John de Burgh

John de Burgh, or de Burgo, or Burke (; ; 1590 – 4 April 1667) was an Irish Roman Catholic clergyman who served as Vicar Apostolic (1629–41) and Bishop (1642–47) of Clonfert, and Archbishop of Tuam (1647–67). Background John de Burgh was a member of the Clanricarde de Burgh or Burke family of County Galway (the surname was latinised as de Burgo and gaelicised as de Búrca, or Búrc, later Burke). He and his brother Hugh were taught by a member of the Ó Maolconaire family, from whom they learned very considerable Greek and Latin. John and Hugh left for the continent in 1614, John to Lisbon, Hugh to Louvain where he joined the Franciscans. Career John de Burgh was ordained a priest and returned to Ireland around 1624, working for two years in the Diocese of Tuam under Boetius Egan. In 1627, on Egan's recommendation, he was appointed Apostolic Vicar of the Diocese of Clonfert by a papal brief on 13 October 1629. During the projected Plantation of Connacht in the 1630s, his influence on Catholic members of the 1634 Parliament was so great that Lord Stafford issued warrants for his arrest, necessitating de Burgh hiding until the Viceroy's recall. On the recommendation of Bishop MacEgan of Elphin, he was appointed to Bishop of Clonfert on 16 October 1641, and consecrated on 9 April 1642. He subscribed to the ordinances agreed upon for the war against Parliament, spending almost all of his time in Kilkenny assisting the seventy-two-year-old David Rothe. During these years, Hugh de Burgh was agent for the Supreme Council at the Court of the Netherlands.