Master of the Rolls in Ireland

The Master of the Rolls in Ireland was an official in the Irish Chancery under English and British rule, equivalent to the Master of the Rolls in the English Chancery. Originally called the Keeper of the Rolls, he was responsible for the safekeeping of the Chancery records such as close rolls and patent rolls. The office was granted by letters patent from 1333, the first holder of the Mastership being Edmund de Grimsby. As the bureaucracy expanded, the duties of the Master of the Rolls were performed by subordinates and the position became a sinecure awarded to a political ally of the Dublin Castle administration. In the nineteenth century it became a substantive judicial appointment, ranking second within the Chancery behind the Lord Chancellor of Ireland. The post was implicitly abolished by the Courts of Justice Act 1924, passed by the Irish Free State established in 1922.

Until the sixteenth century the Master of the Rolls was always a clergyman. The office was closely associated with St. Patrick's Cathedral, Dublin: several Masters of the Rolls served as Dean or Prebendary of the Cathedral. The office was originally an administrative rather than a judicial office, and not all of the early Masters were qualified lawyers: as late as the mid sixteenth century the office was held by John Parker, a layman who had made a fortune from selling hats; nor was his successor, Henry Draycott, as far as is known, a lawyer. At that time, as the older title Keeper of the Rolls suggests, the Master's principal role was to have custody of the Chancery records.

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