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English theologian and philosopher
Ralph Acton
(
fl.
14th century), was a supposed English
theologian
and
philosopher
, apparently primarily known for his writings, some of which still exist. More recent enquiries suggest that Acton may have been a scribe or, indeed, non-existent.
[1]
Biography
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According to the 1885
Dictionary of National Biography
, Ralph Acton is assigned by
Leland
and his followers to the first half of the fourteenth century. Of the details of his life nothing definite is known, for the sketch given by
Bale
and
Pitts
is so vague as to suggest that it is chiefly made up of inferences. According to these writers Ralph received his early education in country schools, whence in due time he proceeded to
Oxford
. After taking his master's degree in philosophy and theology at this university he was appointed head of a famous church (‘rector cujusdam insignis ecclesiæ’), and henceforward devoted himself in the retirement of his parish to the study of the Scriptures and the care of his flock.
His writings apparently consist of
Homiliæ in quatuor Evangelia
,
Commentarii in Epistolas Paulinas
,
Illustrationes in Petrum Langobardum
, and other works of a similar kind. Two manuscripts of this author are still preserved in the library of
Lincoln College, Oxford
-?the one written in an early fifteenth-century hand; the other the gift of Robert Fleming, a near kinsman of
Richard Fleming
, the founder of this college (1427). We thus get a date later than which our author cannot have flourished; and Leland, Bale, and Pits conjecturally assign him to the reign of
Edward II
(1320). Other manuscripts of Acton's works are said by Tanner to be in the
Bodleian Library
and that of
Peterhouse, Cambridge
.
Literary ghost
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More recent study, summarised in Acton's Oxford Dictionary of National Biography entry suggest that Bale misidentified the author of a number of works, which are in fact by
Radulfus Ardens
, attributing them mistakenly to a Ralph Acton, who may have been a scribe or book name, rather than an author.
[1]
Notes
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References
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- Attribution