Adam Loftus (Archbishop)
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Adam Loftus.

Adam Loftus (c. 1533- April 5, 1605) was Archbishop of Armagh, and later Dublin, and Lord Chancellor of Ireland from 1581. He was also the first provost of Trinity College, Dublin.

Early life

Loftus was born in 1533, the second son of a monastic bailiff, Edward Loftus, in the heart of the English Yorkshire Dales. Edward died when Loftus was only 8, leaving his estates to his elder brother Robert Loftus.

Edward had made his living through the Catholic Church, but Adam embraced the Protestant faith early in his development. As an undergraduate at Trinity College, Cambridge, Adam reportedly attracted the notice of the young Queen Elizabeth, as much by his physique as through the power of his intellect, having shone before her in oratory. There is good reason to believe that this particular encounter may never have taken place; but they certainly met more than once and the Queen became his patron. The relationship was to last her entire reign, coming to Adam's rescue at times in his career when less tolerant patrons might have held back.

Move to Ireland

Loftus accompanied Thomas Radclyffe, 3rd Earl of Sussex to Ireland as his chaplain in 1560. In 1563, he was consecrated archbishop of Armagh at the unprecedented age of 28 by Hugh Curwen, Archbishop of Dublin. In 1565 the queen, to supplement the meagre income derivable from the archbishopric in a politically unstable country, appointed Loftus temporarily to the deanery of St Patrick's; and in the same year he became president of the new commission for ecclesiastical causes.

To Dublin

Following a catastrophic clash with Shane O’Neill, the real power in the province during these years, he came to Dublin in 1564 and in 1565, while still holding the office of Archbishop of Armagh, was offered the Deanery of St. Patrick’s Cathedral “in lieu of better times ahead”.

In 1567 Loftus was made Archbishop of Dublin, where the queen expected him to carry out reforms in the Church. On several occasions he temporarily carried out the functions of Lord Keeper, and in August 1581 he was appointed Lord Chancellor of Ireland. Loftus was constantly occupied in attempts to improve his financial position by obtaining additional preferment (he had been obliged to resign the Deanery of St Patrick's in 1567). In other words, he was extraordinarily corrupt, even by the standards of the English in sixteenth-century Ireland.

In 1582, he acquired land and built a castle at Rathfarnham, which he inhabited from 1585 (and which has been recently restored to public view).

Loftus took a leading part in the execution of Dermot O'Hurley, Archbishop of Cashel. When O'Hurley refused to give information, Francis Walsingham suggested he should be tortured. Loftus replied to Walsingham: "Not finding that easy method of examination do any good, we made command to Mr Waterhouse and Mr Secretary Fenton to put him to the torture, such as your honour advised us, which was to toast his feet against the fire with hot boots." Although the Irish judges repeatedly decided that there was no case against O'Hurley, on 19 June 1584 Loftus and Sir Henry Wallop wrote to Walsingham "We gave warrant to the knight-marshal to do execution upon him, which accordingly was performed, and thereby the realm rid of a most pestilent member."^{1 2}

Much has been written about Loftus during this time but between 1584 and 1591, he had a series of clashes with Sir John Perrot on the location of an Irish University. Perrot wanted to use St Patrick’s Cathedral as the site of the new University, which Loftus sought to preserve as the principal place of Protestant worship in Dublin (as well as a valuable source of income for himself). The Archbishop won the argument with the help of his patron, Queen Elizabeth I, and Trinity College was born at its current location, named after his old college at Cambridge (with Adam its first Provost in 1593) leaving the Cathedral unassailed.

Death

Loftus died in Dublin in 1605 and was interred in the building he had helped to preserve for future generations, while many of his portraits hang today within the walls of the University which he helped found. Having buried his wife Jane (Purdon) and two sons (of their 20 children) in the family vault at St. Patrick’s, Adam Loftus died at his Episcopal Palace in Kevin Street “worn out with age” and joined his family in the same vault. Loftus' zeal and efficiency were commended by James I upon the king's accession.

References

• Ball FE, 1902: A History of the County of Dublin - Dublin: Greene's Bookshop; the HSP Library - Ir 94133 1: 6 volumes
• Ball FE, 1926: The Judges of Ireland 1221-1921 - London: John Murray pp. 214-217; 326-328
• Lee, S 1893: Dictionary of National Biography - ed. Sidney Lee vol XXXIV, London Smith Elder & co, Waterloo Place, 1893 pp 73-77
• Luce JV, 1992: Trinity College Dublin, the first 400 years –
• Prestwick J, 1783: Origin and Etymology of the Loftus Family – attributed to a Herald’s manuscript
• Ware J, 1739: The Whole Works of - Sir James Ware concerning Ireland, revised & improved - Vol I p. 94-95, 1739
• This article incorporates text from the Encyclopædia Britannica Eleventh Edition, a publication now in the public domain.