Nathaniel Catelyn

Sir Nathaniel Catlin (c.1580–1637) (whose family name is sometimes spelt Catlyn or Catelyn), was a leading politician and judge in seventeenth-century Ireland. He was Speaker of the Irish House of Commons in the Irish Parliament of 1634–5, Recorder of Dublin and the first holder of the office of Second Serjeant. Despite accusations of conflicts of interest and of Roman Catholic sympathies, he retained the confidence of the Crown and was a key ally of Thomas Wentworth, 1st Earl of Strafford, the Lord Deputy of Ireland.

Woolverstown Hall, Catelyn's family home

He was born in Suffolk, younger son of Richard Catlin III (1547 - 1596) of Woolverstone Hall, near Ipswich, and his wife Dionysia, daughter of Thomas Marsh, Clerk of the Court of Star Chamber. From a landowning family involved in law and politics that was long associated with Norwich, his father was a younger son of the lawyer Richard Catlin II and grandson of the MP for Norwich Richard Catlin I. A first cousin was the MP for Norwich Richard Catlin IV and a first cousin once removed was the MP for Norwich Sir Nevill Catlin.

Following admission to Emmanuel College, Cambridge in 1601, he entered Lincoln's Inn in 1605. After this legal training, it seems he planned a career in the Church of England and was ordained a deacon in Peterborough Cathedral in 1620. However he did not proceed to the priesthood and instead went to practise law in Ireland, where he is recorded as a member of King's Inns in 1622/3 and became Recorder of Dublin in 1626.

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