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The "riding of the bounds" of Dublin in 1603

Dublin city officials rode in procession around the bounds of the city in 1603.
They rode to Merrion chapel.
They then came to the grounds of Merrion Castle, the seat of the young Thomas Fitzwilliam (later knighted in 1608, and later created 1st Viscount Fitzwilliam).
The officials discovered that the path through the grounds of Merrion Castle, formerly passable, was now blocked. They rode around it.
They ended up at a banquet at Sir Henry Harrington's house in Grangegorman.

At Merrion Castle, the officials arrived at "the south-west corner of the orchard ditch of Merrion, through which corner the elder [fathers] of the city said that of old time they did ride. And now for that the same was so strongly fenced with trees and thorns, which, in favour of the gentleman of the house of Merrion [Thomas Fitzwilliam], being the city tenant, they would loathly break down, they rode a little besides it".
Extract from "Riding of Dublin Franchises, 1603", pp.190-198 of Vol.1 of [Gilbert's Records of Dublin].
See p.190 and p.191 and p.192.

Extract from [Ball and Hamilton, 1895].

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References

• "Riding the Franchises", Lennox Barrow, Dublin Historical Record, Vol. 33, No. 4 (Sept 1980), pp. 135-138.

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Sources yet to be consulted

• The ancient "White Book of Dublin".
  • This is the original account, transcribed in Gilbert.
  • This survives as [DCA] C1/2/2.