SNIPPET: The term "beyond the Pale" has its origins in 14th century Ireland in the Statutes of Kilkenny. These laws established a sweeping series of prohibitions against fraternization between Anglo-Irish colonizers and the native Irish. They also defined what became known as the Pale of Settlement (pale comes from the Latin word Palus or fence post) a narrow strip of land, little more than 20 miles wide in most places, running north from Waterford to Dundalk on Ireland's eastern coast. Those living "beyond the pale" were considered "Irish enemies" not entitled to protection under English law. The Anglo-Normans who had arrived in the 1200s had rapidly became Anglo-Irish, intermarrying with the native Irish and taken on their language, dress and customs. This was part of a larger revival of Irish culture in this period known as the Gaelic Recovery. Events such as the Black Death (an epidemic of bubonic and pneumonic plague that spread rapidly from Asia to Europe in the 1340s, arriving in the British Isles in the summer of 1348, with resultant massive loss of life and social disorder) had crippled the English economy, sharply limiting the Crown's ability to intervene in Ireland. The development of Irish identity among the colonizing families in Ireland had caused great concern to the British Crown. To reverse this trend, the British viceroy in Ireland pushed through the Irish Parliament the Statutes of Kilkenny in 1366. Its preamble summed up the problem of British conquest: "Now many English of the said land, forsaking the English language, fashion, mode of riding, laws and usages, live and govern themselves according to the manners, fashion, and the language of the Irish enemies, and also having made divers marriages and alliances between themselves and the Irish enemies aforesaid ... the English language, the allegiance due to our Lord the King and the English laws there are put in subjection and decayed, and the Irish enemies exalted and raised up, contrary to right." The Statutes explicitly forbade intermarriage between the Irish and the Anglo-Irish colonizers. The latter were prohibited from speaking the Irish language in conducting political, legal, or business affairs. They were also forbidden to wear Irish clothing, ride on Irish saddles, employ Irish poets or minstrels, use Irish greetings, or play hurling. The Statutes also defined what became known as the Pale of Settlement, the above-mentioned narrow strip of land. According to the Statutes, those living outside the Pale were henceforth considered "Irish enemies," and those inside "obedient."