Life
fl.1578; English engraver with Sir Henry Sidney on campaigns against Earl
of Tyrone (Hugh O’Neill) 1570s; author of the verse topography, Image
of Ireland, a poem with a discoverie of woodkarne (1581), of which
only one intact copy exists. ODNB OCIL
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Works
The Image of Ireland with a Discoverie of the Wood-karne (London 1578);
rep. with notes by Sir Walter Scott (Edinburgh 1883) [ltd. edn., 286 copies;
prev. published by Scott himself in his edn. of Lord Sumer’s Tracts
(London 1809)]; D. B. Quinn, intro. and transliteration, with foreword
by John Gamble and preface by Liam Miller, The Image of Ireland, with
a Discoverie of Woodkarne [facs. of Edinburgh edn. of 1883] (Belfast:
Blackstaff 1985), [ltd. edn.] 316pp.
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Criticism
Vincent P. Carey, ‘John Dericke’s Image of Ireland, Sir Henry Sidney, and the Massacre at Mullaghmast, 1578’, in Irish Historical Studies, Vol XXXI, No. 123 (May 1999), q.pp.; see also Russell K. Alspach, Irish Poetry from the English Invasion to 1798 (Philadelphia: Pennsylvania UP [1943] 1959), p.34.
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Commentary
Joep Leerssen, Mere Irish and Fíor-Ghael (Amsterdam: Rodopi 1986): ‘John Derricke, a long and vengeful
rhyming tract on raids of Irish soldiers (kernes) on the Pale’, in Image of Ireland, with a discoverie of wood karne (London 1578).
R. F. Foster, Modern Ireland (1988), p.32: perhaps employed making Great Privy Seal of Ireland, 1557; His Image (1578) [note var.] divided into allegorical and historical sections, ded. to Sir Philip Sidney whose father, Sir Henry, is the hero; unflattering but veracious pictures of the native Irish, called ‘woodkerne’ not intended as reflection on Irish nobility and gentry loyal to the Queen (pref. epistle).
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Quotations
The Discovery of the Irish Nymphs, their pleasures, pastimes, and accustomable usages, wherein daily they are occupied, are figuratively expressed. The nymphs of sundry matrons, I: Have heard do there resort, /
As time and fit occasion serve /
To use for their disport. /
Some for to shade them from the heat, /
And some an other thing: /
According as the rain doth fall, /
So do the flowers spring. /
One doth rejoice to spend the day /
In playing barley-break; /
Another doth (I mean no harm) /
As great a comfort take. /
This nymph doth joy to scud along /
The wood and riverside; /
But she in snorting in a bush /
Receiv’th as great a pride. /
These do invite the murmuring brooks, /
These dive and rise again,
And bathing in their sweet delights /
So long they do remain, /
Till Cupid toll’th his sacring-bell /
To enter other rites. /
Ah, would revive a man half dead /
To see those naked sprites! [...] We know by good experience, /
It is a dangerous thing /
For one into his naked bed /
A poisoning toad to bring; /
Or else a deadly crocodile /
Whenas he goeth to rest, /
To lead with him, and as his mate /
To place next to his breast. /
The mischief thereof certainly /
Is this that doth ensue /
Even nothing but sudden death
To careless persons due. /
Then since the harm is manifest, /
Consent with willing mind, /
To rid your hands from such a sort /
For cat will after kind, /
And be not witched evermore /
With their eternal sight— /
For why should men of the English Pale /
In such a crew delight?’
Description of an Irish Feast: ‘Now when their guts be full, / Then comes the pastime in. / The Bard and Harper melody Unto them doth begin. / This Bard he doth report / The noble conquests done, / And eke in rhymes shows forth at large / Their glory thereby won. / Thus he at random runneth, / He pricks the rebels on, / And shows by such external deeds, / Their honour lies upon; / And more to stir them up, / To prosecute their ill, / What great renown their fathers got, / They show by rhyming skill. / And they most gladsome are / To hear of parent’s name, / As how by spoiling honest men / They won such endless fame. / Wherefore like graceless grafts, / Sprung from a wicked tree, / They grow through daily exercise / To all iniquity. / And more t’augment the flame / And rancour of their heart, / The Friar of his counsel vile / To rebels doth impart. / Affirming that it is / An almost deed to God / To make the English subjects taste / The Irish rebels’ rod. / To spoil, to kill, to burn, / The Friar’s counsel is, / And for the doing of the same, / He warrants heavenly bliss.’
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References
University of Ulster Library (Morris Collection) holds Image of Ireland,
with a Discoverie of Woodkarne (Edin: Black 1883) 144pp.
Website: There is a page on the Norton website undert the heading “Island Nations: Forging and Contesting Identities” [link].
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