Edmund de Clay, or del Clay (died after 1389) was an English-born lawyer and
judge
A judge is a person who presides over court proceedings, either alone or as a part of a panel of judges. A judge hears all the witnesses and any other evidence presented by the barristers or solicitors of the case, assesses the credibility an ...
who served as
Lord Chief Justice of Ireland
The Court of King's Bench (or Court of Queen's Bench during the reign of a Queen) was one of the senior courts of common law in Ireland. It was a mirror of the Court of King's Bench in England. The Lord Chief Justice was the most senior judge ...
and
Chief Justice of the Irish Common Pleas
The chief justice of the Common Pleas for Ireland was the presiding judge of the Court of Common Pleas in Ireland, which was known in its early years as the Court of Common Bench, or simply as "the Bench", or "the Dublin bench". It was one of the ...
.
[Ball, F. Elrington ''The Judges in Ireland 1221-1921'' John Murray London 1926 Vol. 1 p. 166]
He was born in
Nottinghamshire
Nottinghamshire (; abbreviated Notts.) is a landlocked county in the East Midlands region of England, bordering South Yorkshire to the north-west, Lincolnshire to the east, Leicestershire to the south, and Derbyshire to the west. The trad ...
, and later became a landowner there.
[ By 1383, he had the reputation for being a man "learned in the law", and in that year he became ]Serjeant-at-law
A Serjeant-at-Law (SL), commonly known simply as a Serjeant, was a member of an order of barristers at the English and Irish Bar. The position of Serjeant-at-Law (''servientes ad legem''), or Sergeant-Counter, was centuries old; there are wri ...
.[Foss, Edward ''The Judges of England'' Longman Green Brown and Longmans London 1851 Vol.4 pp.16-21] He is known to have been most reluctant to take up this office, probably because it would involve him in heavy expenses, and he did so only after King Richard II
Richard II (6 January 1367 – ), also known as Richard of Bordeaux, was King of England from 1377 until he was deposed in 1399. He was the son of Edward the Black Prince, Prince of Wales, and Joan, Countess of Kent. Richard's father ...
issued a warrant commanding de Clay, along with two other leading advocates, John Hill and Sir John Cary, to be admitted to that rank by a specified day.[
In 1385 he was sent to Ireland with a large retinue to take up office as Lord Chief Justice of the Common Pleas, to which he was appointed in February.][Smyth, Constantine Joseph ''Chronicle of the Law Officers of Ireland'' London Butterworths 1839 p.114] He and John Giffard, later to be his successor as Chief Justice, were appointed Justices in eyre (itinerant justices) for Carlow
Carlow ( ; ) is the county town of County Carlow, in the south-east of Ireland, from Dublin. At the 2016 census, it had a combined urban and rural population of 24,272.
The River Barrow flows through the town and forms the historic boundar ...
, Kildare
Kildare () is a town in County Kildare, Ireland. , its population was 8,634 making it the 7th largest town in County Kildare. The town lies on the R445, some west of Dublin – near enough for it to have become, despite being a regional ce ...
and Wexford
Wexford () is the county town of County Wexford, Ireland. Wexford lies on the south side of Wexford Harbour, the estuary of the River Slaney near the southeastern corner of the island of Ireland. The town is linked to Dublin by the M11/N11 ...
in the same year.[ They were also appointed to a Commission of Oyer and Terminer.][ (The Patent Roll says Richard Gyffard, but John is clearly meant).][''Patent Roll 9 Richard IIV 16 October 1385'']
De Clay was a member of the Privy Council of Ireland
His or Her Majesty's Privy Council in Ireland, commonly called the Privy Council of Ireland, Irish Privy Council, or in earlier centuries the Irish Council, was the institution within the Dublin Castle administration which exercised formal execu ...
, and was summoned to the Council meeting in September 1386 when Sir John Stanley, the new Lord Lieutenant of Ireland
Lord Lieutenant of Ireland (), or more formally Lieutenant General and General Governor of Ireland, was the title of the chief governor of Ireland from the Williamite Wars of 1690 until the Partition of Ireland in 1922. This spanned the King ...
, read out his letters patent
Letters patent ( la, litterae patentes) ( always in the plural) are a type of legal instrument in the form of a published written order issued by a monarch, president or other head of state, generally granting an office, right, monopoly, tit ...
of appointment.[''Patent Roll 10 Richard 11'' 18 September 1386] He had been transferred to the more senior office of Lord Chief Justice of Ireland earlier that year.
References
{{DEFAULTSORT:Clay, Edmund de
People from Nottinghamshire
Lords chief justice of Ireland
Chief Justices of the Irish Common Pleas
Members of the Privy Council of Ireland