John of Tynemouth (sometimes John of York [1] or John de Tinmouth [2] ) was a medieval English chronicler who flourished in the mid-14th century.
Little is known of his background. According to medieval accounts, he was claimed to have been the vicar of the parish of Tynemouth in Northumberland. From his writings, he was familiar with the area around Wheatley, near Winchester, which might mean that he could be identified with John Whetely, who is known to have been the vicar at Tynemouth during the 1350s and 1360s. Or possibly, the Wheatley was the one in Yorkshire, which would explain the alternate name he is occasionally given in manuscripts, John York. John may have been a monk of St Albans Abbey, for his work was early associated with that monastery, and the vicar at Tynemouth was appointed by the prior of the monastic priory at Tynemouth that was a dependent priory of St Albans. [3]
John was the author of a chronicle, the Historia aurea, which was a work composed about 1350. It was a history of the world from the creation to 1347. He used as sources a shortened version of the Polychronicon . The Historia survives in full in manuscripts that were originally from Durham Cathedral, Bury St Edmunds Abbey, and St Albans. The St Albans copies, however, are only dated to the 15th century, which undercuts the idea that John might have been a monk at that abbey. The Historia also survives in shortened versions. [3]
Besides the Historia, he also authored a Sanctilogium, or Sanctilogium Angliae Walliae Scotiae et Hiberniae, [1] which gave the lives of 156 English saints. The Sanctilogium survives in a single manuscript, now in the British Library, where it is Cotton Library MS Tiberius E.i. [3] He also wrote a Martyrologium, which survives in some extracts that are appended to one of the manuscripts of the Historia aurea. [1] The Sanctilogium was subsequently rearranged into alphabetical order by the medieval historian John Capgrave, and published by him under the title Nova Legenda Angliae (also spelled Anglie). [4]
Matthew Paris, also known as Matthew of Paris, was an English Benedictine monk, chronicler, artist in illuminated manuscripts, and cartographer who was based at St Albans Abbey in Hertfordshire. He authored a number of historical works, many of which he scribed and illuminated himself, typically in drawings partly coloured with watercolour washes, sometimes called "tinted drawings". Some were written in Latin, others in Anglo-Norman or French verse. He is sometimes confused with the nonexistent Matthew of Westminster.
Thomas Walsingham was an English chronicler, and is the source of much of the knowledge of the reigns of Richard II, Henry IV, Henry V and the latter reign of Edward III depicting the decline of the state of affairs of the English. He also documented the careers of John Wycliff and Wat Tyler.
John Dunstaple was an English composer whose music helped inaugurate the transition from the medieval to the Renaissance periods. The central proponent of the Contenance angloise style, Dunstaple was the leading English composer of his time, and is often coupled with William Byrd and Henry Purcell as England's most important early music composers. His style would have an immense influence on the subsequent music of continental Europe, inspiring composers such as Du Fay, Binchois, Ockeghem and Busnois.
John Capgrave was an English historian, hagiographer and scholastic theologian, remembered chiefly for Nova Legenda Angliae. This was the first comprehensive collection of lives of the English saints.
Sir Henry Savile was an English scholar and mathematician, Warden of Merton College, Oxford, and Provost of Eton. He endowed the Savilian chairs of Astronomy and of Geometry at Oxford University, and was one of the scholars who translated the New Testament from Greek into English. He was a Member of the Parliament of England for Bossiney in Cornwall in 1589, and Dunwich in Suffolk in 1593.
Walston was an Anglo-Saxon prince, known for the miracles which occurred during and after his life after he became a farm worker. He is a patron saint of farm animals and agricultural workers, who once visited his shrine at the church at Bawburgh, in the English county of Norfolk. Two sources for his life exist: the De Sancto Walstano Confessore in the Nova Legenda Angliæ, printed by Wynkyn de Worde in 1516, and known as the English Life; and a later Latin manuscript copied in 1658 from a now lost medieval triptych, now in the Lambeth Palace library in London.
Thomas Allen (or Alleyn) (21 December 1542 – 30 September 1632) was an English mathematician and astrologer. Highly reputed in his lifetime, he published little, but was an active private teacher of mathematics. He was also well connected in the English intellectual networks of the period.
Wihtburh was an East Anglian saint, princess and abbess. According to tradition, she was the youngest daughter of Anna, king of the East Angles, but Virginia Blanton has suggested that the royal connection was probably a fabrication. One story says that the Virgin Mary sent a pair of female deer to provide milk for Wihtburh's workers during the construction of her convent at Dereham, in Norfolk. When a local official attempted to hunt down the does, he was thrown from his horse and killed.
Hugh Candidus was a monk of the Benedictine monastery at Peterborough, who wrote a Medieval Latin account of its history, from its foundation as Medeshamstede in the mid 7th century up to the mid 12th century.
Dominic of Evesham was a medieval prior of Evesham Abbey in England and writer of religious texts. Probably a native Englishman, there is some confusion about when he became a monk, but by 1104 he was at Evesham and by 1125 he held the office of prior. He is chiefly known for his religious works, including one on the miracles of the Virgin Mary that was an important source for later writings on the subject. Four of his works are still extant.
Indract or Indracht was an Irish saint who, along with his companions, was venerated at Glastonbury Abbey, a monastery in the county of Somerset in south-western England. In the High Middle Ages Glastonbury tradition held that he had been an Irish pilgrim — a king's son – on his way back from Rome who was molested and killed by a local thegn after he had stopped off to visit the shrine of St Patrick. This tradition synchronised his life with that of King Ine (688–726), though historian Michael Lapidge has argued that he is most likely to represent a 9th-century abbot of Iona named Indrechtach ua Fínnachta.
Adam of Eynsham was a medieval English chronicler and writer. He was a monk and Abbot of Eynsham Abbey.
Reginald of Canterbury was a medieval French writer and Benedictine monk who lived and wrote in England in the very early part of the 12th century. He was the author of a number of Latin poems, including an epic entitled Malchus, which still survives.
John of Tynemouth was a medieval English clergyman and canon lawyer. He was among the first teachers of canon law at what later became Oxford University, where he was by 1188. By the late 1190s John had joined the household of the Archbishop of Canterbury, Hubert Walter. Besides his position in the household, he also held a number of ecclesiastical positions, which earned him a substantial income. After Walter's death, John continued to serve as a lawyer as well as hold clerical offices. He died in 1221. A number of his writings survive.
John of Tynemouth was a 13th-century mathematician and geometer. Little is known of John's background, but he authored De curvis superficiebus or Liber de curvis superficiebus Archimenidis, a tract about Archimedes' measurements of spheres. This is an important work in the history of medieval geometry, as it helped transmit Archimedes' ideas to other medieval scholars. The work itself follows closely Archimedes' own reasoning, but with enough differences to lead modern historians to believe that John's work was dependent on a Greek text from late antiquity.
The Chronicon Angliae Petriburgense is a 14th-century chronicle written in Medieval Latin at Peterborough Abbey, England, covering events from 604 to 1368, although the original manuscript ends with an entry for 868, and the remainder was added in the 17th century. It survives as part of a composite manuscript volume held at the British Library with the mark Cotton Claudius A.v, in which it appears on folios 2–45. An edition of the Chronicon was published in 1723 by Joseph Sparke, in a collection of English histories by various writers. According to John Allen Giles, in the preface to his own edition published by the Caxton Society in 1845, the Chronicon was attributed by both Simon Patrick and Henry Wharton to John of Caleto, who was an abbot of Peterborough (1250–1262). Giles reported a marginal note in the manuscript making a similar attribution, besides a similar note at the beginning of the manuscript stating that it belonged to Peterborough Abbey. However, Giles observed that this manuscript attribution was "comparatively modern", and regarded the chronicle's author as unknown. In Giles's view, the Chronicon is "extremely valuable both on account of the numerous facts which it contains, and for the [700 years] which it embraces."
Robert of Cricklade was a medieval English writer and prior of St Frideswide's Priory in Oxford. He was a native of Cricklade and taught before becoming a cleric. He wrote several theological works as well as a lost biography of Thomas Becket, the murdered Archbishop of Canterbury.
Robert of Bridlington was an English clergyman and theologian who was the fourth prior of Bridlington Priory. He held the office during the period from 1147 to 1156, but it is not clear if he died in office or resigned before his death. Besides holding monastic office, he wrote a number of commentaries on biblical books as well as other treatises. Not all of his works have survived to the current day.
John Shirley was an author, translator, and scribe. As a scribe of later Middle English literature, he is particularly known for transcribing works by John Lydgate and Geoffrey Chaucer.
John Westwyk was an English astronomer, adventurer, Benedictine monk, and author of the Equatorie of the Planetis.