This is the first modern scholarly edition of the acts of James II's Irish parliament, a short-lived but productive assembly which sat in Dublin's King's Inns from 7 May to 20 July 1689. An act introduced by an entirely Protestant Irish parliament in 1695 ordered that the records of the Jacobite parliament, including the enrolled copies of thirty-five acts, be ‘publicly and openly cancelled and utterly destroyed’ (p. lviii). The text of twenty-five of the acts remain in existence, however, and they have been reproduced in this volume, with the titles of the missing ten acts taken from An exact list, a compilation of material pertaining to the parliament, which was printed in London in 1689.

This edition supersedes the work of Thomas Davis, who reproduced some of the acts of the Jacobite parliament in a series of articles in The Dublin Magazine in the nineteenth century (later republished by Charles Gavan Duffy in The patriot parliament of 1689). Davis patently intended to improve the reputation of James II's Irish parliament, but Bergin and Lyall are fair in acknowledging that his method was ‘conscientious and scholarly’ (p. xxi). Davis worked without knowledge of some of the most important surviving copies of the acts, the most important of which is a compilation from the library of Thomas Grenville in London, now housed in the British Library. If anything, the editors lean toward understating their contribution by observing that a modern edition of the acts is ‘clearly desirable’ (p. xv).

The volume has been assembled diligently and thoughtfully, by two scholars who are in full command of the subject matter. Bergin and Lyall have identified several distinct classes of surviving acts. The most important of these are black-letter official editions and manuscript copies, all of which have been categorised as ‘contemporary or near contemporary’ (p. xvi). An incomplete set, the surviving black-letter editions of the acts ‘suggest nevertheless that the Jacobite authorities did not neglect the printing and promulgation of the legislation’ (p. xix). In at least two cases, acts appear to have been individually printed, revealing the political and administrative concerns of the Jacobite government. While the circulation of the act of supply (c. 2) was necessary for the collection of the tax it imposed, the editors point to the speedy reproduction of the text of the act of recognition (c. 1) in May 1689 as ‘presumably intended to give heart to King James's followers’ in England (p. xix). In the case of acts for which there are no extant copies, it is possible that they were never printed as they were not intended for circulation.

Unsurprisingly, some of the legislation produced by James's parliament was concerned with the land settlement, religious liberty and the war. With its lengthy lists of those outlawed for their opposition to James's rule, the act of attainder (c. 30) demonstrates the fraught atmosphere in which the 1689 parliament met. As Bergin and Lyall point out, however, ‘a good deal of the legislation was uncontroversial’ and ‘[t]he political crisis and impending war did not distract from undertaking revisions of the statute law or from providing legislative remedies for private petitioners’ (pp xxx–xxxi). In their introduction, the editors provide insight into the proceedings of James's parliament. They also address the possible content of missing public and private legislation, including: ‘an act for the speedy recovering of servants’ wages’ (c. 23); ‘an act for reversal of the attainder of William Ryan of Bally Ryan in the county of Tipperary, esquire’ (c. 35); and ‘an act for relieving Dame Anna Yolanda Sarracourt alias Duval and her daughter’ (c. 33) (pp xxxvi–xli). In doing so, they shine a light on the lesser-known concerns of the 1689 parliament and on aspects of life and society at an important juncture in Ireland's history.

Bergin and Lyall provide a clear overview of their editorial method and the text of acts is presented in a considered and accessible manner. The use of footnotes to highlight variations in the titles and text of different editions and lists of the acts is effective, while the appendices provide a helpful overview of surviving black-letter editions, the monthly tax rate imposed on individual counties, and a breakdown of the entries in the act of attainder by category and district, among other things. The indexes are comprehensive, making for an easily navigated volume.

Overall, the editors have produced a highly important volume which further underlines the significance of the Irish Manuscripts Commission in preserving and disseminating primary sources relating to Ireland's history and culture. This volume is an essential resource for students and scholars of early modern Irish and particularly Jacobite history, revealing the immediate and long-term concerns and objectives of an ultimately short-lived Catholic government.