Ælfric of Eynsham [Ælfric Grammaticus, Ælfric the Homilist] (c. 950–c. 1010), Benedictine abbot of Eynsham and scholar, is of unknown origins, though his language suggests he came from Wessex. He was educated under Æthelwold in the monastic school at Winchester, and after becoming a monk and priest was sent about 987 to the abbey of ...
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Malcolm Godden
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Michael Lapidge
Aldhelm [St Aldhelm; Ealdhelm] (d. 709/10), abbot of Malmesbury, bishop of Sherborne, and scholar, was a prolific Latin author whose idiosyncratic style of composition in the media of prose and verse, both metrical and rhythmical, was profoundly influential both in England...
![Cover Aldhelm [St Aldhelm] (d. 709/10)](/cover/searchableMedia/odnb-9780198614128-e-1010268-graphic-1-thumbnail.jpg)
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Ashe, St George (1658–1718), Church of Ireland bishop of Derry and scholar, was born at Castle Strange, co. Roscommon, on 3 March 1658, the second of the three sons of Thomas Ashe, who belonged to a Wiltshire family that had settled in Ireland...
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Bartholomaeus Anglicus (b. before 1203, d. 1272) illuminated initial © The Bodleian Library, University of Oxford
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Bartholomaeus Anglicus (b. before 1203, d. 1272), Franciscan friar and encyclopaedist, is of unknown parentage, and there is no information about his early years. His association with the Suffolk Glanvilles, reported by John Leland, who identifies Bartholomaeus as Bartholomew de Glanville, depends upon a late fourteenth-century colophon in Cambridge, Peterhouse, MS 67. ...
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Basingstoke, John of [John Basing] (d. 1252), scholar and ecclesiastic, takes his name from the town of Basingstoke in Hampshire. Two contemporary sources speak of him: the chronicler Matthew Paris, and Robert Grosseteste, bishop of Lincoln (d. 1253). Basingstoke was closely associated with ...
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T. F. Tout
revised by Vivienne Larminie
Bayly, John (1595/6–1633), scholar and Church of England clergyman, was born in Herefordshire, the eldest son of Lewis Bayly (c. 1575–1631), later bishop of Bangor, and of his first wife, probably called Judith Appleton, and brother of Thomas Bayly (d. c. 1657), also later a clergyman. By 1611 he was an undergraduate at ...
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Alexander Gordon
revised by R. K. Webb
Beard, Charles (1827–1888), Unitarian minister, scholar, and journal editor, was born at Higher Broughton, Manchester, on 27 July 1827, the eldest son of John Relly Beard (1800–1876), Unitarian minister at Salford, and his wife, Mary Barnes (1802–1887). Educated at his father's school, he studied at ...
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Benedict Biscop [St Benedict Biscop] (c. 628–689), abbot of Wearmouth and scholar, was born about 628 of a noble Northumbrian family, named in the life of Bishop Wilfrid by Stephen of Ripon (Eddius Stephanus) as Baducing. Bede provides the chief narrative for his life in the ...
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Margaret Lucille Kekewich
Bernard, Daniel (d. 1588), Church of England clergyman and scholar, was the son of Thomas Bernard (d. 1582) [see under Bernard, John], and the nephew of John Bernard. He is likely to have had a reformist upbringing since his father, vicar of ...
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Stephen D. Snobelen
Best, Paul (1590–1657), scholar and religious writer, was born in 1590 (before 12 August) probably at Hutton Cranswick, in the East Riding of Yorkshire, the first of the six children of James Best (d. 1617), yeoman farmer, and his first wife, Dorothy (...
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Bodi [Bode], John (fl. 1357), Benedictine monk and scholastic writer, graduated doctor of divinity at Oxford University. His institutional affiliation is not known, but he might have been attached to Gloucester College, which was established for monks of his order. His personal circumstances are known only from an incident in which a friar was ordered by the university to make a public apology for having made insulting references to him in a lecture of 20 December 1357. The following January ...
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Joan Greatrex
Bradshaw, Henry (d. 1513), scholar and hagiographer, was a Benedictine monk of the abbey of St Werburgh, Chester. He was probably professed in the mid-1490s since he was ordained subdeacon in 1499 and deacon and priest the following year. Although there is no evidence to corroborate ...
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Thompson Cooper
revised by H. C. G. Matthew
Burgess, Henry (1808–1886), Church of England clergyman and scholar, was educated at Stepney College, where he was noted for his ability in Hebrew, Greek, and Latin. After ministering to a nonconformist congregation, he joined the Church of England, being ordained deacon in 1850 and priest in 1851. He took the degree of LLD at ...
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David Daniel Rees
Butler, Edward Joseph Aloysius [name in religion Cuthbert] (1858–1934), abbot of Downside and scholar, was born in Dublin on 6 May 1858, the only child of Edward Butler (d. 1902), barrister, and his wife, Mary Cruise (d. 1897). His father had been professor of mathematics in ...
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Byrhtferth of Ramsey (fl. c. 986–c. 1016), Benedictine monk and scholar, was the author of a substantial corpus of writing, in both Latin and Old English. Very little is known of his life beyond what can be gleaned from incidental references in his writings....
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Carmichael, James (1542/3–1628), Church of Scotland minister and scholar, is first recorded as matriculating in the University of St Andrews as a student in St Leonard's College in the session 1560–61. Of his parents and earlier education nothing is known. Among his contemporaries in the university were ...
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(Florence Estienne) Meric Casaubon (1599–1671) by Pieter Stevens van Gunst, pubd 1709 (after Adriaen van der Werff) © National Portrait Gallery, London
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R. W. Serjeantson
Casaubon, (Florence Estienne) Meric (1599–1671), scholar and divine, was born on 14 August 1599 in Geneva, the tenth of the seventeen children of Isaac Casaubon (1559–1614), classical scholar and church historian, and his second wife, Florence (1568?–1636), daughter of Henri Estienne. Meric was the most scholarly of ...
