The Composition of Connacht, or Composition of Connaught and Thomond, was a 1585 agreement between, on the one hand, the Gaelic and Gaelicised chiefs of Connacht and Thomond and, on the other hand, the English Dublin Castle administration of the Kingdom of Ireland, which replaced the multiple existing levies with a single tax on land holdings.
In 1577, Lord Deputy Henry Sidney instigated a first Composition, which collapsed when President Nicholas Malby died.
The counties affected by the composition included Clare, which, under the name Thomond, was part of the Presidency of Connaught from 1569 until about 1600.
[n 1] Prior to the composition, a landholder was liable to pay various charges: to the English a cess to cover the cost of the garrisons; and to the Gaelic chief coyne and livery for his private army, and "cuttings" and "coshery" for his household.
Following the Civil wars of the 1640s, land in Connacht was again reassigned as part of the Cromwellian conquest of Ireland.