Roger Boyle 1st earl of Orrery

Roger Boyle Orrery, 1st earl of 1621-79, Irish statesman and writer; son of Richard Boyle, 1st earl of Cork. Created (1627) Baron Broghill, he studied at Trinity College, Dublin, traveled abroad, and served against the Irish rebels in 1641. Although his family leaned toward Charles I, he served in the parliamentary army after 1647. He later became involved in a plot to restore Charles II, but Oliver Cromwell personally intervened to persuade him to serve the Commonwealth. He helped restore order in Ireland, received large grants of land, and served in the parliaments of 1654 and 1656 and as lord president of the council in Scotland. When the restoration of Charles II seemed inevitable, he crossed to Ireland and helped secure it for the king. He was made earl of Orrery (1660) and a lord justice, served in the Parliament of 1661, and was lord president of Munster until 1668. A friend and patron of the writers of his age, Orrery also wrote rhymed-verse tragedies, among them Henry the Fifth (1668), Mustapha (1668), and The Black Prince (1669); a romance, Parthenissa (1654-65); and a military treatise (1677).

Bibliography: See preface by W. S. Clark to his edition (2 vol., 1937) of Orrery's dramatic works; study by K. M. Lynch (1965).

Boyle, Roger, first earl of Orrery (1621–79), author of Parthenissa (1654–65), the first English romance in the style of La Calprenède and M. de Scudéry, which deals with the prowess and vicissitudes of Artabanes, a Median prince, and his rivalry with Surena, an Arabian prince, for the love of Parthenissa. His heroic play Mustapha (1665) is based on Mlle de Scudéry's Ibrahim and the history of Knolles.

Orrery, Roger Boyle, 1st earl of (1621–79), formerly Baron Broghill, fifth son of Richard Boyle, 1st earl of Cork, and leader of the Old Protestants in Munster. Loans to Charles I by his father brought Boyle onto personal terms with the royal family. He was deputy in Inchiquin's Munster command during the Confederate War, becoming his pro‐parliamentary rival after the appearance in Cork of the parliamentarian Lord Lisle, lord lieutenant of Ireland (1646–7).

During the king's trial and execution, Boyle retired to Somerset. Oliver Cromwell gave him the choice of service in Ireland or the Tower. Boyle brought key Munster towns and most of Inchiquin's soldiers over to parliament just as Cromwell's campaign was flagging. In April 1650 he destroyed Lord Muskerry's (see clancarty) royalist‐confederate force at Macroom and executed the Catholic bishop, Boethius MacEgan.

Boyle served as governor of Scotland (1655–6) and was the chief sponsor of the Humble Petition and Advice (1657), an appeal to Cromwell to assume the crown. In Ireland he propped up Henry Cromwell's rule and was granted Muskerry's lands at Blarney. As the protectorate fell apart in 1659–60 he became a supporter of the Restoration.

As a lord justice he helped lay down the Act of Settlement. Subsequently, as lord president of Munster and major‐general of the army, he disputed defence allocations with Ormond but got his way over a long‐cherished militia scheme. Amid fears of land redistribution and disgruntlement about being ignored as Ormond's successor, Boyle embarked on a vigorous anti‐Catholic persecution in Munster in 1671, which helped to provoke his dismissal as provincial president.

Boyle wrote a Treatise on the Art of War (1677) and several allegorical plays on the theme of regicide for the London stage.

Hiram Morgan