Brotherhood of Saint George

The Brotherhood of Saint George was a short-lived military guild founded in Dublin in 1474 for the defence of the crucial English-held territory of the Pale. For a time it was the only standing army maintained by English Crown in Ireland. It was suppressed in 1494. It was not an order of knighthood, although some of its individual members were knights.

Following the Norman Invasion of Ireland, which began in 1169, the English Crown gradually extended its control over about four-fifths of Ireland; but from the early fourteenth century onwards, the Crown's influence steadily diminished and its territories shrank. By the middle of the fifteenth century the only region of Ireland under secure English control was a part of Counties Dublin, Kildare, Meath and Louth. These lands were partially guarded by a fortified ditch or "Pale" (from the Latin palus), which gave its name to the territory itself. The citizens of the Pale were constantly troubled by raids by the Irish clans from adjoining territories, and defence of the Pale was a permanent preoccupation of the Dublin Government.

In 1474 the Irish Parliament, apparently at the instigation of Thomas, 7th Earl of Kildare, then Lord Deputy of Ireland, chose thirteen men "of the most noble and worthy in the four shires" as the members, or companions of the Brotherhood. They were ordered to assemble in Dublin every year on St George's Day to express their loyalty to the Crown.

The members of the Brotherhood were charged with the defence of the Pale, and were assigned 120 archers, 40 other cavalry and 40 pages for that purpose. They had the right to levy customs duties on all merchandise sold in Ireland outside Dublin and Drogheda: this seems to have been an early form of the cess, the tax for the defence of the Pale, which caused much ill feeling and political controversy in the next century. They also had the right to arrest malefactors, rebels and outlaws. The captain was to be chosen annually: the 7th Earl of Kildare was first captain. It has been said that the Brotherhood, with its 200 men, constituted for a time the "entire English standing army in Ireland".

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Wikipedia