Volume 1

Athenae Oxonienses : An exact history of all the writers and bishops who have had their education in the University of Oxford. To which are added the fasti, or annals of the said University / By Anthony A. Wood.

  • Anthony Wood
Date:
1813-20
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Athenae Oxonienses : An exact history of all the writers and bishops who have had their education in the University of Oxford. To which are added the fasti, or annals of the said University / By Anthony A. Wood. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by Royal College of Physicians, London. The original may be consulted at Royal College of Physicians, London.

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    hath committed to posterity these books following of his writing and translation. Of the Nature of JVrits. Whether the same with that written by the great lawyer Anth. Fitz- herbert, who lived before Phayer's time, 1 know not. Exemplars of common Places for the writing of several sorts of Instruments. It is the same which we now call A Book of Precedents. I have a MS. lying by me written on parchment in the time of H. 6, or Ed. 4, containing copies of all matters to be used by lawyers, but who the compiler of it was I cannot tell. In the beginning of it is written, in a pretty ancient character, George Hardley. A goodly bryefe Treatise of the Pestylence, zcith the Causes, Signs, and Cures of the same. Lond. 1544, and 46, oct. Declaration of the veyns of Man's Bodi/, and to what dyseases and iifirmities the opening of every one of them doe serve. This is printed with the former book, an. 1544, &c. A Book of Children^'. And this also, which treats of the grief and diseases of children. Remedies, or Prescriptions of Physic for the Body. Published by Hen. Holland 1603'', whom I shall mention at the end of Hen. Holland under the year 1625. This Thomas Phayer also wrote in verse, of Ozeen Glyudour's being seduced by false Prophecies, took upon him to be Prince of Wales, 8cc. 1401, in one sheet or more in qu. Printed in the first edition of the Minor of Magistrates, 1559, and in the other two that followed. He also translated from French into English, The Regimen of Life, Lond. 1544, and 46, [and 1553] oct. and from Lat. into English, Nine Books of Virgil's JEneidos. The three first of which were by him finished in the forest of Kilgarran in Pembrokeshire, in the year 1555. The fourth at the same place, an. 1556. The fifth in 1557, being ended May 3; just after the trans- lator had undergone a great danger at Caermar- then. The sixth and seventh were also finished by him in the same year and in the same place. The eighth, there also in Kilgarran forest, an. 1558. The ninth was ended 3 Apr. 1560*. The tenth was begun by him in the said year, but died, as it seems, before he could go through it. After- * [All these medical works of Phayer were appended to Tlie Regiment: of Life, 1546, (Bodl. 8vo. P. 24. Med.) and again in 1560, Bod'l. 8vo. Z. IS. Med.] ' [These Remedies are only certain prescriptions taken from xhe Treatise of the Pestylence, and were appended to Holland's Spiritual. Preservatives against the Pestilence, 4to. 1603, and again in Solomon's Pest-Hovse, or Towre Romaic, 4to. 1630, page 49. Bodl. 4to. L. 1. Med.] ^ [The first seven books were printed by John Kingston, in 1558, (Bodl. 4to. Z. 12. Art.) the nine first ' with so muche of the tenthe booke, as since his death coulde be foiinde in vnperfit papers at his house in Kilgarran forest,' by Rowland Hill, 4to. 1562. Herbert, Typ.AntKj. 804. War- ton notices other editions in 1596, 1607, and in 1620, 4to, Mist, of Eng. Poetrt/, iii. 307 ] wards a young physician named Tho. Twyne meeting with the aforesaid translations in MS. he finished the said Tenth JEneid, 23 May, an. 1573. Which being done, he translated the Eleventh, Twelfth, and Thirteenth JEneidos, and published them all together, an. 1584'^, as I shall tell you elsewhere. As for Dr. Piiayer, he ended his days at Kilgarran before-mentioned, after the 12th of Aug. (on which day his last will and ' testament 1560. was dated) in fifteen hundred and sixty, and was [135] buried in the parish church of that place. Over his grave was a marble-stone soon after laid, with an epitaph engraven thereon, made and devised by his good friend Mr. George Ferrers of Lin- coln's-Inn, but what the contents of it are, I know not, nor of any other epitaph made for him, only* that by sir Tho. Clialoner, a most noted Latin poet of his time, who having been well acquainted with the doctor,doth in a pathetical manner highly commend him for his learning and great skill in physic. He the said doctor left behind him a widow named Anne, and two daughters, Eleanor the wife of Gryfiith ap Enon, and Mary. [Phaer stiles himself in IVie seiten first bookes of the Eneidos, ' sollicitour to the king and queue s maiesties, attending their honourable counsaile in the marchies of Wales/ and, in his dedication to Mary, he informs us that he was brought up un- der the patronage of W'illiam, marquis of Win- chester. Our author's poetical abilities seem to have been highly esteemed by his contemporaries': Puttenham says he was well learned above any other, that his translations are clear and faithful, and that his verse is learned and well corrected. How far this applause is merited our readers may judge, although the metre in which the trans- lation is written is sufficient to give us a distaste for the whole composition- Dido receives the Trojans thus courteously : Wherfore approche, and welcome all, my houses shall you boost, For like mischaunce, with labours sore, my self somtyme hath tost; And fortune here hath set me now, this land thus to subdewe. By profe of payne I haue been taught, on payn- fuU men to rewe. [They were published first in 1573, 4to. by Phaer. Herbert, Tt/p. Ant. 774.] ' In ofhc. pr.TRrog. Cant, in Reg^ Lostes, qu. 23. ^ In lib. suo cui lit. est, Dc illustrium quorundam En- comiis 4' Epituphiis vonmdlis,6ic. Lond. 1579, qu. p. 356,357. 3 [' M. Phaer likewise is not to he forgot in regard of his famous Virgil, whose heavenly verse, had it not been blemished by his hawtie thoughts, England might have long insulted his wit, and corrigat ciiii potest have been subscribed to his works. Letter prefixed to Greene's Menu- phon, 1589. See Stanyhurst's comparison between his own version and that of Phayer, in Caisura Literaria, iv. 227, 228.]