In 1556, an Act of Parliament officially stated that Offaly would henceforth be known as King's County. This was after King Philip II of Spain, husband of the then Queen of England, Mary Tudor, better known as Bloody Mary.
Though the county was renamed Offaly after the establishment of the Irish Free State, no official change was ever made, meaning that many legal documents, such as land transfers, still use the name King's County. offal
