[Nicholson's Irish Historical Library, Dublin, 1724; Memoirs of the Rt. Hon. the Marquis of Clanricarde, Dublin, 1744; O'Reilly ed. Account of Irish Writers, Dublin, 1820; Hardiman's Irish Minstrelsy, Lond. 1831; manuscript of Tri Biorghaoithe, written in 1820 by Thomas O'Scanlan for Patrick O'Briain; manuscript of Foras Feasa ar Eirinn written in 1780, both in library of writer; Wm. Haliday's text and translation of Keating's History, pt. i. Dublin, 1811—in part reprinted by Joyce. As to O'Connor's version, Dr. O'Conor's Dissertations, p. 10; R. Atkinson's Royal Irish Academy, Irish MS. series, vol. ii. pt. i., Dublin, 1890.]
KEATING, GEORGE (1762–1842), engraver, bookseller, and publisher, son of Patrick Keating (1734–1816), bookseller, was born in 1762. He was brought up as an engraver under William Dickinson. Between 1784 and 1799 he produced plates in mezzotint and stipple, and ‘attained fair proficiency in the art’ (J. Chaloner Smith, British Mezzotinto Portraits, 1884, ii. 778). He had a shop in Air Street, Piccadilly, and afterwards entered his father's business in Warwick Street, Golden Square. In 1800 the Keatings took over the business of J. P. Coghlan, the leading catholic bookseller of the day, and under the style of Keating, Brown, & Keating carried on business on Coghlan's premises in Duke Street, Grosvenor Square. After the death of the elder Keating in 1816, the firm became Keating & Brown. Brown died in 1837, and his widow continued in partnership with Keating until 1840. Keating then opened a shop in South Street, Manchester Square, but was unsuccessful, and in September 1840 a public subscription was opened for him in the ‘Tablet.’
He published many catholic books, and edited the ‘Laity's Directory’ from 1801 to 1839, the ‘Catholicon, or Christian Spectator,’ from 1815 to 1818, and the ‘Catholic Speaker’ from 1824 to 1826. He died in Crawford Street, Marylebone, 5 Sept. 1842.
[Gillow's Bibl. Dict. of English Catholics, iii. 675–6; Tablet, iii. 607; Bryan's Dict. ed. R. E. Graves, 1886, i. 724.]
KEATING, Sir HENRY SINGER (1804–1888), judge, third son of Lieutenant-general Sir Henry Sheehy Keating, K.C.B., by his wife, the eldest daughter of James Singer of Annandale, co. Dublin, was born at Dublin in 1804. He was called to the bar at the Inner Temple in 1832, and joined the Oxford circuit and attended the Gloucestershire sessions. He became a queen's counsel in 1849 and a bencher of his inn, sat for Reading as a liberal from 1852 to 1859, was solicitor-general from May 1857 to February 1858, and again in June 1859, in the two administrations of Lord Palmerston, and on 14 Dec. 1859 was promoted to the bench of the common pleas. In 1875 he retired upon a pension and was sworn of the privy council. He died at St. Leonards on 1 Oct. 1888. He was a learned and unobtrusive judge, a skilful pleader, and while at the bar was, with Mr. Justice Willes, an editor of the third (1849) and fourth editions (1856) of John William Smith's ‘Leading Cases.’ In 1843 he married the third daughter of Major-general Evans, R.A.
[Foss's Judges of England; Law Magazine, iv. 220; Times, 6 Oct. 1888.]
KEATING, JOHN (fl. 1680), Irish judge, was son of Maurice Keating of Narraghmore, co. Kildare. He was a protestant. On 22 Jan. 1661–2 he was deputy-clerk in the Irish House of Lords, and received a gratuity of 300l. for his ‘diligence and expedition’ (Cal. Treasury Papers, i. 5). He was admitted to the bar in Ireland in 1662–3; was employed as agent or advocate there for James, duke of York (cf. Hist. MSS. Comm. 11th Rep. pt. iii. p. 219), and enjoyed the confidence of the Duke of Ormonde. In May 1679 Keating was appointed chief justice of the court of common pleas in Ireland; purposely, it was said, to try the Earl of Tyrone, who was indicated immediately afterwards for treasonable communication with the French (ib.) He was continued in office by James II, who appointed him a privy councillor in Ireland, and included him among the burgesses of Swords, co. Dublin, in a new charter granted to that town. Henry Hyde, second earl of Clarendon, who was lord-lieutenant through 1686, found in Keating a useful adviser. He joined Clarendon in resisting the attempt of Tyrconnel, then commander-in-chief, to give the Roman catholics supremacy in the Irish government. But despite their disagreements Tyrconnel judged Keating to be both an ‘honest and wise man,’ and one who ‘understood the country as well as anybody’ (Clarendon Corresp. p. 526). In May 1686 Keating suggested to Clarendon a renewal of the commission of grace in order to remedy defects in titles to land. That, he said, ‘would settle the kingdom,’ and he drew up a paper on the subject, in which he also pointed to the decay of inland trade and the need of remedial measures. If the judges, he added, were appointed commissioners for dealing with these matters, he and his colleagues ought to act without additional salary. Clarendon, who approved such proposals, wrote at the time to Rochester of Keating's ability and loyalty, and stated that he was suspected of no evil except a too generous regard for the interests of the native Irish. In July Keating
