British bishop and scholar
Brian Walton
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![](//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/1/15/Walton_Polyglot_%28cropped%29.jpg/220px-Walton_Polyglot_%28cropped%29.jpg) Engraving by Wenceslaus Hollar (1654)
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Consecration
| 2 December 1660
by
Accepted Frewen
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Born
| 1600
Seymour, Yorkshire
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Died
| 29 November 1661 (aged 60?61)
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Denomination
| Anglican
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Spouse
| Anne Claxton
Jane Fuller
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Occupation
| Priest, scholar
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Alma mater
| Cambridge
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Arms: Three geese passant close [no tinctures given]
[1]
Brian Walton
(1600 – 29 November 1661) was an
English
Anglican
priest,
divine
and scholar. He is mostly remembered for
his polyglot Bible
.
Life
[
edit
]
Walton was born at Seymour, in the district of Cleveland,
Yorkshire
. His early education was at the
Newcastle Royal Free Grammar School
.
[2]
He went up to Cambridge as a
sizar
of
Magdalene College
in 1616, migrated to
Peterhouse
in 1618, was bachelor in 1619 and Master of Arts in 1623.
[3]
After holding a school mastership at Suffolk and two curacies (the second as curate of All-hallows, Bread Street), he was made
rector
of
St Martin's Ongar
in London, and of Sandon, in Essex, in 1626. At St Martin's Ongar he took a leading part in the contest between the London clergy and the citizens about the city tithes, and compiled a treatise on the subject, which is printed in
Brewster
's
Collectanea
(1752). His conduct in this matter displayed his ability, but his zeal for the exaction of ecclesiastical dues was remembered in 1641 in the articles brought against him in parliament, which appear to have led to the sequestration of his very considerable preferments.
[a]
He was also charged with Popish practices, but on frivolous grounds, and with aspersing the members of parliament for the city.
[4]
His arms were:
Three geese passant close
.
[5]
He was buried in
Old St Paul's Cathedral
in
London
, but the grave and monument were destroyed in the
Great Fire of London
in 1666. His name appears on a modern monument in the crypt, listing important graves lost in the fire.
[6]
Polyglot Bible
[
edit
]
The proposals for the
Polyglot
appeared in 1652. The book itself came out in six great folios. The first volume appeared in September 1654; the second in July 1655; the third in July 1656; and the last three in 1657. Nine languages are used:
Hebrew
,
Aramaic
,
Samaritan
,
Syriac
,
Arabic
,
Persian
,
Ethiopic
,
Greek
and
Latin
. Among his collaborators were
James Ussher
,
John Lightfoot
and
Edward Pococke
,
Edmund Castell
,
Abraham Wheelocke
and
Patrick Young
,
Thomas Hyde
and
Thomas Greaves
. The great undertaking was the first in England supported by subscription - £50 each. Walton's political opinions did not deprive him of the help of the Commonwealth; the paper used was freed from duty, and the interest of
Cromwell
in the work was acknowledged in the original preface, part of which was afterwards cancelled to make way for more loyal expressions towards that restored monarchy under which Oriental studies in England immediately began to languish. Two versions of the work, one dedicated to Cromwell, and the other known as the "Loyal" one.
[7]
To Walton himself, however, the Restoration brought no disappointment: he was
elected
Bishop of Chester
on 19 October 1660,
confirmed
to that See 22 November, and consecrated a bishop on 2 December 1660.
[8]
In the following spring he was one of the commissioners at the
Savoy Conference
, but took little part in the business. In the autumn of 1661 he paid a short visit to his diocese, and returning to London he died.
[4]
According to an assessment in Chisholm (1911):
However much Walton was indebted to his helpers, the Polyglot Bible is a great monument of industry and of capacity for directing a vast undertaking, and the
Prolegomena
(separately reprinted by Dathe, 1777, and by
Francis Wrangham
, 1825) show judgment as well as learning. The same qualities appear in Walton's
Considerator Considered
(1659), a reply to the
Considerations
of
John Owen
, who thought that the accumulation of material for the revision of the received text tended to atheism. Among Walton's works must also be mentioned an
Introductio ad lectionem linguarum orientalium
(1654; 2nd ed., 1655), meant to prepare the way for the
Polyglot
.
[4]
Manuscripts used by Walton
[
edit
]
See also
[
edit
]
Notes
[
edit
]
- ^
He was from January 1635 to 1636 rector of
Sandon
, in Essex, where his first wife, Anne Claxton, is buried. He appears to have also been a prebendary of
St Paul's
, and for a very short time he had held the rectory of
St Giles in the Fields
.
References
[
edit
]
- ^
"The Armorial Bearings of the Bishop of Chester"
. Cheshire Heraldry Society
. Retrieved
9 February
2021
.
- ^
Welford, Richard (1895).
Men of Mark 'twixt Tyne and Tweed: L?Y
. Vol. III. London; Castle-upon-Tyne: Walter Scott. p. 565.
Citing:
- ^
"Walton, Brian (WLTN616B)"
.
A Cambridge Alumni Database
. University of Cambridge.
- ^
a
b
c
One or more of the preceding sentences incorporates text from a publication now in the
public domain
:
Chisholm, Hugh
, ed. (1911). "
Walton, Brian
".
Encyclopædia Britannica
. Vol. 28 (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. p. 300.
Endnotes:
- Henry J. Todd,
Memoirs of the Life and Writings of Walton
(London, 1821), in two vols., of which the second contains a reprint of Walton's answer to Owen
- M'Clintock, John, and James Strong,
Cyclopaedia of Biblical, Theological, and Ecclesiastical Literature
(New York: Harper & Brothers, Publishers, 1880).
- ^
A Glossary of Terms Used in Heraldry
,
Section G, word: "Goose"
. By James Parker. First Published in 1894. Accessed online January 2019.
- ^
Gill, Macdonald (1 January 1913),
English: Lettering by Max Gill commemorating those who were buried or memorialised in Old St. Paul's Cathedral but whose tombs have not survived. Notable figures listed include King Ethelred, Henry de Lacey, John Poultney, John of Gaunt, his wife Constance (Constantia) of Castile [in fact an error: it was Gaunt's first wife, Blanche of Lancaster, who was buried in the cathedral], Thomas Linacre, William Herbert, Philip Sidney, Francis Walsingham, Christopher Hatton, Thomas Heneage, Thomas Baskerville, Nicholas Bacon, Robert Hare, William Dethick (or Dethic), William Cockayne, John Howson, Anthony Van Dyck and Bryan Walton.
, retrieved
10 October
2020
- ^
"From the Lowy Room: the magnificent 1657 Walton Polyglot Bible"
.
Library and Archives Canada Blog
. 19 February 2015.
- ^
Fasti Ecclesiae Anglicanae 1541?1857
, vol. 11, 2004, pp. 37?42
External links
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