The ''Book of the de Burgos'' or ''Book of the Burkes'' ( ga, Leabhar na Búrca; la, Liber Burgensis) is a late 16th-century

Gaelic Gaelic is an adjective that means "pertaining to the Gaels". As a noun it refers to the group of languages spoken by the Gaels, or to any one of the languages individually. Gaelic languages are spoken in Ireland, Scotland, the Isle of Man, and Ca ...

illuminated Illuminated may refer to: * "Illuminated" (song), by Hurts * Illuminated Film Company, a British animation house * ''Illuminated'', alternative title of Black Sheep (Nat & Alex Wolff album) * Illuminated manuscript See also * Illuminate (disambi ...

manuscript A manuscript (abbreviated MS for singular and MSS for plural) was, traditionally, any document written by hand – or, once practical typewriters became available, typewritten – as opposed to mechanically printing, printed or repr ...

held by the Library of

Trinity College Dublin , name_Latin = Collegium Sanctae et Individuae Trinitatis Reginae Elizabethae juxta Dublin , motto = ''Perpetuis futuris temporibus duraturam'' (Latin) , motto_lang = la , motto_English = It will last i ...

as MS 1440, ''Historia et Genealogia Familiae de Burgo''. The book consists of seventy-five folios, twenty-two of which remain blank. It was made for Sir

Seaán mac Oliver Bourke Seaán mac Oliver (John) Bourke, 17th Mac William Íochtar (Lower Mac William or Mac William Oughter) ( ; died 1580) was an Irish people, Irish nobility, noble who was created Baron Ardenerie (1580). Career Bourke was the son of Oliver Bourke ...

, 17th

Mac William Íochtar Mac William Íochtar (Lower Mac William), also known as the Mayo Burkes, were a fully Gaelicised branch of the Hiberno-Norman House of Burgh in Ireland. Mayo covered much of the northern part of the province of Connacht and the Mac William Í ...

(d. 1580)"MacWilliam" being the title of the chieftain of the Irish sept rather than a surname of Mayo from 1571 to 1580. Believed to have been the product of his patronage, its production appears to have ceased upon his death, except for a few additions in 1584. "It is, as far as we know, the last of the great family books written in Irish, but its text has remained rather bleak, the poems that were probably intended to fill the blank pages never having been copied"."Manuscripts and Illuminations 1169-1603" in: ''A New History of Ireland'', Vol. 2, pp. 809-815. The text is of two symmetrical documents in Irish and Latin respectively, containing many fanciful genealogical links between the

House of Burgh The House of Burgh or Burke (; ; ; ga, de Búrca; la, de Burgo) was an ancient Anglo-Norman and later Hiberno-Norman aristocratic dynasty (with the Anglo-Irish branches later adopting the surname Burke and its variants) who held the earldom ...

( la, de Burgo; ga, de Búrca) and

Charlemagne Charlemagne ( , ) or Charles the Great ( la, Carolus Magnus; german: Karl der Große; 2 April 747 – 28 January 814), a member of the Carolingian dynasty, was King of the Franks from 768, King of the Lombards from 774, and the first Holy ...

, the

Kings of Jerusalem The King of Jerusalem was the supreme ruler of the Kingdom of Jerusalem, a Crusader state founded in Jerusalem by the Latin Catholic leaders of the First Crusade, when the city was conquered in 1099. Godfrey of Bouillon, the first ruler of th ...

France France (), officially the French Republic ( ), is a country primarily located in Western Europe. It also comprises of Overseas France, overseas regions and territories in the Americas and the Atlantic Ocean, Atlantic, Pacific Ocean, Pac ...

and

England England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Wales to its west and Scotland to its north. The Irish Sea lies northwest and the Celtic Sea to the southwest. It is separated from continental Europe b ...

. What distinguishes the ''Book of the de Burgos'' from other late medieval Irish manuscripts is its visual style, with large pictures which are "extremely crude and brutal in colour, but arresting by their originality and their vehemence. Movements are awkward but convincing... skies are red or yellow, dogs are green, there is a constant disproportion of the figures, but a sort of brutal integrity emanates from these images... gaudy and violently realistic." There are four scenes of the Passion, nine family portraits and a page on their

coat of arms A coat of arms is a heraldry, heraldic communication design, visual design on an escutcheon (heraldry), escutcheon (i.e., shield), surcoat, or tabard (the latter two being outer garments). The coat of arms on an escutcheon forms the central ele ...

. Two poems inserted at the end of the book are praise-poems written by Tadhg Dall Ó hUiginn and Ruaidhrí mac Domhnall Ó hUiginn, for Sir Seaán Bourke. The book ends with two legal deeds in Latin, dated 1584, between Walter Ciotach Burke (son of Seaán) and the Barretts, who laid claim to possession of Belleek Castle. There are later comments in English in a later hand from the original scribe - "Olyverus Bourke mac Sheamus died the last daye of December Annno Dom. 1619 in his house at Inisquoe."

Sources

*IE TCD MS 1440, Book of the de Burgos: Burke Seáan Mac Oliverus, d.1580, MacWilliam Burke family. Manuscripts & Archives Research Library, Trinity College Dublin
IE TCD MS 1440, Book of the de Burgos

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Book Of The Burkes, The 16th-century illuminated manuscripts 16th-century documents Irish manuscripts Irish-language literature House of Burgh 16th century in Ireland 1570s books 1580s books