William Darcy (died 1540)

Sir William Darcy (c.1460–1540) was a leading Anglo-Irish statesman of the Pale in the early sixteenth century; for many years he held the office of Vice-Treasurer of Ireland. He wrote an influential treatise called The Decay of Ireland, for which work he has been called "the father of the movement for political reformation in Ireland".

He was born at Platten in County Meath, son of John Darcy IV of Platten and his wife Elizabeth Plunkett, daughter of Christopher Plunkett, 2nd Baron Killeen. The Darcys of Platten were a junior branch of the family of Baron Darcy de Knayth, and had become one of the leading families of the Pale through intermarriage with other leading families such as the Plunketts and St Lawrences. Through his mother he was a great-grandson of Sir William Welles, Lord Chancellor of Ireland.

He was in Dublin, studying law, in 1482-3, along with his cousin Thomas Kent, the future Chief Baron of the Irish Exchequer. The King's Inns was not founded until a year after Darcy's death, but some form of professional instruction for young lawyers did exist. Darcy lodged at the house of the King's Serjeant, John Estrete, with whom he studied those English legal texts which were considered to be essential for the education of those students (by no means all of them) who intended to practice law. During the holidays he visited the home of the Lord Chief Justice of Ireland, Philip Bermingham, to study dancing and the harp: these were not simply recreations but were considered to be an essential part of a young lawyer's education.

Darcy then proceeded to Lincoln's Inn, where he was enrolled in 1485; he was fined for unspecified misconduct in Trinity Term and returned to Ireland soon after.

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