Volume 2

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 à Wood.

Anthony Wood

Date:: 1813-1820

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 à Wood. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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$invention of Mario in the performance thereof. It was printed at Lond. 1606. in qu. [Bodl. 8vo. T. 27- Art. Seld.] and whether before that time, I know not.? “ Others say, that this translation of “ Hero and Leander was done by Chapman alone “ without Mario.8” But all this I speak by the bye. Our author Tho. Newton, whom and his works I am further to mention, hath also trans¬ lated from Latin into English. (1) A Direction for the health of Magistrates and Students, namely, such as he in their consistent age, or near thereunto. Lond. 1574. in tw. written [in Latin] by Gul. Grataro- lus.9 (2) Commentary or exposition upon the tzeo Epistles general of S. Peter and that of S. Jude; gathered out of the lectures and preachings of Dr. Martin Luther by Anonymus. Lond. 1581. qu. (3) Touchstone oj Complexions, containing most easie rules, and ready tokens, whereby every Man may perfectly try and throughly know as well the exact state, habit, disposition and constitution of his body outwardly, as also the indications, Sc. of the mind inwardly. Lond. [1576. Bodl. Crynes 871.] 1581. oct. written [in Latin] by Levinus Lemnius. no date, of which a second edition completed, appeared in the same year; and Lucan's First Booke, rendered line for line, 4to. 1593 and l6()0. His translation of Ovid was burnt at stationers’ hall by order from the archbishop of Canterbury and the bishop of London, dated June 1, 41 Eliz.] 7 [It was printed 4to. 1598 (Herbert Typ. Antiq. 1287), 1600, 1606, 1622, 1629; and in 8vo. 1637.] * [It is not generally known, that Chapman not only finished Marlow’s poem of Hero and, Leander, (which is not a translation) but afterwards translated what had been before written in Latin on the same subject by Musaeus. As this . is one of the rarest books we now meet with, I shall give the full title: The divine Poem of Muscevs, First of all Booties. Trans¬ lated according to-lh originall. By Geo. Chapman. Lon¬ don, printed by Isaac laggard. 1616. It contains to sign. H. and is printed in the smallest size I remember to have seen at this early period. Chapman dedicates it to the well known Inigo Jones, and subscribes himself his ‘ ancient poore friend.’ In his preface he warns the reader that what is now offered is nothing like ‘ that partly excellent poem of maister Mar- loe’s—a different character being held through, both the stile, matter, and inuention.’ The first line or two of this rare but worthless piece will be sufficient: ‘ G01I desse relate the witnesse-bearing light Of loues, that would not beare a humane sight. The sea-man that transported marriages Shipt in the night, his bosome ploughing th’ seas—’ &c. The volume whence this is taken will be found in the Bod¬ leian, 8vo. C. 125. Art. Henry Petowe also added a second part to Marlow’s poem of Hero and Leander, which was printed by Thomas Pur- foot, London, 1598. (Bodl. 4to. L. 12. Art.) This was ex¬ ecuted much more poetically than Chapman’s. Take fqur lines only: ‘ Enis imprisoning caue, this woefull cell. This house of sorrow and increasing woe, Griefe’s tearie chamber, where sad care doth dwell. Where liquid tears, like top-fil’d seas doe flow’—] . ^ [See extracts from this book in the British Bibliographer, u. 414.] e' 1 ' (4) Third Tragedy of L. Ann. Seneca, entit. The- bais. Lond. 1581. qu. in old verse, and printed in an English character. Note that the fourth, se¬ venth, eighth 1 and tenth tragedies, of the said author, were in the like manner translated by John Studley of Trin. coll, in Cambridge, a noted poet in qu. Elizabeth’s time. The fifth called Oedipus was translated by Alex. Nevil of Cambridge, the same person, I mean, who was author of Kettus, sive de furoribus Norfolciensium, &c. lib. 1. an, 1582. The 9th trag. was translated by Tho. Nuce, contemporary with Studley and Nevill, and three more by Jasp. Hey wood, as I have told you else¬ where.2 (5) Of Christian Friendship, Sc. with an Invective against Dice-play and other prophane Games. Lond. 1586. oct. written [in Latin] by Lamb. Dan a1 us. (6) Tryal and examination of a Man’s own self, &c. Lond. 1587. tw. by Andr. Hi- perius. (7) Herbal oj: the Bible, containing a plain and familiar exposition of such similitudes, parables, Sc. that are borrowed and taken from Herbs, Plants, &c. Lond. 1587. oct. by Levinus Lem¬ nius. These are all the translations, as I conceive, that Tho. Newton hath made. At length having gotten a considerable estate by his endeavours, concluded his last day at Little Ilford in Essex, in the month of May in sixteen hundred and se¬ ven, and was buried in the church belonging to 1 The eighth trag. called Agamemnon was first of all pub¬ lished by the said Jo Studley, at Lond. 1566. in tw. [Bodl. 8vo. H. 44. Art. Seld. It is most likely, that all the plays were printed separately at first. Heywood’s we know were, (see vol. i. col. 664.) and Studley in his preface to Agamem¬ non, notices Nevill’s as set furthe before, which undoubtedly means in print,] 2 \_Seneca his tenne Tragedies translated into Englyshe. London by Thomas Marsh, 1581; Bodl. 4to. A. 46. Jur. Of this Volume Newton was the editor. The tragedies were exe¬ cuted as follows: Hercules Furens by Jasper Hey wood; Ihyestes by the same; Thebais by Newton; Hippolitics by John Studley; Oedipus by Alexander Neville; Troas by Heywood; Medea by Studley; Agamemnon by the same; Octavia by Thomas Nuce, first printed in 1566; and Her¬ cules Oeteus by Studley. Of Heywood we have already had an account in vol i. col. 663. Studley was educated at Westminster school, and was afterwards of Trinity college, Cambridge. In what capacity he went to Flanders we know not, but it has been said that he had a command under prince Maurice, and was killed at the siege of Breda in 1587. Be¬ sides the plays of Seneca, he translated Bale’s Pageant of Popes, contayninge the Lyues of all the Bishops of Rome from the beginning of them to the yeare of grace 1555. Lond. 1574, 4to. (Bodl. 4to. P. 58. Jur.); and wrote two copies of Latin verses on the death of Nicholas Carr, the Greek pro¬ fessor at Cambridge, which were appended to the professor's translation of Demosthenes, 4to. 1571. (Bodl. 4to. B. 9. Art. B S.) Thomas Nuce, or Newce, was fellow of Pembroke hall in 1562, afterwards rector of Oxburgh, Norfolk; of Bec- cles, W eston Market, and vicar of Gaysley, Suffolk ; and finally, Feb. 21, 1584-5, became prebendary of Ely. He died Nov. 8, 1617, at Gaysley, where he was buried. From his epitaph, preserved in Bentham’s History of Ely, we learn that he had five sons and seven daughters by his wife Ann, who died in l6l3. Of the translation of Seneca, thus jointly executed, the curious reader will find an ample account in Warton’s History of Eng. Poetry, iii, 382; Censura Lite- raria, ix, 386; and British Bibliographer, ii, 372.] [339] 1607-.$