: © Copyright Sarah Smith and licensed for reuse under this Creative Commons Licence)

Martial Law governed the land in 1587 Waterford: 'Forasmuch as foreign invasion may be doubted from beyond seas, and if any such happen their landing-place likely to be at the haven of Waterford ; the commissioners are to view and muster the able men in the city of Waterford'. (Image: LBC Charts/53: Admiralty Chart 2046: Waterford Harbour, from Dunmore Bay to Passage (1881). From private collections of admiralty and earlier charts of Ireland, digitised by Leslie Brown, 2008-16)

In this fiant, Donald O’Hydryscoll is formally pardoned 'for procuring and publishing bulls from the court of Rome'. (Image: Flickr / Leo Reynolds (CC BY-NC-SA 2.0))