Disputes in the Irish college, Douai (1594–1614)

Abstract

By the late sixteenth century, Irish demand for seminary places was sufficient to warrant the establishment of a dedicated Irish college in Lisbon (1590). This was followed by foundations in Salamanca (1592), Douai (1594) and elsewhere. The great majority were administered by the Society of Jesus, whose Irish members were generally Old English, a term denoting descendants of the twelfth-century Anglo-Norman settlers. Old English Jesuit domination of Irish colleges occasioned accusations of discrimination against students of Gaelic family backgrounds, with the students seeking redress from the secular authorities. The Irish college in Douai was not formally administered by the Jesuits, but its founder, Christopher Cusack, collaborated closely with the Society. Accusations against him of anti-Gaelic bias emerged in the 1600s, coincidental with the arrival of large numbers of Gaelic Irish refugees in Flanders at the end of the Nine Years War (1594–1603). Ethnic tensions and financial difficulties all but put paid to the college in the 1620s.