[3] Fiants dealt with matters ranging from appointments to high office and important government activities, to grants of pardons to the humblest of the native Irish.
[4] Fiants relating to early modern Ireland are an important primary source for the period for historians and genealogists.
[5] The Tudor fiants were especially numerous, many relating to surrender and regrant.
[8] Thereafter the rolls, which were catalogued in the 19th century, give the same information as the original fiants.
[12][13] An 1820s manuscript calendar of the fiants of James I and Charles I is available in the PROI (now the National Archives of Ireland).