An act against Jesuits, seminary priests, and such other like disobedient persons, also known as the Jesuits, etc. Act 1584, was an Act of the Parliament of England passed during the English Reformation. The Act commanded all Roman Catholic priests to leave the country within 40 days or they would be punished for high treason, unless within the 40 days, they swore an oath to obey the Queen. Those who harboured them, and all those who knew of their presence and failed to inform the authorities, would be fined and imprisoned for felony, or if the authorities wished to make an example of them, they might be executed for treason.
Sir John Arundell of Lanherne: he and his wife, Lady Anne Stanley, were the patrons of the Catholic martyr John Cornelius, whom they harboured in their house in breach of the 1584 Act
Gunter Mansion, Abergavenny, where Catholic priests were sheltered for generations, in defiance of the 1584 statute
The Gordon Riots 1780, painting by Charles Green
Margaret Clitherow was an English saint and martyr of the Roman Catholic Church, known as "the Pearl of York". She was pressed to death for refusing to enter a plea to the charge of harbouring Catholic priests. She was canonised in 1970 by Pope Paul VI.
Margaret Clitherow
The Black Swan, Peasholme Green, York
The shrine to Saint Margaret on The Shambles, York, 2018
Commemorative plaque on the Ouse Bridge, York
