The Reformation of England's Past: John Foxe and the Revision of History in the Late Sixteenth Century 9780429886058, 0429886055

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The Reformation of England’s Past

This book is a detailed examination of the sources and protocols John Foxe used to justify the Reformation, and claim that the Church of Rome had fallen into the grip of the Antichrist. The focus is on the pre-Lollard, medieval history in the first two editions of the Acts and Monuments. Comparison of the narrative that Foxe wrote to the possible sources helps us to better understand what it was that Foxe was trying to do, and how he came to achieve his aims. A focus on sources also highlights the collaborative circle in which Foxe worked, recognising the essential role of other scholars and clerics such as John Bale and Matthew Parker. Matthew Phillpott is a historian focused on the intellectual history of sixteenth-century Britain and Digital Projects Officer for the School of Advanced Study (SAS) at the University of London.

Routledge Research in Early Modern History

The Turks and Islam in Reformation Germany Gregory J. Miller Individuality in Early Modern Japan Thinking for Oneself Peter Nosco The Solemn League and Covenant of the Three Kingdoms and the Cromwellian Union, 1643–1663 Kirsteen M. MacKenzie Guilds, Labour and the Urban Body Politic Fabricating Community in the Southern Netherlands, 1300–1800 Bert De Munck The Discourse of Exile in Early Modern English Literature J. Seth Lee Women and Jewish Marriage Negotiations in Early Modern Italy For Love and Money Howard Tzvi Adelman Piracy and Captivity in the Mediterranean 1550–1810 Edited by Mario Klarer The Reformation of England’s Past John Foxe and the Revision of History in the Late Sixteenth Century Matthew Phillpott For more information about this series, please visit: www.routledge.com/ Routledge-Research-in-Early-Modern-History/book-series/RREMH

The Reformation of England’s Past John Foxe and the Revision of History in the Late Sixteenth Century Matthew Phillpott

First published 2018 by Routledge 711 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017 and by Routledge 2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business © 2018 Taylor & Francis The right of Matthew Phillpott to be identified as author of this work has been asserted in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers. Trademark notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks or registered trademarks, and are used only for identification and explanation without intent to infringe. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data A catalog record for this title has been requested ISBN: 978-1-138-60525-1 (hbk) ISBN: 978-0-429-46791-2 (ebk) Typeset in Sabon by Apex CoVantage, LLC

For Mum and Dad, and for Caroline

Contents

List of Figures and Tables List of Abbreviations Author’s Note Acknowledgments

viii ix xii xiii

1

Our History Is a Lie

1

2

Sources and Evidence

30

3

The First Edition

60

4

From Christ to Constantine

90

5

From King Lucius to Harold Godwinson

115

6

From William the Conqueror to Henry II

142

7

From Richard Lionheart to Edward III

166

8

Our History Is the Truth

191

Appendix: A Bibliography of Sources That Foxe Consulted for His Pre-Lollard History Index

215 227

Figures and Tables

Figures 3.1 Length of narrative sequences in the Acts and Monuments, 1563, Book 1 (counted by the number of words) 4.1 Length of narrative sequences in the Acts and Monuments, 1570, Book 1 (counted by the number of words) 5.1 Length of narrative sequences in the Acts and Monuments, 1570, Book 2 (counted by the number of words) 5.2 Length of narrative sequences in the Acts and Monuments, 1570, Book 3 (counted by the number of words) 6.1 Length of narrative sequences in the Acts and Monuments, 1570, Book 4, William I–Henry II (counted by the number of words) 7.1 Length of narrative sequences in the Acts and Monuments, 1570, Book 4, Richard I–Edward III (counted by the number of words)

62 97 118 120

145

170

Table 5.1 The number of kings slain, deposed, or abdicated in the Acts and Monuments, 1570, Book 2, 162–165

122

Abbreviations

A&M (1563)

A&M (1570)

Bale, Catalogus

Brompton

Cent.

John Foxe. “The Unabridged Acts and Monuments Online or TAMO, 1563 edition” (HRI Online Publications, 2011), www.johnfoxe.org. John Foxe. “The Unabridged Acts and Monuments Online or TAMO, 1570 edition” (HRI Online Publications, 2011), www.johnfoxe.org. John Bale. Scriptorum illustriū maioris Brytannię . . . catalogus . . . usque ad annū hunc Domini 1557 . . . IX centurias continens, etc.: (Scriptorum illustrium . . . posterior pars, quinque continens centurias ultimas) (Basel, 1557). John Brompton. “Chronicon Johannis Bromton Abbatis Iornalensis,” in Historiæ Anglicanæ scriptores X: Simeon Monachus Dunelmensis. Johannes Prior Hagustaldensis. Ricardus Prior Hagustaldensis. Ailredus Abbas Rievallensis. Radulphus de Diceto Londoniensis. Johannes Brompton Jornallensis. Gervasius Monachus Dorobornensis. Thomas Stubbs Dominicanus. Guilielmus Thorn Cantuariensis. Henricus Knighton Leicestrensis. Ex vetustis manusciptis, nunc primùm in lucem editi; Adjectis variis lectionibus, glossario, indicéque copioso., ed. Roger Twysden (London, 1652), cols. 725–1284. Matthias Flacius Illyricus, Johann Wigand, and Mattheus Judix. Ecclesiastica historia, integram ecclesiae Christi ideam quantum ad locum, propagationem, persecutionem, tranquillit., doctrin., haereses, ceremonias, gubunationem, schismata, synodos, personas, miracula, martyria, religiones extra ecclesiam: singulari diligentia et fide ex vetustissimis et optimis historicis, patribus et aliis

x Abbreviations scriptoribus congesta per aliquot studiosos et pios viros in urbe Magdeburgica, 14 vols (Basel, 1559). Fabyan Robert Fabyan. The New Chronicles of England and France, in Two Parts; Named . . . the Concordance of Histories, ed. Henry Ellis (London, 1811). Flacius, CTV (1556) Matthias Flacius Illyricus. Catalogus Testium Veritatis, Qui Ante Nostram Aetatem Reclamarunt Papae: Opus Varia Rerum, Hoc Praesertim Tempore Scitu Dignißimarum, Cognitione Refertum, [. . .] (Basel, 1556), www2.uni-mannheim.de/mateo/ camenahist/autoren/flacius_hist.html. Flacius, CTV (1562) Matthias Flacius Illyricus. Catalogus Testium Veritatis, Qui Ante Nostram Aetatem Pontifice Romano Ejusque Erroribus Reclamarnt, Jam Denuo . . . Emendatiori et Auctior Editus. (Strasbourg, 1562), https://books.google.co.uk/ books?id=PWVeAAAAcAAJ. Flores Henry R. Luard. Flores Historiarum per Matthaeum Westmonasteriensem collecti, 3 vols (London: H.M.S.O, 1890). Gervase Gervase of Canterbury. The Historical Works of Gervase of Canterbury, edited by William Stubbs, 2 vols (London: Longman, 1880). Guisborough Walter of Guisborough. The Chronicle of Walter of Guisborough: Previously edited as The Chronicle of Walter of Hemingford or Hemingburgh, edited by Harry Rothwell (London: Offices of the Society, 1957). Hemingford Walter of Hemingford. Chronicon Domini Walteri de Hemingburgh, Vulgo Hemingford Nuncupati . . . de Gestis Regum Angliæ., edited by Hans C. Hamilton, 2 vols (London, 1848). Higden Ranulph Higden. Polychronicon Ranulphi Higden, Monachi Cestrensis: Together with the English Translations of John Trevisa and of an Unknown Writer of the Fifteenth Century, edited by Joseph R. Lumby and Churchill Babington, trans. John Trevisa (London: Longmans, 1865). Hoveden Roger of Hoveden. Chronica Magistri Rogeri de Houedene, edited by William Stubbs (London: Longmans, Green, Reader, and Dyer, 1868). Huntingdon Henry of Huntingdon. The Chronicle of Henry of Huntingdon: Comprising the History of England, from the Invasion of Julius Caesar to the Accession

Abbreviations

Malmesbury, GP

Malmesbury, GR

Matthew Paris, CM

Matthew Paris, HA

ODNB TAMO

Trivet Walsingham

xi

of Henry II, trans. Thomas Forester (London: Henry G. Bohn, 1853). William of Malmesbury. Gesta Pontificum Anglorum = The History of the English Bishops, edited by Michael Winterbottom and Rodney M. Thomson (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 2007). William of Malmesbury. William of Malmesbury’s Chronicle of the Kings of England from the Earliest Period to the Reign of King Stephen, edited by John A. Giles (London, 1847). Matthew Paris. Matthæi Parisiensis, Monachi Sancti Albani, Chronica Majora, edited by Henry R. Luard, 7 vols (London: Rolls Series, 1872). Matthew Paris. Matthai Parisiensis, monachi Sancti Albani: Historia Anglorum, sive, ut vulgo dicitur, Historia minor., edited by Frederic Madden (London: Longmans, Green, Reader, and Dyer, 1866). Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, www. oxforddnb.com/. John Foxe. “The Unabridged Acts and Monuments Online or TAMO.” (HRI Online Publications, 2011), www.johnfoxe.org. Nicholas Trivet. Annales Sex Regum Angliae, edited by Thomas Hog (London, 1845). Thomas Walsingham. Thomae Walsingham, Quondam Monachi S. Albani, Historia Anglicana, edited by Henry T. Riley, 2 vols (London: Longman, Green, Longman, Roberts, and Green, 1863).

Author’s Note

All references to pages in the Acts and Monuments in this study are to the online TAMO edition, which can be found at www.johnfoxe.org. Mostly, these correspond exactly to the original page numbers but where they do differ due to unusual pagination the original page number(s) have been included in brackets.

Acknowledgments

The origin of this book and a large part of the underlying research with which it contains derives from my doctoral thesis, awarded in 2009. Whilst different in scope and general argument, this book is nonetheless the product of this research, which was entitled Rectifying the “Ignoraunce of History”: John Foxe and the Collaborative Reformation of England’s Past. I would therefore very much like to thank primarily my doctoral supervisor, Professor Emeritus Mark Greengrass, whose constant encouragement, advice, and enthusiasm for the project continue to this day. I would also like to thank my secondary supervisors Professor Sarah Foot and Dr Philip Shaw for their advice and help during this period, and to the lively history postgraduate community that existed at Sheffield at that time. The doctoral research, and thus the basis for this book, is the result of an Arts and Humanities Research Council Postgraduate Award along with the sponsorship of the British Academy John Foxe Project, hosted by the University of Sheffield, Humanities Research Institute (HRI). I am deeply indebted to all three organisations for offering me the opportunity to work on this subject. Although this book has been some 13 years in the making, it is only in the last year that its chapters were written and the ideas and thoughts behind it coalesced into any kind of suitable state. I would, therefore, like to thank my publisher, Routledge, and the series editors of the Routledge Research in Early Modern History for agreeing to publish my research and to the School of Advanced Study (University of London) for their patience. Over the course of this year, I have extensively used the resources of the British Library, the Senate House Library, and the library of the Institute of Historical Research, and I, therefore, would like to thank the staff there for their patience and help in finding books. I would also like to thank Caroline Delaney, Keith Fildes, and Mark Greengrass for reading substantial drafts of the final text, and a variety of others for looking over individual segments. Additionally, I would also like to thank the staff who helped me to peruse various medieval manuscripts at Corpus Christi College, Cambridge; Pembroke College Cambridge; Magdalen College Oxford; the Bodleian; and the British Library. Additionally, I am very much indebted to those who made various digital resources available, especially Early English Books Online

xiv Acknowledgments (EEBO), Parker on the Web, Google Books, Archive.org, and Project Gutenberg, each of which enabled me to examine original and later editions of medieval texts alongside the archive and library copies. More than any other digital resource though, I owe my ability to have worked on this subject to the online edition of John Foxe’s first four editions of the Acts and Monuments, TAMO (The Acts and Monuments Online). This resource is truly transformative for research into John Foxe’s work, untangling the differences between editions and providing methods for searching the contents of each book faster and more accurately than was possible with archived copies of the text or with the composite copies published in the nineteenth century. I am thankful to have had the opportunity to be involved in the latter few years of that project, and I am very much indebted to it for allowing me to carry out this research. Finally, but most importantly, I would like to thank my family for their patience and support over the years, particularly my parents, Trevor and Ann Phillpott, and my fiancée, Caroline Delaney, who has calmly put up with me disappearing to a desk every evening for over a year and complaining bitterly about how Foxe is taking over my life.

1

Our History Is a Lie

Our history is a lie. That was a fundamental hypothesis that dominated many of the writings published during the Reformation in England. Relying on a series of assumptions, beliefs, and methodological practices, clerical scholars argued that the traditional story of English and religious history had been misinterpreted and distorted by past authorities, and that it was up to them to rectify this deficiency. On 20 March 1563, one of the most significant of these works—The Actes and Monuments of Matters Most Speciall and Memorable—went on sale for the first time. Its author was the Lincolnshireborn John Foxe (1516/1517–1587) and its printer John Day (1521/1522– 1584). Together, they worked to reshape history, rendering persecution and martyrdom as the determinant features of the true church. The Acts and Monuments and its creators Foxe and Day were, however, smaller cogs in the larger machine run by Queen Elizabeth’s senior statesmen. Men, such as Sir William Cecil (1520–1598) and Archbishop Matthew Parker (1504–1575), set the tone for English scholarship across a 20-year period, and they themselves focused on the rediscovery and promotion not only of an entirely revised conception of English history but also a new set of standard historical sources upon which that history was expected to emerge. This book examines the processes, methodologies, ideas, and interpretations that formed the backbone of this work, with its focus being the preLollard history in the first two editions of the Acts and Monuments. Such a focus has practical purposes. First, the concentration on pre-Lollard history enables us to study the historical element in the Acts and Monuments, without concerning ourselves with oral testimony or contemporary martyrological material. Both subjects have already received in-depth examination elsewhere.1 This division is also a distinction that Foxe himself made, claiming that Satan was released around the time of the Lollard uprisings and that the fourteenth century was the true beginning point of the Reformation. Second, a focus on the first two editions, that being the first published in 1563 and the second published in 1570, is a benefit to the study, as it covers the period in which Foxe most developed the classical and medieval sequences and where most alterations were made. The third edition, published in 1576

2

Our History Is a Lie

contained almost no changes, whilst the 1583 edition (the final published in the lifetime of Foxe and Day) was largely expanded by bringing contemporary events up to date. The earlier history was largely left alone. This study is about understanding not only the why but also the how behind the purposeful appropriation of history to support and sustain the Elizabethan regime and its programme of religious reforms. The how not only asks how honest Foxe was in his re-ordering of the past but also what sources he used, how he used them, and why. There can be no doubt at all that Protestant reformers came at their past from a de-neutral position—no history that placed the pope as Antichrist could be claimed as otherwise— but how far off a neutral telling was it? On a scale of truth, where might this history be placed and was it any different than other histories written around the same time? To arrive at some answers to these questions, this study will offer a focus on the sources that Foxe and his colleagues used to construct their arguments and compile their history. The Reformation of the sixteenth century represents for writers of history a time of flux not only in what it was that they believed (or should believe) but also in terms of what history was required to tell them. The Reformation placed more emphasis on individual belief and on converting the hearts and minds of people, and not just on producing outward conformity. History and its re-telling were important to this process. There were purely academic challenges as well that had a huge effect on how and why histories were written in the way that they were. Those who wrote histories during the Tudor period and those who sought to gather and collect old manuscripts for the same goal were generally trained in new humanist learnings that placed classical writers, particularly Cicero, in a place of authority and sought to return research to the source.2 Yet retained as well were the older scholastic methods focused on dialectical reasoning and on ideas of inference and disputation.3 This meant that methodological approaches to writing about the past were constantly under scrutiny and persistently evolving whilst contestation arose about religion. Thus ecclesiastical history, such as that compiled by John Foxe, became as much about preserving memory and history as it did about shaping it. It harked back to tradition whilst also striving for re-evaluation. Foxe and his colleagues were asking not only what this history should be about but also how it should be constructed and structured as well. This, then, is the story of how Elizabethan scholars, clergymen, printers, and other men of learning sought to rewrite history for their own age. It is also a story that involves the deconstruction of accepted historiographical practices, assumptions, and arguments in favour of a new interpretation based on the hypothesis that much of the accepted wisdom was flawed. There was a genuine belief amongst English writers that history had long been misrepresented, distorted, and even falsified in favour of the Roman Church, and very much at the expense of the ‘true’ church that was now again believed to be in the ascendancy.

Our History Is a Lie

3

The History of a History The sixteenth century is generally viewed today as a breaking point between the old and the new, the end of medievalism and the bringing forth of science, enlightenment, and renaissance. In the 1560s, that new age would have been apparent, if not for those reasons or on terms that would now be recognisable. The break from Rome in the 1530s followed rapidly by the dissolution of monastic life had transformed England’s landscape both physically and figuratively. The rising of a rival ‘protestant’ Christian faith, especially after the death of Henry VIII, had transformed the Church experience and asked the ordinary person to reappraise his or her approach to religious devotion. This was no small thing to ask. The cult of saints may have been waning, but this by no means meant that belief in a saint’s ability to transmit aid and comfort at times of need was viewed as any less crucial an aspect of community life. People were accustomed to the mystery of the church service—from the lifting of the Mass glimpsed only at a distance through a rood screen to the quoting of Scripture in Latin and right down to the pictorial representation of biblical stories and characters that covered the church fabric in bright colours and evocative imagery. The Reformation in England was not only a political act carried out by a king desiring a divorce but also a wholesale demystification of religion from the revelation of the Scriptures in an understandable tongue right down to the demotion of bread and wine from a very real transformation to little more than a symbolic gesture.4 Of course, there were those who were already dissatisfied with the state of the Church. Widespread envy of and anger at monastic wealth and luxury filled many words of gossip and complaint across the country. But as Eamon Duffy has argued, the Church, whilst needing some aspects of reform, was not in a state of decline or in need of such a massive upheaval as that professed by radical reformers.5 As is often the case, the dissatisfaction of a few highly placed individuals selected the course of change, whilst the rest did their best to conform and manage the upheavals placed on them from above. Alongside this very physical and noticeable change in people’s lives and relationship with the Church, the State and with God, Queen Elizabeth’s government worried itself also with the true state of belief. The rhetoric would have us believe that this concern was due to salvation; only true belief in the acts of faith outlined in Scripture would save the people (and thus themselves) from sin. There is much truth to this claim, and there were certainly many who would have seen salvation as the principal purpose of promoting the reformed church. But the truth of the matter was that Elizabeth’s regime found itself exposed both internally and externally to the threat of collapse. Her claim to the throne could be contested from many avenues, and the threat from Catholic Spain remained ever present. If the hearts and minds of the people could be won over to their new queen, then invasion or rebellion was all the less likely. Such a need to obtain the support of the populace was not, of course, dependent entirely on the religious conversion of the people.

4

Our History Is a Lie

The cult of the ‘virgin queen’ is still clearly recalled because it represented a very successful campaign of propagandistic rhetoric that transformed the Queen of England into a superhuman figure. However, religion did figure prominently. If Elizabeth was promoted as the saviour and protector of England, then her predecessor and Roman Catholic half-sister Mary was vilified as ‘Bloody Mary’. The burning of Protestants during her reign had, even at the time, seemed brutal and savage, and Protestant preachers and writers sought to make use of that. Those Protestant converts presented themselves always in contrast to the other, to what would happen if the Roman Catholic was allowed back into power. They considered themselves to be the light to the pope’s darkness. This was the hearts-and-minds struggle with which the Elizabethan government sought to defend its power base. The constant paralleling of Protestant faith to that of the Roman Catholic became omnipresent. This was nowhere made more clearly than in the revising and rewriting of English history. The Reformation was not to be won or lost through doctrine alone but upon a clearer examination and understanding of the past, and the role of the Church through time. Protestant scholars realised that it was vital not only to reinterpret the traditional stories told in old chronicles and annals but also to claim those histories themselves as untrustworthy testimonies containing a multitude of errors, misleading statements, and full-blown lies. This understanding of the past, present, and future was important for Protestants who sought to overcome the dangerous accusation that the doctrines and theology that they claimed as true were new innovations, without tradition or ancient authority. Protestant reformers recognised this argument as a very real threat to their authority. The trick, however, was to produce something that could speak to a variety of people. The printing press enabled a presentation of beliefs and arguments on a scale inconceivable even a generation earlier.6 It was to prove not only important but also revolutionary in what Elizabethan writers were able to achieve. Men of power recognised that it was vital not only to satisfy the intellectually knowledgeable believer (that was the relatively easy part) but also to convince the learned Roman Catholic as well. It was also important to speak to the ordinary person, those unable to read the Latin tongue and those who might only ever hear the words read out loud, as they were neither in a position or capable of reading the words themselves. The results were staggering. Manuscript copies of old and ancient chronicles—forgotten and neglected just one generation before—were rediscovered, gathered, and used to support and promote a new history of England and the Church. New transcriptions and translations were published, and new histories emerged promoting a past partially familiar but wholly revised both in terms of its content and its primary sources. To be successful, the Reformation of religion required a Reformation of history. John Foxe’s Acts and Monuments speak volumes to this process. Whilst this book is largely remembered as a martyrology recording the writings and

Our History Is a Lie

5

experiences of those persecuted under Mary I, it is also extensively an ecclesiastical history covering the rise and fall of the Roman Church and placing it within a prophetical and often apocalyptic framework. His work would argue (and reveal) that the Protestant ecclesiastical tradition was older and purer than the Roman one. It would place special attention on the English story but would do so in the context of the entire world. It would act as onepart memorial, another history, and another moral guide. It would even act as a type of newspaper, reporting on recent events. The life of John Foxe has been told many times.7 It is well attested, for instance, that Foxe was not originally concerned with the type of work that would lead to an ecclesiastical history. Foxe had spent his younger years as a teacher and translator, receiving his education first at Brasenose College and then beginning his career at Magdalen College, both of Oxford. Foxe would also work as a private tutor in the household of the Duchess of Richmond. His life changed, and his career stalled, when, in the mid-1540s, he refused priests orders as a prerequisite of a Magdalen College fellowship. It seems that Foxe converted to the ideas of Luther around this time. After a brief interlude and the passing of one monarch to another, Foxe was ordained deacon and began to develop a strong network of evangelical friends and colleagues. It was Nicholas Ridley (c. 1502–1555), then Bishop of London (eventually one of the Marian martyrs), who ordained him. He met John Hooper (1495–1555) and John Rogers (c. 1500–1555), both of whom would also become martyrs for the cause; he attracted the attention of William Cecil, future principal secretary to Elizabeth I and met John Bale (1495–1563). Bale is another individual whose life story has been told more than enough times. Lesley P. Fairfield once called him the ‘mythmaker for the English Reformation’, which is not an unfair assessment.8 John N. King labelled him as an ‘evangelical polemicist and historian’, which only scratches the surface of his multifaceted career.9 Bale was a scholar, a bishop, a playwright, a martyrologist, a historian, a polemicist, a bibliophile, a collector of ancient manuscripts, and much more besides. In early life, he was a Carmelite friar who trained at Jesus College, Cambridge, and travelled to Louvain and Toulouse to carry out research into the history of his order. By 1530, Bale had graduated and become prior in Maldon, Essex, and three years later, he was promoted to the convent in Ipswich and then a year later to Doncaster. It was here that his career stalled in much the same way as Foxe. By the mid1530s, Bale had left the Carmelites, married a woman named Dorothy, and put all his efforts into promoting, through learned writings, the Lutheran reforms that he now believed in with complete certainty. Foxe’s meeting with Bale in the 1540s proved significant. It was Bale who encouraged Foxe to write his first Latin commentary. It was Bale who granted him access to manuscripts, especially one containing a collection of Lollard writings. It was Bale who helped Foxe develop an account of the Reformation embedded in the idea that it had begun with John Wycliffe (d. 1384). In exile, it was Bale who aided Foxe in developing martyrologies.

6

Our History Is a Lie

That exile came in 1554 when Mary came to the throne and returned England to the Roman Church. Foxe left relatively late in the same year, first staying at Frankfurt before moving to Basel. During that period of his life, Foxe befriended Edmund Grindal (c. 1516–1583), who was engaged in smuggling out of England tracts and accounts that had been written by their friends who had remained and were now being persecuted and burnt as heretics.10 Grindal engaged Foxe on the Latin edition of this text—a work Foxe did not complete until shortly after Mary’s death. Indeed, that text, called the Rerum in ecclesia gestarum, had become more than what Grindal had originally envisaged. Foxe had adjusted the scope of the work so that it additionally acted as a direct sequel and extension of his own first Latin commentary (the Commentarii), which in turn provided the basis for his English translation and further extension, the Acts and Monuments. Of that latter work, its publisher, John Day, was an equal partner, offering material, ordering woodcuts, and producing special fonts.11 Foxe’s exile work, supported by Bale and Grindal, was therefore transported and reinvented for an English audience. It was, in large part, a memorial for the Protestant martyrs who had died, but increasingly it was also an ecclesiastical history that sought to reveal the true past of the English Church. The Archbishop of Canterbury, Matthew Parker, is another individual who now comes into the story. His part begins in July 1560 when a representative from Germany requested provision of old English manuscripts and books which might aid a project there in the compilation of an ecclesiastical history.12 This project would become commonly known as the Magdeburg Centuries, in which a collaborative group of scholars headed by the controversial disciple of Martin Luther, Matthias Flacius (1520–1575), compiled a giant ecclesiastical history. The project resulted in 14 published volumes tracing church history from Christ to the thirteenth century. Parker turned to Bale for help in answering their questions, resulting in a lengthy response detailing all the known locations of old histories that he could recall.13 When the Centuriators wrote to Parker a year later, the archbishop claimed to have found little of use, but in truth, he was already making it his business to identify, reclaim, and use England’s dispersed manuscript heritage, which had been largely lost during the dissolution of the monasteries in the 1530s. Foxe came under Parker’s patronage, which proved crucial to the development of his history in the second edition. Not only could Parker provide Foxe with access to newly found and rediscovered historical manuscripts but also he brought Foxe into a wider circle or network of scholars, clerics, and antiquarians. This, in brief, is the history of the history and those who sought to make it. There were many others who collaborated in the enterprise, of course: Henry Bull (d. 1577), William Lambarde (1536–1601), John Joscelyn (1529–1603), and Heinrich Pantaleon (1522–1595), to name but a few. These men feature in the story of the Acts and Monuments, but as the following chapters of this book will show, Foxe, Bale, and Parker are key to understanding the

Our History Is a Lie

7

argument, the methodology, and the source base for the reappraisal of English and Christian history within its pages.

History in the Acts and Monuments What did this history look like? The first edition ran to five books and 1,827 pages. Only the first of these books, the first 136 pages, were focused on history before John Wycliffe and then only in detail from the Norman Conquest to the early reign of Henry III. The second edition expanded to 12 books, running to 2,354 pages in total. The first book focused on biblical and Roman history, the second and third on Anglo-Saxon history, and the fourth on Anglo-Norman and Plantagenet history up until the reign of Edward III. Those first four books together cover 513 pages, almost onequarter of the total. The Acts and Monuments is, therefore, a very large work and a substantial portion of it is historical, not contemporary. Nonetheless, ever since J. F. Mozley reinitiated interest in studying Foxe in the 1940s, the focus has been largely on those latter portions. Indeed, Mozley himself dismissed the possibility of any interest in the pre-Lollard material for, he claimed, there is ‘no first-hand value’; it is simply ‘based on previous writers whose works are open to us’.14 Writing in 1963, William Haller was equally as disparaging, dismissing the significance of Foxe’s expansion backwards into history as ‘more easily mistaken than exaggerated’, limiting its purpose to a link between contemporary martyrs and ancient martyrs, identifying the continuance of the true church as persecuted groups, and conceiving of the format as more a ‘hodge-podge of fabulous tales topped off with a martyrology and redeemed only by the inclusion of certain unique documents’.15 Nonetheless, Haller at least recognised the importance that medieval history had to Foxe’s vision of the Reformation. Its importance was as a prologue to the important contemporary history and martyrology. This belief has not altered greatly in the intervening years, although there are some notable exceptions such as the work of Thomas S. Freeman, Elizabeth Evenden, Benedict Scott Robinson, Gretchen E. Minton, and Michael S. Pucci. The John Foxe Project (1992–2009), which placed the first four editions of the Acts and Monuments online, similarly supports the contention that there is value in the preLollard material. Indeed, would Foxe have devoted one-quarter of his entire text (a massive 513 pages and 653,576 words), purely to introduce his contemporary history? Foxe, himself, argued against such a limitation, famously complaining in the second edition of the Acts and Monuments, I professe no such title to wryte of Martyrs: but in general to wryte of rites and Monuments passed in the church and realme of England. Wherin, why should I be restrained from the free walke of a story wryter [historian], more than other that have gone before me?16

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Here Foxe denounces the popular and immediate description of his book as a martyrology or hagiography, as a misrepresentation. Whilst Foxe is a little unclear of his intention in the first edition, the second is clearly identified as an ecclesiastical history, based on the genre instigated by Eusebius of Caesarea in the fourth century.17 Such a history had its own set of protocols. Eusebius had argued that its focus should be ecclesiastical only. No secular history should be allowed. It should also be structured by means of succession. Eusebius had ordered and delineated his content by each rule of a Roman Emperor. The emphasis should be on distant history as well as contemporary, and it should contain frequent inclusion of documents in verbatim. The history should also avoid invented speeches. An additional protocol to ecclesiastical history came later. Eusebius’ successors canonised his text, preferring to insert it as a prologue to their own continuation, not because it was perfect, but because its replication signalled a relationship between the texts. Through such practices, ecclesiastical historians began to see themselves as members of what Robert Markus called, a kind of ‘diachronic syndicate’ in which each of their own instalments added to the previous as a single, cumulative history.18 By examining the historical sequences in the Acts and Monuments as equal to the contemporary, these protocols become more significant and understandable. A better knowledge of what it was that Foxe was doing and understood himself as doing becomes clearer, the value that he attached to history, and therefore a better understanding of what Foxe produced and why he produced it that way, becomes more obvious. Such observations will help to bring a better understanding of the reasons why Foxe’s work is so often seen as martyrology or hagiography, despite his own protestations. In general, and partly because of Mozley and Haller, twentieth-century scholars of Foxe (and many over the last two decades as well) have focused largely on the contemporary portions, believing that this is where the historical interest lies. This is nothing new. Devorah Greenberg suggests that in the eighteenth century, the focus was also on the martyrological sequences and not the historical.19 That focus is most likely true for the early reception as well.20 However, the historical portions of the text were not just ignored and thrown out, as studies often seem to suggest just by a certain bias of focus on the contemporary portions. The historical sequences were used and have had a significant effect on popular knowledge and understanding of English history. The problem is partly one of recognition of this fact and partly because the influence is less obvious and less noticed in the historical record. Historians have borrowed, cited, and integrated the Acts and Monuments into their own histories, often silently, ever since it was first published. Many of Foxe’s historical stories reappeared in Holinshed’s Chronicles and from there in the plays of William Shakespeare (1564–1616). Foxe inspired other historians with his concept of history, such as Sir John Temple (1600– 1677) who wrote the History of the Irish Rebellion (1646).21 Furthermore, it must not be forgotten that the Acts and Monuments itself was republished

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multiple times with a possible 10,000 copies of one edition or another in circulation by the end of the seventeenth century.22 Additionally, the use of the Acts and Monuments in churches and cathedrals as a prop for sermons also meant that Foxe’s stories of past events entered local and national consciousness. Foxe became part of the oral tradition and, therefore, influenced the popular conception of history and, later, English nationalism. His stories were similarly propagated in broadsheets, another outlet for popular and mass-produced reading. Then there are the nineteenth-century debates over religious toleration and Catholic emancipation, which used the Acts and Monuments as a ‘mark or symbol of party spirit’, encouraging re-publication of the text by George Townsend, Stephen Cattley, and Josiah Pratt, and commentary by Samuel Maitland, Robert Parsons, and William E. Andrews.23 Our history is, therefore, in part, moulded from what Foxe wrote both in terms of national imagination and in terms of academic research. Greenberg suggests that Foxe helped to construct images of national identity, installing a sense of persecution and resistance in English national identity that might not have been so forthcoming otherwise.24 In short, there is much more work for historians and literary scholars to do in understanding this transmission and its continued effect on English identity and understanding of itself. More is also to be said about structural, theoretical, and theological elements in the Acts and Monuments. Foxe understood the past in terms of the enactment of Scriptural prophecy, and Richard Bauckham has studied this in some detail, as has Paul Christianson.25 It is known that Foxe initially based his ideas on the concept of five ages as described by John Bale in his Image of Bothe Churches (1545). Each age was expected to have lasted around 300 years with the first being a time of suffering and persecution (300 years from Christ’s passion); the second a time of peace and the removal of Satan from the world (from Constantine’s conversion to Christianity to the pontificate of Silvester II); the third a decline, in part caused by human avarice and in part by whispers by the imprisoned Satan (leading to the first millennium); the fourth corruption and the release of Satan into the world (from the first millennium to the time of the Lollards); and the fifth the age of Reformation and the end of days. Foxe followed Bale’s ideas, arguing that a knowledge of Revelation is crucial to understanding history and that it is a precondition for membership of the elect nation.26 Bale had further conceived of two churches based on his reading of Augustine: one true and faithful and persecuted, the other false and corrupted. Again, Foxe followed and accepted this reading. In the first edition, Foxe used this schema to pit the original ‘primitive’ Roman Church against its contemporary form by arguing that the Church of Rome was no longer the same church that it had been and had become thus the false church. In the second edition, Foxe deviated and altered Bale’s reading of the past. His influences were varied, looking back to William Tyndale’s The Practice of Prelates (1530), which had first identified the

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Antichrist as the papacy, and Johanne Sleiden’s Commentariorum de status religionis et reipublicæ (1555), which had related the past in terms of a similar apocalyptic framework. Foxe must have also considered the works of Matthias Flacius, especially the Magdeburg Centuries, and might have also been influenced by John Knox.27 Foxe came to believe that, per the original schema, the first and second ages should have been free from Satan’s influence (roughly for 600 years from Christ). The third age, a period of decline, brought that number roughly to the millennium, equalling 1,000 years—the length of time that Revelation claimed that Satan would be imprisoned. However, the ten periods of persecution by a variety of Roman emperors undermined the schema. Sometime between starting Book 1 of the second edition and ending it, Foxe changed his mind about the apocalyptic calculations that Bale had made. He even stated the question part way through, asking his reader to question why God would allow such persecutions to occur during the 1,000 years free of Satan.28 The question played heavily on Foxe’s mind. As a result, Foxe produced revised calculations at the end of Book 1, repeating them again at the start of Book 2, in more length at the start of Book 5, and at three points in Book 6. The first age from Christ to Constantine was no longer set during the period of Satan’s binding. Christ had no longer achieved this act himself. Instead, it is Constantine’s conversion to Christianity that binds Satan for 1,000 years, thus moving the moment of its imprisonment 300 years later. Such an alteration had ramifications. First, there was a risk in claiming that Christ’s passion had not resulted in the immediate locking up of Satan. In his telling of the new framework in Book 5, Foxe attempts to add nuance to his new concept by arguing that the passion of Christ did cause Satan to lose ‘all his power’ in taking the ‘soule of ma[n]’, meaning that he could only now focus his ‘furious rage and malice [. . .] against the people of Christ’ by ‘tormenting their outward bodies’.29 Satan’s power had been limited, but not removed. Second, Foxe had placed Satan’s release at the first millennium in the first edition, interpreting Silvester II and Gregory VII as the root cause, viewing increasing contentions between English archbishops, secular princes, and the papacy as symptoms of Satan’s presence, as well as the eventual enthrallment of England under a vindictive and abusive papal church. Foxe inserted wholesale these sequences into the second edition with few changes, but now it was the vague influence of the Antichrist or the distant whisperings of Satan causing a failure of true faith. Satan’s release would not occur until the fourteenth century and the first persecutions against Lollardy. What studies of Foxe’s prophetic history are missing is an understanding and analysis of the actualisation of this framework in the narrative of the text. Christopher Toenjes rectifies this deficiency in his study of Foxe’s construction of Islamic history.30 The same is now required for the preLollard sequences, where the alteration that Foxe made to his calculations has the potential to upset the narrative being told. Furthermore, it is not only a question of how Foxe integrated his understanding of the past into

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the narrative of history but also the underlying assumptions that guided his use and analysis of source material that enabled him to compile that narrative in the first place. Foxe stated his case for prophetic history multiple times across his Acts and Monuments, but such statements do not tell us how he integrated the framework in the history itself. This point brings us back to the core of this study. It is all about sources— where Foxe got them and how he used them—it is also about methodology— Foxe wrote an ecclesiastical history and conceived of the past and present in terms of apocalypse and prophecy. An understanding of the protocols upon which Foxe compiled his history is therefore vital. Some of these will become apparent as this book progresses through that history, others are more general, either unconsciously embedded in the text or consciously followed and adhered to in its compilation. One place to begin is to ask how Foxe conceived of his own project in terms of his expected readership. The multiple prefaces that Foxe provided for each edition of the Acts and Monuments clearly identify his expectation that he was writing for multiple audiences. Foxe claimed to write for the edification of those who had already converted (the true faithful), the Roman Catholic who needed conversion, the learned (both Protestant and Catholic), the nobility and the ordinary person, and, finally, the monarch herself. Each category of person was addressed in one or another preface. In the 1563 edition preface, ‘Persecutors of Gods Truth, Commonly Called Papists’, Foxe claimed that God not only ‘detected’ the guilt of the ‘papists’ but also would have it ‘displayed’.31 Foxe refers specifically to the recent persecutions under Mary, but he also has in mind a much longer list of charges carried out over centuries. In the 1570 edition, under the sub-title To All the Professed Friends and Followers of the Popes Proceedings, Foxe asked his ‘papist’ audience to take note of all the murders, injustices, and cruelties carried out by their church over the course of time. He calls on Roman Catholics to repent their butchery and to question their obedience; he asks, will they answer for these crimes at the time of Judgement?32 The opening preface of the 1570 edition, ‘To the True and Faithful Congregation of Christs Universal Church’, similarly refers to the lies and criticisms of Roman Catholics as a danger to true faith. This preface is directed to fellow Protestants. Foxe asks them to ‘measure’ his history ‘not by the scoryng vp of their hundreds and thousands of lyes’ but by weighing their activities on their good judgement.33 For the learned reader, Foxe had another message. In the 1563 edition, Foxe addressed, in Latin only, a preface that described the hard work that he had put into the Acts and Monuments and his concern that telling the truth would incur ‘great ill will’ and ‘hatred of many people’ for the reason that he engages ‘in such an historical theme of history, as does not relate only to events of earlier years recalled from the distant past, but touches upon this very age of ours’.34 Foxe also chastises those who would call his work a new ‘Golden Legend’, referring to Jacobus da Varagine’s thirteenth-century

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hagiography of saints lives.35 This would seem to be a problem that preexisted the publication of the first edition. Many supporters of the project appeared to talk about it in terms of a Protestant Golden Legend—a hagiography to replace the faulty one belonging to the Roman Catholics. In a dedicatory epistle to the second edition, Laurence Humphrey (c. 1525–1589), a close friend of Foxe, continued to conceive of the work in these terms, arguing that unlike Varagine, Foxe did not ‘embellish’ or ‘invent’, but did produce ‘a new and real Golden Legend’.36 Humphrey’s recommendation was meant as flattery, by arguing that Foxe replaced a false hagiography with a true one. Foxe disagreed. Returning to the preface, Foxe ends his address to the learned reader by offering an apology that his work is not more learned on certain points. The reason, Foxe exclaims, is that the work is ‘published not for your ears, but for mine, that it is for men of the duller crowd, by whom books are more easily read than judged’.37 Thus, again, Foxe offers an expectation of the duality of his readership. In each edition, Foxe provided a preface dedicated to Queen Elizabeth in which he advised his queen to promote and encourage reform in the English Church. In the first edition, Foxe did so by alluding to Elizabeth as a new Constantine and himself as a new Eusebius. John Day even provided an opening woodcut depicting an enthroned Elizabeth enclosed by a large ‘C’. Above her head is depicted the horn of plenty to emphasise all that could be achieved through reform. Below her is a chained pope, holding the broken keys of heaven and surrounded by snakes representing the Antichrist of Rome. To her side, Foxe offers the Acts and Monuments (as the author), Day (as the printer), and, arguably, Sir William Cecil (as the patron).38 The double parallel encapsulated in this woodcut and the opening preface emphasised the similar circumstances in which each leader had brought about a period of peace after a time of persecution and how each writer had documented that history and recorded those who required memorial. In doing so, Foxe sought to argue that the early church and his own church were similarly forged in the blood and acts of martyrs’ lives. He also sought to encourage the queen, through example, to further the cause of Christian faith. The accolade has often been evoked by scholars as a symbol of expectation and a belief that Elizabeth would fully reform the English Church.39 The symbol was downgraded in the second edition because Foxe felt that Elizabeth had not done enough to earn it. What began as encouragement became admonishment. The prefaces, therefore, demonstrate Foxe’s awareness that he was writing for different audiences, with unique needs and requirements. This is his mindset whilst compiling each story and sequence of events. However, as the prefaces also show, there is much more to be learned about what Foxe understood as his purpose whilst compiling his history. Not only is it not a new Golden Legend for Foxe but also it is written in the vernacular to reach as wide an audience as possible. Foxe apologises for this concession,

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recognising the primacy of Latin as the favourable language of learned writing, but emphasising the need for English as a delivery mechanism to reach the whole church of Christ, at least in his homeland of England. The necessity of ‘another’ history is also defended, as are the sources that it is based on. The fact that Foxe chose to discuss these issues in his prefaces is interesting. Foxe recognised their importance for defending the purpose and necessity of his history. They also draw attention to a fundamental requirement for understanding the Acts and Monuments properly. What is the sense of the past that provides a framework and purpose to Foxe’s work?

Sources and a Sense of the Past In 1969, Peter Burke posited that our current sense of the past was lacking in the middle ages, but that its constituent elements—a sense of anachronism, an awareness of evidence, and an interest in causation—were beginning to develop in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries.40 The thesis is debatable, as certain medieval histories were more critical than others in terms of assessing past events. The twelfth-century chronicle of William of Newburgh, for instance, contained critical analysis, a capability to explain the significance of events, and a capacity to evaluate the evidence on which it relied.41 The theory is, then, a generalisation, but a useful one nonetheless for studying and understanding Foxe’s own sense of the past. First, Burke suggests that medieval scholarship is uncritical. This first protocol concerns itself with a failure to recognise the difference between the past and the present state. Burke argues that medieval chroniclers projected their own present onto the past as if it were one and the same. The individual person is therefore described and explained as based on contemporary actions, laws, and culture, rather than on his or her cultural and political state. According to Burke, the differences of the past were either ignored entirely or explained in one of two ways: often a difference was explained as ‘foreign’, placing anything outside of ordinary expectations into a category of otherness.42 Alternatively, historical figures or events were granted a supernatural dimension to explain variation. There are multiple examples of these explanations in the Acts and Monuments. Foxe often argues that alterations in the Church are due to outside influences, mainly ‘Italians’ (sometimes his shorthand for the papacy), he also explains certain events, persons, and groups as influenced by Satan, Antichrist, and God. The task here will be to identify the extent that these examples satisfy Burke’s claim that a history, such as Foxe’s, might not have a sense of anachronism. The second protocol for having a modern sense of the past, as posited by Burke, is an awareness of evidence.43 This is much easier to identify in the Acts and Monuments, as Foxe directly challenges his readers to consider issues of source material in his prefaces to the second edition. For instance, in his preface ‘To the True and Faithful Congregation of Christ’s Universal Church’, Foxe drew his reader’s attention to the problems of source material

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and the weakness that he and his colleagues saw in the chronicle heritage. He argued, ‘These writers while they shew us one halfe of the Bishop of Rome, the other halfe of him they leave unperfect, and utterly untold’.44 Foxe referred to the fact that most chronicles and annals had been written by monks and clerics, and that all histories drew upon a shared and blind acceptance of Roman domination. In using these words, Foxe wanted to draw his reader’s attention to the problems of source material and the weakness that he and his colleagues saw in the chronicle heritage. He also wanted to outline how they had striven to overcome these weaknesses by employing a particular methodology to interrogate those texts. When Foxe claimed that the ‘simple flocke of Christ’ and especially the ‘unlearned’ had been sold a lie, he argued for nothing less than the oblivion of collective knowledge.45 If history was not what it appeared, then how could any person be sure that his or her faith was valid? Foxe calls this ‘ignorance of history’ and claimed it as the gravest of dangers. By dislocating the present from the past, Foxe made his own history necessary. The Church of England could not bring forth the true church without historical foundation. That foundation had collapsed, based as it were on faulty, corrupted, and disingenuous authorities who owed their allegiance to a false faith. The Acts and Monuments, then, would ‘open the plaine truth’ through a reappraisal of the historical story, but above all a reassessment of the very sources upon which it was based. The solution was not to ignore old chronicles but to sub-divide their contents in terms of what Protestant scholars believed to be correct and incorrect statements. Such critical analysis based on theological, rather than historical assumptions, provided a lens through which England’s manuscript heritage could be reassessed and a specific interpretation extracted. Thus when Foxe laments that ‘their Monumentes’ were ‘drawen to the honour specially of the Church of Rome, or els to the favour of their owne sect of Religion’, he reveals his own use of this analytical protocol.46 Foxe, therefore, goes on to base his argument on concepts of truth, knowledge, and accuracy arguing, Most thinges [had been] lost in silence, and some againe misshadowed & corrupted, eyther through obtrectation, or flattery of writers, who not observing Legem historiae in Tully required, semed eyther not bold enough to tel truth, or afraide enough to beare with untruth and time.47 Tully, more commonly called Marcus Tullius Cicero (106 BC–43 BC), was extremely influential on early humanist thought and, indeed, had been influential to scholars ever since he had first introduced the Romans to the chief schools of ancient Greek philosophy.48 In his De Oratore (written around 55 BC), he argued that the first law of history should be the priority of truth. Foxe includes it here as a standard protocol of humanist learning, but it is nonetheless a statement that should be considered further. What was

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the truth for Foxe? He understands that the historical record survives only as a collection of partial records and is written through a variety of biased perspectives, but his understanding of this is also biased. The truth that Foxe seeks to identify is a different truth than the original authors sought and different to the kind of truth that modern-day historians seek to identify. Foxe wrote at length on how the records of the past—the chronicles and annals—were nothing more than the flawed record of Roman Catholic monks and clerics now shown as having ‘abused’, ‘partially handled’, and in some cases ‘fabricated’ their histories. Crucially, those records could not be entirely abandoned—if they were, there would have been no place to turn for proof or evidence—but neither could they be trusted in their entirety. More than anyone else it was Foxe’s colleague, friend, and mentor John Bale who had come up with a way forward. During the late 1530s, whilst Henry VIII and his ministers were dissolving the monasteries, men such as Thomas Cromwell (d. 1540) promoted the idea that everything about the Roman Church had been corrupted.49 This included the books and manuscripts in their libraries. Thus monastic chronicles and religious and intellectual works were all lumped together by the growing learned evangelical communities as nothing more than a storehouse of papal corruption. Some historians, such as Ronald Harold Fritze, have concluded that this negative association of the monastic manuscripts explains the lack of interest at the time.50 The monastic libraries were abandoned, leaving their works open to anyone who might want them (much of which ended up being sold abroad or used as wrapping paper). Many scholars also feared the accusation that they were ‘papal’ sympathisers because they retained monastic texts (an accusation that the antiquarian John Stow would have to deal with in 1568). However, James Carley has suggested that such a conclusion is not as simple as it appears and that it is Bale who was one of the first to argue for a partial saving of the monastic heritage.51 There are many choice quotes from Bale’s writings supporting and promoting the idea that England’s manuscript heritage required attention. These begin in 1549 when he edited The Laboriouse Journey and Serche of Johan Leylande and continued until his death in 1563. In The Laboriouse Journey, Bale lamented, ‘That in turnynge over of the superstycyouse monasteryes so lytle respecte was had to theyr lybraryes for the savegarde of those noble  & precyouse monumentes’.52 Bale held no love for the monasteries and he makes that clear, but the destruction of their labours—labours that Bale had himself been a part of—was an offence to his antiquarian nature. This position Bale emphasises with a warning that ‘to destroye all without consyderacyon, is and wyll be unto Englande for ever, a moste horryble infamy amonge the grave senyours of other nacyons’.53 Later in life, Bale continued to extoll the same position. In writing to Matthew Parker in the 1560s, Bale again suggested that manuscripts had been sold overseas and that pages could now be found in various shops, their value reduced to nothing more than waste paper.

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What Bale was proposing here and elsewhere though was not the wholesale protection of monastic written ‘monuments’ but a choice selection. Bale differentiated books as ‘the profytable corne’ and the ‘unprofytable chaffe’, depending on their ability to say anything useful to the evangelical cause. This is what he wrote in full: I have wyshed (and I scarsely utter it without teares) that the profytable corne had not so unadvysedly and ungodly peryshed wyth the unprofytable chaffe, nor the wholsome herbes with the unwholsome wedes, I meane the worthy workes of men godly mynded, and lyvelye memoryalles of our nacyon, wyth those laysy lubbers and popyshe bellygoddes.54 Bale was arguing here that although many of the texts hidden away in monastic libraries represented corrupted ideas and doctrines, there were, nonetheless, much that was worthy to be saved either wholly or partially. To take Bale’s weed metaphor—a gardener does not pluck out all plants in the ground, only those that are no use to him (the weeds) and harmful to those that will ultimately feed him (the herbs and vegetables). Neither was Bale alone in this opinion. In worrying about how monastic books tended to end up as book bindings for foreign publications, Parker expressed that many monastic texts—including popish laws and decretals—were worthy of such disregard but that other texts ‘our ancient Chronicles, our noble Histories, our learned Commentaries, and Homilies upon the Scriptures’ required saving, urgently.55 In her insightful 2008 study of pre- and postReformation libraries, Jennifer Summit describes Parker’s concern regarding ‘monuments of antiquity’ as an exclusive one, not inclusive.56 Parker separated texts as monuments of antiquity and monuments of superstition; he preserved some texts but suppressed others. The clergyman, Stephen Batman (1542–1584) noted that Parker only kept a small selection of the books he sent him, and the contents of Parker’s library prove this. Historians have often noted how Batman claimed to have sent Parker 6,700 books whilst he acted as his agent. There is much dispute over this figure— many claims to its exaggeration, but what Summit notes is that of the 433 books Parker bestowed to Corpus Christi College, Cambridge, only two can be traced to Batman.57 Whilst far from meaningful as a figure, this does strongly illustrate how narrow Parker’s choices were. The texts he chose to preserve were selected and categorised carefully, and much appears to have been discarded. As Summit further notes, John Leland also claimed to have saved many books, but what survives of his is very small.58 Was Leland also selecting what he felt worthy to be saved at the expense of unworthy texts? John Bale certainly believed this to be the case, although how trustworthy the cause Bale gives regarding Leland’s own real views are hard to judge. Carley, for instance, suggests that all too often, Leland’s work and voice has been seen through the prism of Bale.59 When publishing Leland’s New Year gift as

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The Laboryouse Journey, Bale noted that Leland’s ‘noble purpose was thys, to save the precyouse monume[n]tes of auncyent wryters, which is a most worthy worke, and so to brynge them from darkenesse to a lyvely light, to the notable fame and ornature of this la[n]d’.60 The focus on ancient writers is noticeable as is the focus on ‘this land’ and its ‘notable fame’. Leland notoriously published very little in his lifetime, whilst publicly promising a great deal. His travels in the 1530s resulted in notebooks full of evidence regarding the extent and form of monastic books and manuscripts, but these have largely passed down to us through those notes and via reuse by scholars such as Bale. What there is, however (either in published form or only as notes or exclamations of planned works), reveals in Leland a selective interest in the ‘monuments’ of those monastic houses. Leland, for instance, published an attack on Polydore Vergil (c. 1470– 1555), asserting King Arthur and Merlin as historical fact, not fiction as Vergil insisted (this appeared in his Assertio inclytissimi Arturii regis Britannia). He nearly completed a De viris Illustribus (history of British writers), which work would later be taken up by Bale and even later by Anthony Hall (in the early eighteenth century). Leland did produce a presentation copy of Antiphilarchia, an antipapal dialogue. He also envisaged a topographical account of Britain, another on the history of British universities, and another on British ecclesiastical history. Leland also promised to focus on ‘the beginninges, encreases, and memorable actes of the chiefe townes, and castelles of the prouince’.61 Carley argues that Leland sought to support Henry VIII’s Restraint of Appeals to Rome and Act of Supremacy via an edifice of British origins and Arthurian history.62 Indeed, Leland’s searches of the monasteries focused on ancient writers, especially pre-Saxon, and evidence of origins in terms of the founding of the realm and topography. His searches sought and focused on the ancient authority of Tudor monarchy. Leland may not have regarded the rest as precious monuments at all. Others also focused exclusively on manuscripts that talked about English origins. Sir John Prise (1501/2–1555), a collector of books but also one of Cromwell’s commissioners sent to suppress monasteries, was one of those.63 Both he and Leland were amongst the first to write a rebuttal to Polydore Vergil’s exclamations against the Brutus myth of England’s foundation. John Twyne (1505–1581), the headmaster of King’s School, Canterbury, also looked at the monastic collections with a similar eye to worthy and unworthy works related exclusively to what they could tell him about the origins of this island.64 Meanwhile, Thomas Cromwell and Thomas Cranmer (1489– 1556) had specifically saved manuscripts that provided precedents for the supremacy but were content to leave the rest to their fate. These examples raise a question. Does Foxe too select the ‘corn’ from the ‘chaff’ when he reassessed the manuscript heritage? Is this how Foxe understood his evidence and identified those elements that he considered ‘worthy of knowledge’? These questions are crucial to understanding the formation of pre-Lollard history in the Acts and Monuments and additionally to

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answering Peter Burke’s emphasis on appraising evidence as a key tenant of early modern histories. Returning to Burke’s protocols for assessing a sense of the past, his third protocol is an interest in causation. According to Burke, medieval chronicles and annals were designed and written to refer to one event after another, with no attempt to analysis or contextualisation.65 Statements such as ‘because’ or ‘as a result’ had no purpose in such histories. Foxe, however, lived in a time of humanist learning in which such questions were asked of historical chronology. There is no doubt that Foxe shows an understanding of causation; his book consistently analyses and compares stories and narratives, and makes an argument about the importance of specific occurrences. There is, however, a question regarding Foxe’s perception of causation. What does he identify as causal events and how does he interpret them in a meaningful way? This question leads us to further questions regarding the use of truth and issues regarding bias and reliability. In the preface to the Cattley and Pratt edition of the Acts and Monuments, George Townsend argued that the ‘principles’ of Foxe’s history are ‘those of a learned, humble Christian, well versed in the fathers, well acquainted with tradition, well skilled in Scripture, and convinced by all the three that the Church of Rome inculcated error’.66 He further explains that the ‘object’ for Foxe in writing and completing the work was ‘to relate the history of the Church before his own day’ and ‘to record the evils which have resulted’.67 When Mozley characterised Foxe in the 1940s, he called him partisan, but in doing so emphasised that Foxe was honest in his one-sidedness.68 Foxe ‘has no use for impartiality’, Mozley tells us. His history was compiled ‘with a purpose’ which ‘bore him forward’. William Haller, meanwhile, emphasised that Foxe’s history not only sought to convince the people of a revised history but also to provide new meaning to the past and lessons for the present.69 For Haller, the question is not whether Foxe told the truth in his history, but why the truth that Foxe understood convinced so many of his countrymen. Foxe did not write a history simply as a supporting mechanism for Elizabethan religious conformity, but did so to win the hearts and minds of England’s citizens to his cause, to memorialise those who had perished for their beliefs—including many of his own friends—and to warn and encourage those in positions of authority of the need of defending the faith. For Foxe, the exploration of history was not neutral by default. The honest partisanship that Foxe’s biographers describe is key to what he was trying to achieve. The task here is to identify the use of partisanship in the pre-Lollard history and compare it to the descriptions provided by Foxe’s biographers. Does such a comparison grant us a better understanding of causation in the Acts and Monuments? Beyond identifying Foxe’s sense of the past, but intricately related to it, is the tendency for Foxe to read history as cylindrical and reflective of supernatural battles between good and evil. This is another protocol for

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understanding Foxe’s history, outlined in basic form in the 1960s by Fred Levy.70 Essentially, the historical past was interlinked and reflective of the historical present and future. The belief in a future moment of judgement herded the past and present towards that singular point, directing the telling of history as a process, guided and directed by supernatural elements sometimes, and often in conflict with one another. William Haller believed that Foxe’s work was reliant on a continuity of martyrs, in which those who had died for the faith in the first few centuries of Christianity were the same as those who died in the sixteenth century.71 Historical figures, as Warren Wooden also argued, were understood in terms of biblical archetypes, suppressing individual characteristics and historical and geographical context in preference for a reading of similarity and comparison: King John was of a similar type to Henry VIII, Elizabeth a new Constantine, and Foxe a new Eusebius.72 The argument that Wooden and Haller make suggests that these were not just allegorical representations, used to make a point (although they did have this purpose), but an analytical system for understanding humanity as repetitive in all its forms and personalities. On these terms, history repeats itself. It does not progress forwards, nor does it alter substantively. Indeed, alteration and novelty are enemies, a threat to the natural order of things. In our post-enlightenment age where empirical science and rational judgement are considered the essential truths of our times, tradition is rarely looked upon favourably beyond a wistful (but useless) sense of nostalgia. Edward Shils, amongst others, has closely examined this sense of being and concludes that, at most, tradition provides a sense of consistency and a framework for maintaining social unity or imbuing a sense of cultural identity.73 Novelty, meanwhile, is a driver. Innovation provides rebirth, change, and improvement. This has become a prevailing belief in the Western world over the last few centuries, but it is not the belief that has driven humanity for most of its history. It has been reversed. During the Reformation, supporters of the Roman Church claimed that Protestant reformers were without tradition and therefore lacked any basis for their faith in ancient authority. They asked Protestants, ‘Where was your church before Luther?’, a question most clearly articulated by Thomas Harding as a response to John Jewel’s Apologia and Foxe’s first edition of the Acts and Monuments. He wrote, If the Gospel beganne with Luther and Zuinglius, how was it before? If before their time the Gospel was vnknowen and vnhearde of (for so the Apologie saith) then where was there any truth at al? If it were not knowen, nor hearde of at al, where was it in al the earth?74 This was considered a dangerous accusation and one that required an immediate response. Western thought considered novelty as a serious and worrying phenomenon based on the premise that everything right (and Christian) had existed in completion from the beginning of time and should remain

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unchangeable. God, it was argued, had determined the entire historical drama from beginning, middle, and end. Human history was a book already written, its pages set rigidly on the page. Thus, as Patrick Collinson has argued, what looks like anachronistic plagiarism to us in the historical and polemical literature, was an assumption that human nature and behaviour were unchanging constants, ‘and that once described in classical antiquity, it was not necessary to invent new descriptions of those qualities’.75 Protestants, therefore, rebuffed the Roman Catholic position by arguing that the doctrines, rules, and institutions built up over a millennium and a half were novelties. The centrality of Scripture was key to their argument.76 Whilst human history was understood as mutable and corruptible, the words of Scripture were the unalterable truth. Indeed, one of the main areas of contention in the Reformation was the idea of Sola Scriptura as of paramount importance and the frailty and weakness of human activities in comparison. Therefore, in his prefaces, Foxe argued that the corruption of the Church was a temporal process of long decline, caused by supernatural forces, and eventually brought about by the activities of four or five specific popes, each influenced by the Antichrist. Foxe wrote, All these deformities above touched of vaine title, of pretensed iurisdiction, or heretical doctrine, of schismatical life, came not into the church of Rome all at one time, nor sprang with the beginning of the same Church, but with long working, and continuaunce of time by litle and litle crept up, through occasion, and came not to their ful perfection, til the time partly of Pope Silvester, partlye of Pope Gregory the vij. An. 1170. Partlye of Innocentius the third, and finallye of Pope Boniface the eight an. 1300.77 Each of the four popes has a specific role to play in the temporal process of decline. Silvester II (AD 670) begins that process by making claims of primacy over other bishops after making a deal with the devil to obtain his pontificate. Gregory VII (1170 AD) then expands this claim of supremacy over the jurisdiction and authority of kings and emperors, and in thus doing so unleashes Satan onto the world. Innocent III (1160 AD) begins the process of corrupting life for all men, by encouraging a ‘rable’ of monks, friars, and priests to corrupt and obscure doctrine and manners, whilst Boniface VIII and Clement V (1300 AD) complete the process by completely corrupting faith and by enthralling all otherworldly powers to their own. In parallel, Foxe described various groups and individuals who maintained the true faith and who, Foxe could point towards, as the basis for the Protestant faith of his present time. Where was his church before Luther? Foxe answered that it was the original apostolic church, persecuted throughout history, but able to survive in small groups and now given greater strength because of men such as Luther and Zwingli. Foxe is far from alone in such a reading. In his preface to his English translation

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of Heinrich Bullinger’s Antiquissima Fides et vera Religio, as ‘The Olde Fayth’, Miles Coverdale wrote, Is no newefangled fayth: no straunge fayth, no fayth invented by mannes brayne, but even the same that Gods holy spirite teacheth in the infallible trueth of his scripture.78 Coverdale was not just writing his own opinion here. Bullinger held a core belief that those who fell for novelties were not God’s elect or chosen.79 The question for this study regarding claims of novelty and tradition then is to what extent the narrative of pre-Lollard history reflects the answer to the challenge of novelty and depicts human history (post-Scripture) in terms of right and wrong processes. Does Foxe, for example, always depict alterations as novelties (and therefore as corruptions) and identify the true faith through the lens only of Scripture? Does tradition, for Foxe, end soon after the Bible? How does Foxe link these concepts to actual history? The answers to these questions can only be deduced by a greater understanding of the pre-Lollard history.

Conclusions An understanding of all these facets which led Foxe and his colleagues to forge the Acts and Monuments into its final form consciously or unconsciously can be tested and examined through an analysis of sources and their use in the pre-Lollard sequences. The claims are that Foxe wrote history as a form of hagiography, linking past, present, and future events by prophetic and apocalyptic frameworks, but he did so in the larger genre of ecclesiastical history, using Eusebian principles wherever possible. Foxe also used the past as an example for the present and conceived of historical change in terms of deviation from the true path of religious devotion as outlined in Scripture. Foxe was openly partisan. He has a purpose and directive which he outlines in the prefaces. Foxe writes for multiple audiences but does so to defend the Reformation from Roman Catholic critics and to convert English citizens or enhance their belief in Protestant doctrines. The question is how well did Foxe achieve these aims and how closely did he follow these protocols when using his sources to write his history? Answering that question, and all that it contains, is the purpose of this book. It will not be possible to refer to every item of interest, nor every story that Foxe tells. The length of his pre-Lollard history precludes that possibility, at least for this study. What can be done is to draw out conclusions based on a close reading of what Foxe says and an analysis of how he constructed each sequence of the narrative. The starting point, Chapter 2, will be to examine further the source material that Foxe used (where he got them and why he used them). This starting point is important, as it provides the basis upon which a study of

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the first two editions can be made. That begins with an examination of Book  1 in the first edition of the Acts and Monuments. Chapter 3 will, therefore, examine the extent and purpose of pre-Lollard history when Foxe first began its study in the 1560s. Subsequent chapters focus on the pre-Lollard history in the second edition of 1570. Foxe’s own division of periods will help supply a natural division for these chapters. Chapter 4 focuses on Roman history in Book 1 and Chapter 5 on Anglo-Saxon history in Books 2 and 3. Book 4 of the Acts and Monuments is divided into Chapters 6 and 7 as this is, by far, the longest of the pre-Lollard books both in terms of word count and content. Chapter 6 focuses on the first half— where Foxe describes history between the Norman Conquest of England and the story of Thomas Becket during the reign of Henry II. Chapter 7 looks at the rest of Book 4. Taken together, these chapters will demonstrate that the pre-Lollard history can help to improve understanding of the whole of Foxe’s work, especially his purpose and intention. It should also help with an understanding of his textual practices and his worldview, both equally important to understanding the contemporary and martyrological elements of his work. Furthermore, it should not be forgotten that whilst Foxe believed that the history he had inherited was somewhat of a lie, he believed that the history he wrote was a better truth. Many agreed with him. Many did not. It is hoped that this study shows that Foxe should be taken seriously as a historian of late sixteenth-century England beyond the confines of religious history. He had an effect on his own time and beyond, both in terms of those who agreed with him and those that did not, but also in terms of becoming a historical source that would feed ideas about the past for centuries to come.

Notes 1. There is an extensive bibliography of studies on John Foxe available in the critical apparatus at John Foxe, “The Unabridged Acts and Monuments Online or TAMO” (HRI Online Publications, 2011), Accessed January 10, 2018, www. johnfoxe.org. Most of these studies focus on the contemporary portions of the Acts and Monuments. 2. For more on Foxe’s humanist approach, see John N. King, “Religious Dissidence in Foxe’s ‘Book of Martyrs’: Humanism or Heresy?,” Religion & Literature 32, no. 2 (2000): 141–56. For an argument concerning the centrality of Cicero in Elizabethan thought see Michael Pincombe, Elizabethan Humanism: Literature and Learning in the Later Sixteenth Century (Harlow: Longman, 2001), 15–36. 3. For an outline of the issues involved in scholastic and humanist methodology, see Alister E. McGrath, The Intellectual Origins of the European Reformation, 2nd ed. (Malden, MA; Oxford: Blackwell Publishing, 2004). 4. For a sample of recent and divergent arguments on the Reformation, see Eamon Duffy, Reformation Divided: Catholics, Protestants and the Conversion of England (London: Bloomsbury, 2017); Mark Greengrass, Christendom Destroyed:

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5. 6.

7.

8. 9. 10.

11.

12. 13.

14. 15. 16. 17.

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Europe 1517–1648 (London: Penguin, 2015); and Diarmaid MacCulloch, Reformation: Europe’s House Divided (London: Allen Lane, 2003). Eamon Duffy, Stripping of the Altars: Traditional Religion in England, 1400– 1580, New ed. (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1994); and Duffy, Reformation Divided: Catholics, Protestants and the Conversion of England. For a general appraisal of the printing press and the Reformation, see Mark Edwards, Printing, Propaganda, and Martin Luther (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1994). Foxe, himself, discusses the importance of the technology at A&M (1570), 858–9. The first biography of John Foxe was written by his son, Samuel, as a preface to the 1641 edition of the Acts and Monuments. Many versions have since been written. The most up to date is Thomas S. Freeman, “Foxe, John (1516/17–1587), Martyrologist,” ODNB, 2004, https://doi.org/10.1093/ref:odnb/10050. Leslie P. Fairfield, John Bale, Mythmaker for the English Reformation (Eugene, Oregon: Purdue University Press, 1976). John N. King, “Bale, John (1495–1563), Bishop of Ossory, Evangelical Polemicist, and Historian,” ODNB, 2004, https://doi.org/10.1093/ref:odnb/1175. See Patrick Collinson, Archbishop Grindal, 1519–1583: The Struggle for a Reformed Church (London: Jonathan Cape, 1979), 72–81, which reappraises the evidence first given in John Strype, The History of the Life and Acts of the Most Reverend Father in God, Edmund Grindal: The First Bishop of London, and the Second Archbishop of York and Canterbury Successively, in the Reign of Queen Elizabeth . . . [Etc.] (London: John Hartley, 1710). Elizabeth Evenden, Patents, Pictures and Patronage: John Day and the Tudor Book Trade (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2008). The case is again made in Elizabeth Evenden and Thomas S. Freeman, Religion and the Book in Early Modern England: The Making of John Foxe’s ‘Book of Martyrs’ (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2011). Norman L. Jones, “Matthew Parker, John Bale, and the Magdeburg Centuriators,” The Sixteenth Century Journal 12, no. 3 (1981): 35–49, https://doi. org/10.2307/2539785. John Bale’s 1560 reply to Parker was first published in Henry R. Luard, “A Letter From Bishop Bale to Archbishop Parker: Communicated by the Rev. M.R. Luard,” Cambridge Antiquarian Communications; Being Papers Presented at the Meetings of the Cambridge Antiquarian Society 3, no. 15 (1865): 157–73. More recently, the letter was published with annotations by Timothy Graham and Andrew G. Watson, The Recovery of the Past in Early Elizabethan England: Documents by John Bale and John Joscelyn From the Circle of Matthew Parker (Cambridge: Cambridge Bibliographical Society, 1998). James Frederic Mozley, John Foxe and His Book (London: Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge, 1940), 130. William Haller, Foxe’s Book of Martyrs and the Elect Nation (London: Jonathan Cape, 1963), 141–42. A&M (1570), 851. Robert A. Markus, “Church History and Early Church Historians,” Studies in Church History 11 (1975): 1–17, https://doi.org/10.1017/S0424208400006252. For more on the influence of Eusebius on Foxe see Gretchen E. Minton, “‘The Same Cause and like Quarell’: Eusebius, John Foxe, and the Evolution of Ecclesiastical History,” Church History 71, no. 4 (2002): 715–42; V. Norskov Olsen, John Foxe and the Elizabethan Church (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1973); Haller, Foxe’s Book of Martyrs and the Elect Nation; Thomas S. Freeman, “‘Great Searching Out of Bookes and Autors’: John Foxe as an Ecclesiastical Historian” (PhD diss., Rutgers University, 1995).

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18. Markus, “Church History and Early Church Historians,” 8. 19. Devorah Greenberg, “Eighteenth-Century “Foxe”: History, Historiography, and Historical Consciousness,” TAMO, 2004, www.johnfoxe.org/index.php?realm= more&gototype=&type=essay&book=essay8. 20. David Loades, “The Early Reception,” TAMO, 2004, www.johnfoxe.org/index. php?realm=more&gototype=&type=essay&book=essay7. 21. Kathleen M. Noonan, “‘Martyrs in Flames’: Sir John Temple and the Conception of the Irish in English Martyrologies,” Albion: A Quarterly Journal Concerned With British Studies 36, no. 2 (2004): 223–55, https://doi.org/10.2307/4054214. 22. Patrick Collinson, “John Foxe and National Consciousness,” in John Foxe and His World, ed. David Loades (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2002), 26. 23. Peter Nockles, “The Nineteenth Century Reception,” TAMO, 2004, www.johnfoxe. org/index.php?realm=more&gototype=&type=essay&book=essay9; and Andrew Penny, “John Foxe’s Victorian Reception,” The Historical Journal 40, no. 1 (1997): 111–42. 24. Greenberg, “Eighteenth-Century “Foxe”: History, Historiography, and Historical Consciousness”. 25. Richard Bauckham, Tudor Apocalypse: Sixteenth Century Apocalyptism, Millenarianism and the English Reformation, From John Bale to John Foxe and Thomas Brightman (Oxford: Sutton Courtenay Press, 1978); and Paul Christianson, Reformers and Babylon: English Apocalyptic Visions From the Reformation to the Eve of the Civil War (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1978). 26. John Breen, “‘The Faerie Queene’, Book I and the Theme of Protestant Exile,” Irish University Review 26, no. 2 (1996): 226–36. 27. On John Knox and his apocalyptic ideas see Richard Kyle, “John Knox and Apocalyptic Thought,” The Sixteenth Century Journal 15, no. 4 (1984): 449–69, https://doi.org/10.2307/2540361. For Matthias Flacius see Oliver K. Olson, Matthias Flacius and the Survival of Luther’s Reform (Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz in Kommission, 2002). 28. A&M (1570), 151 (138). 29. Ibid., 514. 30. Christopher Toenjes, Islam, the Turks and the Making of the English Reformation: The History of the Ottoman Empire in John Foxe’s Acts and Monuments (Frankfurt am Main; New York: Peter Lang, 2016). 31. A&M (1563), 12 (934). 32. A&M (1570), 13–15 (blank). 33. Ibid., 1 (blank). 34. A&M (1563), 9 (blank). 35. This work can be found in the modern edition by Jacobus da Voragine, The Golden Legend: Readings on the Saints, trans. William G. Ryan (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1993). 36. A&M (1570), 20 (blank). 37. A&M (1563), 11 (933). 38. In 1975, Frances A. Yates, Astraea: The Imperial Theme in the Sixteenth Century, New ed. (London: Pimlico, 1993), 156, suggested that the woodcut symbolised the three estates of the realm, while John N. King, English Reformation Literature: The Tudor Origins of the Protestant Tradition (Princeton, NJ; Guildford: Princeton University Press, 1983), 435, has suggested that the image depicted John Foxe, John Day, and Thomas Norton. By comparing the third figure to another drawing of William Cecil, Elizabeth Evenden, and Thomas Freeman, “John Foxe, John Day, and the Printing of the ‘Book of Martyrs’,” in Lives in Print: Biography and the Book Trade From the Middle Ages to the 21st Century, ed. Michael Harris, Giles Mandelbrote, and Robin Myers (London: Oak Knoll

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39.

40. 41. 42. 43. 44. 45. 46. 47. 48. 49.

50. 51. 52.

53. 54. 55. 56. 57. 58. 59.

60.

61. 62. 63.

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Press, 2002), 23–54, have suggested that this is in fact William Cecil and that evidence related to both Foxe and Day make this identification more likely. For example, Patrick Collinson, “John Foxe as Historian,” TAMO, 2004, www. johnfoxe.org/index.php?realm=more&gototype=&type=essay&book=essay3; Avihu Zakai, “Reformation, History, and Eschatology in English Protestantism,” History and Theory 26, no. 3 (1987): 300–18, https://doi.org/10.2307/2505065; and Frances A. Yates, “Queen Elizabeth as Astraea,” Journal of the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes 10 (1947): 27–82. Peter Burke, The Renaissance Sense of the Past (London: Edward Arnold, 1969). William of Newburgh, The History of English Affairs, Book 1., trans. Patrick G. Walsh and M J. Kennedy (Warminster: Aris, 1988), 1. Burke, The Renaissance Sense of the Past, 6. Ibid., 7–13. A&M (1570), 2 (blank). Ibid. Ibid. Ibid., 26. For an overview of Cicero’s reception in this period, see David Marsh, “Cicero in the Renaissance,” in The Cambridge Companion to Cicero, ed. Catherine Steel (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2013), 306–17. See Ronald H. Fritze, “Truth Hath Lacked Witnese, Tyme Wanted Light: The Dispersal of the English Monastic Libraries and Protestant Efforts at Preservation, ca. 1535–1625,” Journal of Library History, Philosophy and Comparative Librarianship 18, no. 3 (1983): 274–91. Ibid. James P. Carley, “The Dispersal of the Monastic Libraries and the Salvaging of the Spoils,” in The Cambridge History of Libraries in Britain and Ireland, vol. 1 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2006), 265–91. John Leland and John Bale, The Laboryouse Iourney [and] Serche of Iohan Leylande, for Englandes Antiquitees: Geuen of Hym as a Newe Yeares Gyfte to Kynge Henry the Viij. in the. Xxxvij. Yeare of His Reygne, With Declaracyons Enlarged (London, 1549). Ibid., sig. B1r. Ibid., sig. A7v-A8v. John Strype, The Life and Acts of Matthew Parker, . . . Archbishop of Canterbury .  .  . To Which Is Added an Appendix, Containing Various .  .  . Records, Letters, Etc. (London, 1711), vol. 4, 529. Jennifer Summit, Memory’s Library: Medieval Books in Early Modern England (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2008), 108. Ibid., 110. Ibid. John Leland, De Uiris Illustribus: On Famous Men, trans. James P. Carley (Toronto: Pontifical Institute of Mediaeval Studies, 2010), xlv. An idea borrowed by Carley from James Simpson, Oxford Literary History: 1350–1547, Reform and Cultural Revolution, vol. 2 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2002), 22. Leland and Bale, The Laboryouse Iourney [and] Serche of Iohan Leylande, for Englandes Antiquitees: Geuen of Hym as a Newe Yeares Gyfte to Kynge Henry the Viij. in the. Xxxvij. Yeare of His Reygne, With Declaracyons Enlarged, sig. B8v. Ibid., sig. E1r. Leland, De Uiris Illustribus: On Famous Men, cxviii. Huw Pryce, “Prise, Sir John [Syr Siôn Ap Rhys] (1501/2–1555), Administrator and Scholar,” ODNB, 2008, https://doi.org/10.1093/ref:odnb/22752.

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64. Andrew G. Watson, “John Twyne of Canterbury (d. 1581) as a Collector of Medieval Manuscripts: A Preliminary Investigation,” The Library 6, no. 8 (1986): 133–51. 65. Burke, The Renaissance Sense of the Past, 13–18. 66. Stephen Reed Cattley, The Acts and Monuments of John Foxe., New and complete ed., vol. 1 (London: Seeley and Burnside, 1841), 4. 67. Ibid., 4. 68. Mozley, John Foxe and His Book, 156. 69. Haller, Foxe’s Book of Martyrs and the Elect Nation, 130. 70. Fred J. Levy, Tudor Historical Thought, reprint (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2004), 100–1. It is also discussed in Bauckham, Tudor Apocalypse: Sixteenth Century Apocalyptism, Millenarianism and the English Reformation, From John Bale to John Foxe and Thomas Brightman. 71. Haller, Foxe’s Book of Martyrs and the Elect Nation, 50. 72. Warren W. Wooden, John Foxe (Boston: Twayne, 1983). 73. Edward Shils, Tradition (London: Faber and Faber, 1981), 1. 74. Thomas Harding, A Detection of Sundrie Foule Errours . . . Vttered . . . by m. Jewel, in . . . A Defence of the Apologie &c. (Louvain, 1568), fo. 102r. 75. Collinson, “John Foxe as Historian”. 76. See Gillian R. Evans, Problems of Authority in the Reformation Debates (Cambridge; New York: Cambridge University Press, 1992), 55–60. 77. A&M (1570), 27. 78. Heinrich Bullinger, The Olde Fayth: An Euident Probacion Out of the Holy Scripture, That the Christen Fayth, Whiche Is the Right, True, Old and Vndoubted Fayth, Hath Endured Sens the Beginnyng of the Worlde. Herein Hast Thou Also a Short Summe of the Whole Byble, and a Probacion, That Al Vertuous Men Haue Pleased God, and Wer Saued Through the Christen Fayth, trans. Miles Coverdale (London, 1547), Preface. 79. J. Wayne Baker, “Heinrich Bullinger, the Covenant, and the Reformed Tradition in Retrospect,” The Sixteenth Century Journal 29, no. 2 (1998): 359–76, https:// doi.org/10.2307/2544521.

Works Cited Printed Baker, J. Wayne. “Heinrich Bullinger, the Covenant, and the Reformed Tradition in Retrospect.” The Sixteenth Century Journal 29, no. 2 (1998): 359–76. https://doi. org/10.2307/2544521. Bauckham, Richard. Tudor Apocalypse: Sixteenth Century Apocalyptism, Millenarianism and the English Reformation, From John Bale to John Foxe and Thomas Brightman. Oxford: Sutton Courtenay Press, 1978. Breen, John. “‘The Faerie Queene’, Book I and the Theme of Protestant Exile.” Irish University Review 26, no. 2 (1996): 226–36. Bullinger, Heinrich. The Olde Fayth: An Euident Probacion out of the Holy Scripture, That the Christen Fayth, Whiche Is the Right, True, Old and Vndoubted Fayth, Hath Endured Sens the Beginnyng of the Worlde. Herein Hast Thou Also a Short Summe of the Whole Byble, and a Probacion, That Al Vertuous Men Haue Pleased God, and Wer Saued Through the Christen Fayth, translated by Miles Coverdale. London, 1547. Burke, Peter. The Renaissance Sense of the Past. London: Edward Arnold, 1969.

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Carley, James P. “The Dispersal of the Monastic Libraries and the Salvaging of the Spoils.” In The Cambridge History of Libraries in Britain and Ireland. Vol. 1, 265–91. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2006. Cattley, Stephen Reed. The Acts and Monuments of John Foxe. New and complete ed. Vol. 1. London: Seeley and Burnside, 1841. Christianson, Paul. Reformers and Babylon: English Apocalyptic Visions From the Reformation to the Eve of the Civil War. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1978. Collinson, Patrick. Archbishop Grindal, 1519–1583: The Struggle for a Reformed Church. London: Jonathan Cape, 1979. ——— “John Foxe and National Consciousness.” In John Foxe and His World, edited by David Loades, 10–36. Aldershot: Ashgate, 2002. ——— “John Foxe as Historian.” TAMO, 2004. www.johnfoxe.org/index.php?real m=more&gototype=&type=essay&book=essay3. da Voragine, Jacobus. The Golden Legend: Readings on the Saints, translated by William G. Ryan. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1993. Duffy, Eamon. Reformation Divided: Catholics, Protestants and the Conversion of England. London: Bloomsbury, 2017. ——— Stripping of the Altars: Traditional Religion in England, 1400–1580. New ed. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1994. Edwards, Mark. Printing, Propaganda, and Martin Luther. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1994. Evans, Gillian R. Problems of Authority in the Reformation Debates. Cambridge and New York: Cambridge University Press, 1992. Evenden, Elizabeth. Patents, Pictures and Patronage: John Day and the Tudor Book Trade. Aldershot: Ashgate, 2008. Evenden, Elizabeth, and Thomas Freeman. “John Foxe, John Day, and the Printing of the ‘Book of Martyrs’.” In Lives in Print: Biography and the Book Trade From the Middle Ages to the 21st Century, edited by Michael Harris, Giles Mandelbrote, and Robin Myers, 23–54. London: Oak Knoll Press, 2002. ——— Religion and the Book in Early Modern England: The Making of John Foxe’s ‘Book of Martyrs’. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2011. Fairfield, Leslie P. John Bale, Mythmaker for the English Reformation. Eugene, Oregon: Purdue University Press, 1976. Foxe, John. “Acts and Monuments.” TAMO, 1563. www.johnfoxe.org. ——— “Acts and Monuments.” TAMO, 1570. www.johnfoxe.org. ——— “The Unabridged Acts and Monuments Online or TAMO.” HRI Online Publications, 2011. www.johnfoxe.org. Freeman, Thomas S. “Foxe, John (1516/17–1587), Martyrologist.” ODNB (2004). https://doi.org/10.1093/ref:odnb/10050. ——— “‘Great Searching Out of Bookes and Autors’: John Foxe as an Ecclesiastical Historian.” PhD diss., Rutgers University, 1995. Fritze, Ronald H. “Truth Hath Lacked Witnese, Tyme Wanted Light: The Dispersal of the English Monastic Libraries and Protestant Efforts at Preservation, ca. 1535–1625.” Journal of Library History, Philosophy and Comparative Librarianship 18, no. 3 (1983): 274–91. Graham, Timothy, and Andrew G. Watson. The Recovery of the Past in Early Elizabethan England: Documents by John Bale and John Joscelyn From the Circle of Matthew Parker. Cambridge: Cambridge Bibliographical Society, 1998.

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Greenberg, Devorah.“Eighteenth-Century‘Foxe’: History, Historiography, and Historical Consciousness.” TAMO, 2004. www.johnfoxe.org/index.php?realm=more& gototype=&type=essay&book=essay8. Greengrass, Mark. Christendom Destroyed: Europe 1517–1648. London: Penguin, 2015. Haller, William. Foxe’s Book of Martyrs and the Elect Nation. London: Jonathan Cape, 1963. Harding, Thomas. A Detection of Sundrie Foule Errours . . . Vttered . . . by m. Jewel, in . . . A Defence of the Apologie &c. Louvain, 1568. Jones, Norman L. “Matthew Parker, John Bale, and the Magdeburg Centuriators.” The Sixteenth Century Journal 12, no. 3 (1981): 35–49. https://doi.org/10.2307/2539785. King, John N. “Bale, John (1495–1563), Bishop of Ossory, Evangelical Polemicist, and Historian.” ODNB (2004). https://doi.org/10.1093/ref:odnb/1175. ——— English Reformation Literature: The Tudor Origins of the Protestant Tradition. Princeton, NJ and Guildford: Princeton University Press, 1983. ——— “Religious Dissidence in Foxe’s ‘Book of Martyrs’: Humanism or Heresy?” Religion & Literature 32, no. 2 (2000): 141–56. Kyle, Richard. “John Knox and Apocalyptic Thought.” The Sixteenth Century Journal 15, no. 4 (1984): 449–69. https://doi.org/10.2307/2540361. Leland, John. De Uiris Illustribus: On Famous Men, translated by James P. Carley. Toronto: Pontifical Institute of Mediaeval Studies, 2010. Leland, John, and John Bale. The Laboryouse Iourney [and] Serche of Iohan Leylande, for Englandes Antiquitees: Geuen of Hym as a Newe Yeares Gyfte to Kynge Henry the Viij. in the. Xxxvij. Yeare of His Reygne, With Declaracyons Enlarged. London, 1549. Levy, Fred J. Tudor Historical Thought. Reprint. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2004. Loades, David. “The Early Reception.” TAMO, 2004. www.johnfoxe.org/index.php? realm=more&gototype=&type=essay&book=essay7. Luard, Henry R. “A Letter From Bishop Bale to Archbishop Parker: Communicated by the Rev. M.R. Luard.” In Cambridge Antiquarian Communications; Being Papers Presented at the Meetings of the Cambridge Antiquarian Society. Vol. 3, 157–73, 15. Cambridge, 1865. MacCulloch, Diarmaid. Reformation: Europe’s House Divided. London: Allen Lane, 2003. Markus, Robert A. “Church History and Early Church Historians.” Studies in Church History 11 (1975): 1–17. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0424208400006252. Marsh, David. “Cicero in the Renaissance.” In The Cambridge Companion to Cicero, edited by Catherine Steel, 306–17. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2013. McGrath, Alister E. The Intellectual Origins of the European Reformation. 2nd ed. Malden, MA and Oxford: Blackwell Publication, 2004. Minton, Gretchen E. “‘The Same Cause and Like Quarell’: Eusebius, John Foxe, and the Evolution of Ecclesiastical History.” Church History 71, no. 4 (2002): 715–42. Mozley, James Frederic. John Foxe and His Book. London: Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge, 1940. Nockles, Peter. “The Nineteenth Century Reception.” TAMO, 2004. www.johnfoxe. org/index.php?realm=more&gototype=&type=essay&book=essay9.

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Noonan, Kathleen M. “‘Martyrs in Flames’: Sir John Temple and the Conception of the Irish in English Martyrologies.” Albion: A Quarterly Journal Concerned With British Studies 36, no. 2 (2004): 223–55. https://doi.org/10.2307/4054214. Olsen, V. Norskov. John Foxe and the Elizabethan Church. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1973. Olson, Oliver K. Matthias Flacius and the Survival of Luther’s Reform. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz in Kommission, 2002. Penny, D. Andrew. “John Foxe’s Victorian Reception.” The Historical Journal 40, no. 1 (1997): 111–42. Pincombe, Michael. Elizabethan Humanism: Literature and Learning in the Later Sixteenth Century. Harlow: Longman, 2001. Pryce, Huw. “Prise, Sir John [Syr Siôn Ap Rhys] (1501/2–1555), Administrator and Scholar.” ODNB (2008). https://doi.org/10.1093/ref:odnb/22752. Shils, Edward. Tradition. London: Faber and Faber, 1981. Simpson, James. Oxford Literary History: 1350–1547, Reform and Cultural Revolution. Vol. 2. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2002. Strype, John. The History of the Life and Acts of the Most Reverend Father in God, Edmund Grindal: The First Bishop of London, and the Second Archbishop of York and Canterbury Successively, in the Reign of Queen Elizabeth .  .  . [Etc.]. London: John Hartley, 1710. ——— The Life and Acts of Matthew Parker, .  .  . Archbishop of Canterbury .  .  . To Which Is Added an Appendix, Containing Various . . . Records, Letters, Etc. London, 1711. Summit, Jennifer. Memory’s Library: Medieval Books in Early Modern England. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2008. Toenjes, Christopher. Islam, the Turks and the Making of the English Reformation: The History of the Ottoman Empire in John Foxe’s Acts and Monuments. Frankfurt am Main and New York: Peter Lang, 2016. Watson, Andrew G. “John Twyne of Canterbury (d. 1581) as a Collector of Medieval Manuscripts: A Preliminary Investigation.” The Library 6, no. 8 (1986): 133–51. William of Newburgh. The History of English Affairs, Book 1, translated by Patrick G. Walsh and M. J. Kennedy. Warminster: Aris, 1988. Wooden, Warren W. John Foxe. Boston: Twayne, 1983. Yates, Frances A. Astraea: The Imperial Theme in the Sixteenth Century. New ed. London: Pimlico, 1993. ——— “Queen Elizabeth as Astraea.” Journal of the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes 10 (1947): 27–82. Zakai, Avihu. “Reformation, History, and Eschatology in English Protestantism.” History and Theory 26, no. 3 (1987): 300–18. https://doi.org/10.2307/2505065.

2

Sources and Evidence

What were the sources that John Foxe used to compile the first and second editions of the Acts and Monuments, specifically the pre-Lollard history? It is well attested that the contemporary sequences relied on a combination of oral testimony, official record, correspondences, and recent polemical writings and publications. It is also known that a large proportion of the Lollard history relied on John Bale’s collection of Lollard writings, the Fasciculi Zizaniorum.1 Biblical, classical, and medieval history posed different challenges, specifically a need to consult multiple chronicles and annals, as well as more contemporary arguments about past times. There are several key reasons why a diverse source base was important for Foxe, more so, perhaps, than it had been for Polydore Vergil (c. 1470– 1555) when he wrote his history of England in the early sixteenth century, or for Robert Fabyan (d. 1513) when he compiled the last of the great London chronicles in the late fifteenth century or, for that matter, Ranulf Higden (d. 1364), who wrote the cumulative medieval history the Polychronicon in the early fourteenth century. Foxe could not rely on the traditions and narratives of past writers with the same freedom of confidence. His starting point was a belief that the historical record was intrinsically flawed, recognising the fact that previous English histories had been almost exclusively written by monks and understanding this as a problem. Foxe considered the loyalty of monks to English sovereignty and true faith to be questionable and their dependence and allegiance to the Bishop of Rome, the pope, a tricky and problematic blockage to any claim that they wrote the truth about events. The result was a programme of research in which lesser-known or used chronicles were given more prominence and the popular histories relegated, somewhat, to the background. It also resulted in a different kind of analysis, in which each document was assessed and shifted for claims that were deemed true and those that were deemed false. Such analysis was done through the lens of theology and a sense of the past which emphasised continuity with Scriptural evidence and considered novelties or alterations from that basis as corruption and failure. History was not just about telling an account of the past and finding evidence to support claims and arguments, but rather it was a study of individual and collective human existence. There

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was a choice to be made between the path that leads to God or the path that leads to Satan. Foxe believed that a proper interpretation of history revealed those two choices and showed the righteousness of the path that led to the Reformation, and in turn their salvation on the day of judgement. It is no easy thing to identify, with complete accuracy and certainty, the sources that Foxe chose to consult to make these arguments, nor is it entirely possible to recreate the process in which he shifted through their contents and extracted the ‘corn’ from the ‘chaff’, as John Bale had termed it in his The Laborious Journey (1549). Foxe does provide a list of authorities at the beginning of each edition, as was the custom of his time. He also inserts the occasional citation in the margins or body of the text, but more often he just refers to an authority by name or provides no information at all. None of this is reliable. What Foxe mostly cites is the original source—the first utterance—and not the source that he most likely consults. Why does he do this? The answer is one of common historiographical and textual practice, and can be illustrated through misinterpretation of sixteenth-century historiography in nineteenth-century polemic. In 1837, Foxe’s great detractor Samuel Maitland wrote A Review of Fox the Martyrologist’s History of the Waldenses.2 His purpose was to dismantle the Acts and Monuments as a credible source, claiming, amongst other things, that Foxe was a plagiarist who had stolen his account of the Waldensians from the Catalogus Testium Veritatis of Matthias Flacius. In doing so, Maitland also found fault with Foxe’s general lack of citations, accusing Foxe of frequently giving ‘his authority in so vague and uncertain a manner, that it is of no use’.3 Maitland declared that Foxe ‘sometimes gave one authority when he was, in fact, using another’, he also accused Foxe of abridging his sources ‘unfairly’.4 In 1841, Stephen Cattley rejected these arguments as part of his defence of Foxe, reminding Maitland that standards of scholarship had changed since the sixteenth century: ‘References were not given with particularity. Notes— that great explanatory improvement on the text, were unknown. The art of criticism was in its infancy’.5 The Waldensian account was indeed taken wholesale from Flacius’ catalogue as Maitland had claimed, and no credit is given to its source, but as Cattley argues, this is not plagiarism per se because the practice of scholarship and the understanding of authorship in the sixteenth century differed significantly from that of the nineteenth century and, indeed, practices of the twenty-first century as well.6 The word ‘plagiarism’ did not exist until the next century, and whilst this does not preclude its earlier existence and occurrence, it does suggest that the concept was unformed and other identifications of wrongdoing in scholarship emphasised instead. Much research has been done on this subject by scholars such as Richard Terry, Alastair Pennycook, B. S. Yamey, and Max W. Thomas.7 Mary T. Crane offers us one explanation for the widespread occurrence of what would now be thought of as plagiaristic practices. Crane links this authorial practice to the humanist method for extracting commonplaces for mnemonic ordering and retention.8

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The commonplace method encouraged the extraction of worthy knowledge as fragments, distilled into notebooks under a series of headings and subheadings. Such a method for assimilating knowledge encouraged a distancing of the source itself, from the ideas and evidence with which it contained. Primacy was given to the original utterance. The intermediary source is little more than a receptacle for that knowledge, abandoned at the point of its extraction. Patrick Collinson has observed this practice in the Acts and Monuments.9 Foxe did not always cite the source that he had seen, but the one that first appeared to utter it. For Collinson, this is evidence that Foxe also considered human nature and behaviour as unchanging constants, and that once described for the first time, ‘it was not necessary to invent new descriptions of those qualities’.10 The importance was in what the material conveyed, not in its originality of style. Medieval learned material relied for a large part on repetition, straddling the line between acceptable citation to what would now be called outright plagiarism. However, this was not only an acceptable practice but also standard practice, and Foxe himself has often been called a ‘compiler’ or ‘editor’ more than an author by some researchers because he repeated so much material in his work.11 It is also worth remembering that a ‘copy and paste’ approach is exactly what is encouraged and demanded by Eusebian protocols for writing ecclesiastical history, and although verbatim copying is not recommended in the same way for secular histories (where the focus is more on style and rhetoric), the inclusion of ideas and evidence in verbatim was still a common and acceptable practice.12 Part of Bede’s ecclesiastical history is found, for example, in the Gesta Regum Anglorum of William of Malmesbury, and parts of the Gesta Regum Anglorum are found in Ranulf Higden’s Polychronicon and so forth. It was not considered crucial to claim ownership over ideas and evidence. Copyright law did not exist. Indeed, most modern scholars studying authorship in the early modern period claim that a modern understanding of ‘the author’ as having in some way ‘ownership’ over the text that they write was basically unknown in the sixteenth century.13 The tension that existed instead was concerned with the knowledge that was to be conveyed. The literary dramas of the period are focused on claims of forgery and interested in the honesty of imitation.14 Providing one such example, Max Thomas has described the case of several texts being falsely ascribed to Francesco Petrarch (1304–1374), who rejected the attribution because he was concerned that he would be accused of forgery.15 Alastair Minnis, meanwhile, has argued that authorship is the identification by scholars of ‘intrinsic worth’ and ‘authenticity’, and is therefore reliant on the bestowal of worth by later scholars and writers who extract from the works and consider them authorities or literary models.16 Elsewhere, Natasha Simonova has examined the prevalence of continuations in literary texts from the seventeenth century onwards, noting that a combination of print (providing a feeling of completion to a text), alongside writing and publishing for economic gain, evolved the idea of ownership.17 Scholarship on this

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subject tends to focus on the tension between acceptable and unacceptable practice, and the degree of difference in authorial understanding between then and the latter early modern development of ‘the author’. What emerges would appear to suggest that a copy of a text, whether in manuscript or printed form, was understood as little more than a conveyer of knowledge and that it was this that was of paramount importance. It is the first author, the originator of the knowledge, who is generally cited. It is they who provide the stamp of authority, the claim of truth. In terms of our understanding of the Acts and Monuments, it must be understood that the authorship of the text was not considered sacred in of itself. It was not only ideas that could be shared without credit but also the very words themselves. This is equally true for the transmission of words from the Acts and Monuments. A large proportion of Thomas Taylor’s 1633 commentary on Revelation, Christ’s Victorie over the Dragon, is clearly lifted from Foxe, as are parts of Sir Francis Hasting’s An Apologie or Defence of the Watch-Word dated 1600. Neither provide much in the way of credit to the Acts and Monuments, nor would readers expect it to necessarily do so.18 On many occasions then, it is impossible to identify from Foxe’s citations with any degree of certainty which source Foxe might have consulted, as any citation offered might refer to the original utterance and not to the source Foxe examined. For example, in Book 1 of the 1570 edition, Foxe narrated the martyrdom of Polycarp during the fourth persecution of Christians by the Roman Empire. Foxe cited as his sources Eusebius, Irenaeus, and Jerome. Whilst it is possible that Foxe used all three original sources, it is somewhat more likely that he consulted Eusebius’ ecclesiastical history, which cited Irenaeus as its source. However, the added citation to Jerome provides some doubt to this conclusion and instead leads us to a contemporary compilation: the third volume of the Magdeburg Centuries.19 A close comparison of Foxe’s English narrative sequence on Polycarp with the narrative provided in Latin by the Centuriators—including their citation to all three authorities—strongly identifies this as Foxe’s actual source. As a second example, the insertion of papal history by Foxe throughout his pre-Lollard history refers to a variety of sources but is often reliant on two sixteenth-century catalogues rather than the originals.20 To illustrate, in Book 3, Foxe provided a summary of schisms in the third and fourth centuries which includes details on Pope John XI—whom Foxe claims as the bastard son of Pope Lando and a harlot—and Pope John XII—who Foxe claims as the son of the harlot’s daughter. Foxe cites as his source the ‘de imperatoribus’ (the Mission to Constantinople) of Liutprand of Cremona (c. 920–972). His actual source is John Bale’s Catalogus.21 In Book 4, the sequence on Pope Gregory VII contains various references, including to Platina, Johannes Nauclerus, Lambert of Hersfeld, Cardinal Benno, Burchard of Ursperg, Sabellicus, and Albert Krantz. Foxe does appear to use the texts of Platina and Lambert of Hersfeld, as he suggests, but all of the other references and a large

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portion of the text itself are taken from Matthias Flacius’ Catalogus Testium Veritatis.22 In addition to the problem of citation, many paragraphs in the Acts and Monuments might derive from one source, but it will not always be word for word, often it is rearranged, mixed together with the words of other authorities, or with the opinion of the author himself. Often, Foxe or one of his colleagues translated the material from Latin to English, thus even if the translation is accurate, linguistic choices alone make it more difficult for the modern researcher to identify with complete certainty that one source was selected rather than another with similar content. In a case such as the Acts and Monuments, the analysis must especially contend with interpretation creating a new or alternative meaning out of the words of the original author.

Foxe’s Books What are the sources that Foxe owned or could access?23 It is not possible to identify with certainty all the books and manuscripts that Foxe owned, or to identify those that he had borrowed or had only temporary access and thus relied on notes he had previously made in commonplace books. There are, however, two key lists and documents that provide a partial reconstruction of some of what Foxe owned. In addition, a certain amount of evidence on ownership can be drawn from annotations in Foxe’s hand found in surviving manuscripts and original copies of books. These at least confirm that Foxe used a particular copy of a text at some point in his life. In some cases, it is possible to confirm that Foxe had access to the text before he wrote the first or second editions of the Acts and Monuments, but not always, and there is rarely any way to be certain that Foxe used that specific text rather than others (ownership or access does not necessarily equal use). Internal evidence from the first two editions of the Acts and Monuments also indicates some texts that Foxe must have used, although rarely does this lead to the exact copy of the text. The first set of sources was published in 1998 by Timothy Graham and Andrew G. Watson in a book entitled The Recovery of the Past in Elizabethan England. The first half of the publication reproduced the letter that John Bale had written to Matthew Parker in 1560.24 It was a response to the archbishop’s enquiry regarding the location of historical manuscripts, spurred by an initial request from the Magdeburg Centuriators for English materials. This letter does not refer to texts under Foxe’s care, but it did lead to two written lists of manuscripts and their ownership compiled by John Joscelyn (Parker’s Latin secretary), also published in the same volume by Graham and Watson. These lists contain references to Foxe and his own book collection. This is particularly true of the list that Graham and Watson refer to as ‘J2’, dated to before January 1567. This is, therefore, one source for information where there is certainty that Foxe owned the manuscripts before 1570.

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The second source is part of a large collection of Foxe’s papers preserved in the British Library. This is a composite manuscript referred to as Lansdowne 819, which contains three handwritten lists spread across two folio pages in the hand of Foxe’s son, Samuel. Although these lists would seem to have been written after John Foxe’s death, James Carley and Thomas S. Freeman are certain that the assortment of printed materials, manuscripts, and transcriptions listed belonged to Foxe himself and not his son, that they record only a selection from his library, and that Samuel either wrote the lists to record those volumes that he did not want to be sold, or as a list to sell or donate somewhere specific.25 It might be the latter. Neil Kar and Ralph Hanna have identified at least 14 volumes written on the list that now reside at Magdalen College, Oxford, all in their original bindings and all supplied to the college after 1600. These manuscripts might suggest that the list was indeed intended to record those books that Samuel planned to donate.26 The list (really one large list, followed by two small lists) contains roughly 160 items, but only around 40 are of a topic that Foxe might have found useful in compiling a Roman and Medieval history. The third source that can help to identify Foxe’s sources are handwritten annotations on various manuscript copies of chronicles and annals. Foxe’s handwriting has been identified on a range of manuscripts, some provided to him by Matthew Parker, others most likely in his own collection, and others borrowed from elsewhere. For instance, CCCC MS 152, a copy of Nicholas Trivet’s Annales sex Regum Angliæ owned by Parker, has traces of annotation by Bale, Parker, and Foxe. In this case, Foxe provides one annotation only, which can be found on a blank sheet at the end of the manuscript. It reads, This English history is collected from Geoffrey of Monmouth, Bede, William Malmesbury, Peter of Poitiers [Petro Pictavensi], Martin the penitentiary, who was the chaplain to the pope and Henry Huntingdon which Mr. Horton has. This book does not agree with the sacred words of Holy Scripture.27 Not only does this annotation suggest that Foxe has examined the manuscript in some detail to be able to identify the sources upon which it is based, but it also demonstrates once again that Foxe, like Bale, was assessing the truthfulness of the text based on its agreement with Scriptural prophecy. Foxe provided a similar summary at the end of CCCC MS 96, the only known copy of the chronicle attributed to John Brompton.28 In this instance, he also added annotations against the text itself, which appear to align with some elements of narrative in the Acts and Monuments. For instance, Foxe highlights the names of various kings such as Sigeberht, King of Wessex (d. 757), Ceolwulf I, King of Mercia (d. 823), Beornwulf, King of Mercia (d. 826), and Athelstan (d. 939). Comparison of these portions of Brompton’s text to the corresponding sequences in the Acts and Monuments suggests a strong

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connection and thus suggests that this is Foxe’s source on these occasions. The battle between Cuthred and Æthelbald, for example, fits the description in Brompton’s chronicle perfectly.29 From these sources, the occasional reference elsewhere, and evidence within the Acts and Monuments itself (and comparison of the Acts and Monuments with these texts), it is possible to identify many of the sources that Foxe used to compile his pre-Lollard history with a good degree of accuracy.

Sources for the First Edition The result of this research is listed and described in the Appendix, forming the basis upon which this book has been researched and written. In total, there are around 22 sources identified as used by Foxe in Book 1 of the 1563 edition. These are a combination of published materials and manuscript copies. However, there are more. Freeman once argued that Foxe did not write the sequence on King John and that, perhaps, it was never originally planned to be part of the 1563 edition of the Acts and Monuments at all.30 This will be examined further in Chapter 3. What is important here is that the sources used to describe King John’s fight with the papacy, the attack on monasticism that follows, and the profile of Pope Innocent III all derive from sources that Foxe generally did not use and does not seem to have had access to before 1563, if at all. Freeman argues that previous attempts to rehabilitate King John as a proto-Protestant had been based on a limited range of sources, specifically Robert Fabyan’s New Chronicles, Ranulf Higden’s Polychronicon, and William Caxton’s edition of the Brut.31 The attempt to revise John’s story by Protestant scholars was therefore weak, as it was based on few sources and on obviously biased and selective readings. The account of John in the Acts and Monuments was something different. It ‘bristled’ with references to a wide range of sources, as Freeman puts it, taking as its sources Matthew Paris’ Historia Anglorum and possibly his Chronica Majora, Roger of Wendover’s Flores Historiarum, the Barnwell chronicle, William Caxton’s The Cronycles of England, Ranulf Higden’s Polychronicon, the anonymous Winchester annals (Annales Monastici), the Memoriale of Walter of Coventry, Ralph Niger’s life of John, the Annales of Roger of Hoveden, and the anonymous Eulogium. Foxe used a few of these sources elsewhere in the 1563 edition, but most he never used again. The argument is that Foxe never researched this portion of the Acts and Monuments and that he instead received it from Bale in either note form or in a polished state, ready to print. The subsequent sequence of Frederick II’s disagreement with the papacy would appear to mark a return to Foxe’s own work. This is taken entirely from Matthias Flacius’ catalogue. Foxe also provided a short sequence on Henry III, briefly describing heavy taxation in England by papal agents as a direct result of John’s failure to win his argument with the pope, caused, Foxe argues, by the betrayal of his barons. This

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sequence is taken entirely from Matthew Paris’ Chronica Majora, although it might also, or instead, derive from the smaller chronicle, the Historia Anglorum. This would suggest that Henry III, too, derived from Bale’s provision. The sources, therefore, suggest that almost everything in Book 1 of the 1563 edition from King John to its end should be considered separately from the work undertaken in the earlier part of the book. The 22 sources identified as used in that earlier part can be broken down into types. Some were printed, some were manuscript copies. Some texts Foxe used regularly, some rarely or for specific purposes, and one or two formed the core of his compilation. The most important of all were the two catalogues of past writers compiled independently by Matthias Flacius and John Bale. These were the foundation of Foxe’s history. Almost everything that he included in Book 1 derived in some fashion from these two works. This will be argued in Chapter 3, but here it is useful to describe the texts themselves in more detail.

The Works of Matthias Flacius and John Bale The first of these catalogues, Flacius’ Catalogus Testium Veritatis, was first published in 1556 and then in a slightly expanded form in 1562, both times in Basel. Foxe certainly had access to the first edition, as he worked on it as a proofreader for Johannes Oporinus (1507–1568) whilst he stayed in that town. There is some small evidence also that Foxe used the second edition for the history that he compiled and published in 1570, but realistically, he could have used either.32 Indeed, as the text proved so valuable to Foxe, it would seem highly likely that he would have purchased both editions for his own use. Succinctly put, the catalogue offered easy access to summarised, abridged, and verbatim transcriptions of continental medieval texts, all of which had been identified by Flacius as holding evidence for Lutheran beliefs. Oliver K. Olson has identified within it some 400 to 650 ‘witnesses’, many of whom were, at the time, obscure or entirely unknown to scholars.33 However, Flacius does not appear to have been very good at ordering this material into a sensible form. Olson makes a complaint here, stressing that there is almost no kind of sensible organisation and that there is almost no attempt to order by topic or offer a usable framework. It is unified only by Flacius’ belief that all sources might shed light on the spirit of the true church. Despite its faults, the Catalogus Testium Veritatis was immediately welcomed in England in the early 1560s, as it offered useful material to defend the Elizabethan religious settlement. John Jewel had used it in his Apologia, and Foxe would do so in his Acts and Monuments.34 It would also become the blueprint for the much larger project in Germany, the ambitious Magdeburg Centuries, which would be equally as valuable to Foxe in the coming years.35 Meanwhile, John Bale’s own Catalogus proved equally as important as a foundation of Foxe’s history. It was published twice: first in 1548 and 1549

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in Ipswich and Wesel (this edition is commonly called the Scriptorum), and then between 1557–1559 in Basel (commonly called the Catalogus). The first edition ran to just over 500 pages, containing entries starting from the preChristian era to an entry on himself in the 1540s. The second edition was divided into two volumes: the first containing 742 pages and a shorter second volume of 250 pages (a total of 992 pages plus index) ending the work in the 1550s. Unlike Flacius, Bale offered a structure for his biographical entries, using his beliefs about history as the outcome of prophecy and its design as five ages that foresaw a flourishing time dissolve into corruption and chaos. Bale divided his authors into groups of 100, each grouping paralleling and representing one age in the five-age schema. Each of these entries is further organised into a standardised form containing the names of the authors, a brief description of them, and a list of their known works.36 In addition, Bale inserted ‘appendices’ in between the biographical entries. These offered context and polemic. Although the volume was inspired and based on the work first undertaken by John Leland (c. 1503–1552) earlier in the century, Bale worried about England’s manuscript heritage being lost.37 The catalogue was, therefore, an attempt to prove the usefulness and extent of English writings, but it was also polemical in doing so. Leslie P. Fairfield, May Mckisack, and Fred J. Levy have all highlighted the fact that Bale was not only interested in providing a cataloguing service but also in curating a sense of the past that identified writers who offered truths from those that falsified or pretended.38 Such categorisation was not based on historiographical merit, but upon precepts of faith. Bale, therefore, described the political and religious history, especially the activities of papal agents and the pope in sequences inserted between the biographical profiles. These offered context. They also offered a polemical assessment of the past in terms of Bale’s prophetic schema of five ages. Incidentally, but also of relevance, these would be reused separately (and with amendment) in another work that Bale published in 1558 that he called the Acta Romanorum Pontificum. Foxe ended up making use of both texts, despite one being a virtual reprint of the other, leading Freeman to argue that such double-picking is a testimony to Foxe’s admiration for Bale.39 There is, however, good reason for Foxe’s ‘double-picking’, beyond simple admiration. In the second edition of his Catalogus, Bale described his work as a ‘weapon’ so that ‘those who are assailed may defend themselves and slay their adversaries’.40 Foxe appears to have agreed, using both the Catalogus and the Acta Romanorum Pontificum for that very purpose. Rarely does Bale provide more than a summary or outline, but this was often enough to send another Protestant scholar to the right sources or sometimes enough in itself for what was needed to make an argument. As Alan MacColl has observed, Bale had placed traditional cataloguing methods into an ideological format and context, which proved particularly helpful to Foxe and other

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39

scholars, as it provided them with a pre-prepared argument, eminently suitable to a Protestant rendering of history.41 Together, these two catalogues formed the foundation for Foxe’s broader interpretations and polemical approach in the first edition of the Acts and Monuments. Bale provided English-specific content and a strong Protestant weaving of papal history, whilst Flacius excelled at offering lesser-known continental evidence. Two more of Bale’s publications were also useful to Foxe. The first, The Actes or Unchast Examples of the Englysh Votaryes (published between 1546 and 1551), is the closest that Bale gets to a historical chronicle of his own. Most accurately, the text is to be described as a polemic against monastic life. This is its primary focus. Nonetheless, Fairfield calls the Votaryes Bale’s first ‘systematic application of his vision of history to the English past’ and an attempt to ‘shape the myth’ of England’s past as one vainly fighting against Roman spiritual corruption.42 In this, it is a companion work to the Catalogus, offering another appropriation and example of Bale’s theories. It proved useful to Foxe again as a pre-prepared interpretation of past events. The second of these texts is the Image of Bothe Churches (published 1545/1548). This short treatise is not used as evidence or example, neither is it inserted verbatim at any point. Instead, Foxe used it for interpretation and as the basis for his initial framework for understanding the past. In this way though, it was the most crucial and influential. Bale provided within this treatise a detailed outline for his theory of history as the product of Scriptural prophecy. It is the basis upon which the Catalogus, Acta Romanorum Pontificum, and Votaryes are given their sense of the past. In the first edition of the Acts and Monuments, Foxe followed this outline in precise detail; in the second edition, he would begin to build on its ideas, making it his own.

Printed Texts in the 1563 Edition Beyond the printed texts of Flacius and Bale, Foxe did use other publications. The Vitae Pontificum (Lives of the Popes), by Bartolomeo Platina, was important. It acted as companion to Bale’s rendition of papal history and was also the standard text on the subject. The Fasciculus Rerum by Ortwin Gratius (published in Cologne in 1535) had been used by Foxe ever since his commentary of 1559 and was used again for material on the Waldensians and Archbishop Lanfranc. The History of Bohemia, by Aeneas Sylvius Piccolomini (published in Basel in 1489), Johannes Nauclerus’ Chronica (published in Tübingen in 1516), the Annales of Lambert of Hersfeld (published in Tübingen in 1525), and Giovanni (or Johannes) Stella’s Vitae ducentorum et triginta summarum pontificutatum (published in Basel in 1507) were also used for specific evidence. Of these, Samuel Foxe only refers to a copy of Johannes Nauclerus in his list of Foxe’s books, but we must presume that Foxe had purchased these all himself, or at least had made notes on them at some point prior to 1563.43

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None of these sources were specifically Protestant in purpose or intent. Indeed, other than the works of Bale and Flacius, the printed material all harkened from before the Reformation. However, this was useful. Ortwin Gratius had, for example, exposed a variety of corruptions in the Church through his use of history, which he had highlighted in hope of internal reform. The other authors also offered aspects of criticism and evidence that was not worried about providing offence in a time of religious transformation. Foxe could use such evidence to add detail, offer an anecdote, and provide a general narrative. Foxe, though, was the student of Bale, who was himself the student of Leland. Contemporary, or near-contemporary, writings were never going to be enough to defend religion through historical example. Whilst extremely useful, the references provided by Bale and Flacius were not enough. Foxe often needed more than summary or a brief mention. For history to be properly written, Foxe needed to compare these modern arguments, the narratives, and the anecdotes with materials that had been written closer to the time in question. He needed access to medieval chronicles.

Manuscript Texts in the 1563 Edition Foxe appears to have had at least ten manuscript chronicles available to him before 1563, although in almost all cases the exact identity of the copy remains unidentified or uncertain. The main evidence is to be found in the text of the Acts and Monuments itself and comparison of that material to the possible sources. Proof of ownership (and, indeed, access) can only be ascertained in a few cases, especially as the earliest evidence about Foxe’s texts—the ‘J2’ list written by John Joscelyn—was written in 1567. To complicate matters, some of the manuscripts that Foxe used for the first edition now belong in the Parker Library at Corpus Christi College as part of the collection donated by Matthew Parker. In most of these cases, we can tell that Foxe used that specific manuscript for the 1570 edition of the Acts and Monuments, but it is much more difficult to be certain that he used the same manuscript before 1563. There is no direct evidence that Parker had any kind of active role in the Acts and Monuments before that date and no proof that he supplied Foxe with manuscripts. There are assumptions here and a distinct level of uncertainty. What do we know for certain? In the scribbled list of Foxe’s books that was written after his death, Samuel Foxe lists several items that Foxe must have used in his 1563 edition. One of these is the ‘Vita Beati Thomae Cantuariensis’, a copy of Elias of Evesham’s Quadrilogus de vita S. Thomae. Another is ‘Guilelmi Malmesburiensis de gestis pontificum Angliae’, the Gesta Pontificum Anglorum, compiled by William of Malmesbury. Samuel also lists ‘Neubrigensis rerum Anglicanarum’, which has been identified as the Historia Regum Anglicarum by William of Newburgh.44 This is evidence that Foxe owned a version of these three texts at the time of his death. Joscelyn’s 1567 list of books confirms that Foxe owned the Gesta Pontificum

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Anglorum by William of Malmesbury by that date, but is otherwise silent.45 Joscelyn does, however, refer to four other manuscripts in Foxe’s possession. These are the Historia Anglorum of Henry of Huntingdon (c. 1088–1157), the Chronica or Annales of Roger of Hoveden (fl. 1174–1201), the Polychronicon of Ranulf Higden (c. 1280–1364), and the chronicle of Walter of Guisborough (fl. c.1290–c.1305).46 From a comparison of possible medieval sources to the contents of Book 1 of the 1563 edition, it would appear likely that these chronicles were all available to Foxe before 1563. Evidence from extant copies of these chronicles does provide us with more detail. Ralph Hanna has, for instance, identified the copy of Gesta Pontificum Anglorum, as William of Malmesbury’s autograph copy, Magdalen College Oxford MS 172.47 This is certain because of around 50 separate annotations in Foxe’s hand, mostly highlighting the names of kings and bishops, and redrawing letters that had faded. There is evidence also in the manuscript that Foxe has ‘corrected’ or re-labelled material on occasion. On the end leaf (once again), Foxe wrote a note warning potential readers of the manuscript that William is not always honest as a source.48 The precise copy of Henry of Huntingdon’s Historia Anglorum remains unknown, although Foxe might have used the version that ended up in Parker’s collection (which is CCCC MS 280). There is no direct evidence for this, however. The Annales of Roger of Hoveden similarly might be a copy that Parker eventually obtained (CCCC MS 138). This is made slightly more possible by the fact that in 1560, Bale noted in his letter to Parker that this manuscript was in the hands of a man named William Carye.49 There is a strong likelihood that Foxe obtained one or more of Carye’s manuscripts (which he called ‘Historia Cariana’), at least by the time that he started writing his second edition of the Acts and Monuments.50 Perhaps he too obtained this manuscript and then passed it on to Parker. The copy of the Historia compiled by William of Newburgh is unidentified, although it had been printed in 1567, so it is possible that Foxe never owned a manuscript version at all.51 Foxe did certainly own a copy of Walter of Guisborough, that he had obtained from Bale, but this is most likely not the copy that interests us here. Bale owned a miscellany which is now Oxford Magdalen College MS Latin 53. Part of it contained the final part of the chronicle, beginning at 1327 to its extended end around 1346.52 It is likely that this is the copy that Joscelyn mentions. Foxe, however, does cite Walter of Guisborough for sequences dated well before the fourteenth century, suggesting that he also had access to another copy.53 Foxe relied heavily on the Quadrilogus by Elias of Evesham for his sequence on Thomas Becket. It is possible that Foxe used the edition published in Paris in 1495, but Hanna and James Robertson suggest otherwise, claiming Foxe’s ownership of a manuscript copy, now identified as Cotton Faustina B, VIII.54 This would appear likely, but the printed edition should not be entirely dismissed. Anne Duggan has described this first printed

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edition as one that contained not only the narrative accounts about Becket but also containing a group of 67 related letters and documents that were unavailable in the Cotton Faustina manuscript. Foxe does appear to have included some of that information, suggesting that he probably used both the printed and the manuscript copies. The final manuscript referenced by Joscelyn is a copy of Ranulf Higden’s Polychronicon. Graham and Watson have identified this as Magdalen College Oxford Latin MS 181, finding more of Foxe’s annotations.55 By the time Foxe compiled the 1570 edition, he also owned Arundel MS 5, which he called ‘Scala Mundi’.56 The Polychronicon proved useful to Foxe, but it also came with baggage. Ranulf Higden had been a Benedictine monk of St Werburgh Monastery in Chester. This did not set Higden apart from the other authors of chronicles that Foxe used (most of whom were also monks). However, its popularity in the sixteenth century posed more of a problem. The Polychronicon was translated in 1387 by a Cornish translator called John of Trevisa and printed by William Caxton in 1480. It proved to be a financial success, and other printers, later, also reprinted it. The Polychronicon’s extensive use was partly because of the English translation, but more particularly because Higden had written a universal history, which combined much of what had previously been written from the time of Bede right up to the fourteenth century. It was therefore extremely useful. Before Foxe, this was the best summary of the English chronicle heritage available. Its popularity was, however, also its problem. Its extensive use had associated it with the established history as told by Roman Catholics, the very version of history that Foxe was writing against. Foxe, therefore, used it, but he did so sparingly and seemingly with some reluctance. The twelfth-century chronicles by William of Malmesbury, Henry of Huntingdon, and Roger of Hoveden were more useful to Foxe. He used them to compare evidence and to assess variation and coherence in narratives about events, particularly in the eleventh and twelfth centuries. William of Malmesbury had also produced a history of English kings (the Gesta Regum Anglorum). Foxe used this as well, although, again, the copy he had access to is unidentified. These account for seven of the ten manuscripts that appear in the 1563 edition. To these must be added CCCC MS 96, an anonymous chronicle attributed to John Brompton (fl. 1436–1464), an abbot of Jervaulx. Bale owned this manuscript, having obtained it from Peter Osborne (1521– 1592).57 Bale appears to have handed it to Foxe, who then handed it to Parker. Both Bale and Foxe call it ‘Iornalensis’, and whilst V. J. Goodman came to believe that the attribution originated with Roger Twysden, in his 1652 edition of the chronicle (where he calls it the Chronicon), the claim must begin with Bale.58 The Chronicon was a useful source for Foxe. It only existed in one known copy; it incorporated material from Ranulf Higden’s Polychronicon, without the baggage of what that meant, and contained material from a multitude of

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other medieval chronicles. It also provided multiple references to its sources (useful for providing alternative opinions about events) and unusually focused more on older history from the conversion of the Anglo-Saxons to the reign of King John. The manuscript has annotations in the hands of Bale, Foxe, and Parker (or Joscelyn).59 The ninth manuscript chronicle that remains unmentioned is equally important to what Foxe wrote. This is the Flores Historiarum. Whilst it was written in the thirteenth century by Matthew Paris as one variant of his larger Chronica Majora, the Flores Historiarum was known only and incorrectly, in the sixteenth century, as an independent work, accredited to a fictional character that they called Matthew of Westminster. It was, however, at least known, setting it apart from Matthew Paris’ Chronica Majora (larger chronicle) and Historia Anglorum (smaller chronicle), which had, for all intents and purposes, been forgotten. In the 1520s, Polydore Vergil had referred briefly to Matthew Paris in his Anglica Historia. A few decades later, Bale had gained access to the smaller chronicle and was aware, at least, that the larger chronicle existed somewhere. By the time the account of King John was written, access to both variants seems to have been possible. Otherwise, the Flores Historiarum was the only representation of Matthew Paris in sixteenth-century historiography until Parker made the effort to track down all the variant copies. For all intents and purposes then, the Flores Historiarum is to be treated as separate.60 Foxe must have recognised the similarities when he got his hands on the Chronica Majora after 1563, but these were similarities that he had observed elsewhere as well. One chronicle fed into another, and Foxe knew this. The end leaf notes that he had scribbled into the manuscripts of John Brompton, Nicholas Trivet, and William of Malmesbury proves his awareness of this interpolation between chronicles, even if, in the case of his ‘Scala Mundi’, which was obviously like his copy of the Polychronicon, Foxe claimed to have never made the connection (or at least claimed ignorance). For the Flores Historiarum manuscript, one possibility does present itself in the form of BL Cotton Claudius E.8, which appears to contain some more annotations in Foxe’s hand.61 The final medieval chronicle that Foxe used for the first edition to any large degree is an anonymously authored one. It is called the Eulogium. Its nineteenth-century editor, Frank S. Haydon, believed it to be a fourteenthcentury compilation from various sources probably compiled by a monk of Malmesbury Abbey possibly named Thomas (this suggestion was first made by John Leland).62 By the sixteenth century, there were various copies in existence (at least five of which survive today). For instance, John Dee owned one.63 Bale, in his Catalogus, refers to another, which was combined within a manuscript of John Capgrave’s fifteenth-century Nova Legenda Angliæ, but this manuscript no longer exists.64 Parker also owned a partial copy of the Eulogium in CCCC MS 101, which Foxe used to add weight to his claim of King John’s poisoning in the second edition. Unfortunately, the copy that Foxe used for the rest of his history remains unknown.

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Sources and Evidence

These 22 sources, taken together and compared to Book 1 of the 1563 edition, help us to reconstruct the pre-Lollard history that Foxe wrote. This is the basis for Foxe’s interpretation of the past. Although it is possible to have a good idea of which sources Foxe consulted, there remains less certainty about which specific copy he used in many cases. It is a similar picture for the sources used in the second edition. Foxe once again used these same sources, furnishing the new edition with extra information. He also added additional texts to his collection and borrowed heavily from Matthew Parker and elsewhere.

Sources for the Second Edition When John Bale died in 1563, he left Foxe with his intellectual legacy. He also left Parker with a renewed mission to track down numerous books that Bale claimed to have lost when he was forced to flee Ireland in the 1550s.65 A few years earlier, Parker told Matthias Flacius that he had only been able to find the ‘ryff raff and wurst’ of Bale’s library.66 In 1563, he told Sir William Cecil that he was still searching for Bale’s ‘old antiquities’.67 Despite Parker apparently failing to find many of Bale’s books, he had, nonetheless, begun to amass a large collection, which did include many texts that had once belonged to Bale. The basis for Parker’s new scholarly enterprise was his own household. He employed John Joscelyn, who worked tirelessly on Parker’s historical publications and helped in finding manuscripts. He hired George Acworth (1534–1581/1586) to help in the research for his De Antiquitate Britannicæ. He ordered his chaplain, Stephen Batman (c.1542–1584) to gather books on his behalf.68 He asked Peter Lily, his registrar of the consistory court, to counterfeit antique hands and ‘restore’ old manuscripts to perfection.69 Parker also made use of his various contacts as Archbishop of Canterbury. Bishop Richard Davies of St David’s told Parker of an old Saxon manuscript that had baffled John Jewel.70 Rowland Meyrick, Bishop of Bangor offered Parker a transcript of Eadmer’s hagiography in 1567, and from John Stow, Parker obtained one variant of Matthew Paris’ Chronica Majora. The amount of materials that Parker shared with Foxe shows just how large his collection was becoming and how diverse. There was material here that only existed in one copy—material that was otherwise hard to find. Material that was previously unknown. In brief, Parker at the very least provided Foxe with Gervase of Canterbury’s Opera Historia (CCCC MS 438), Matthew Paris’ Chronica Majora (CCCC MS 16 and 26), Walter of Guisborough’s chronicle (either CCCC MS 250—a sixteenth-century transcript or a fourteenth-century copy of Cambridge University Library MS Dd 2.5), Nicholas Trivet’s Annales (CCCC MS 152), a copy of Walter of Coventry’s chronicle (CCCC MS 175), the Chronicon Angliæ (BL Harley MS 3634), Osbern’s Life of St Dunstan (BL Arundel MS 16), Eadmer’s Vita S. Dunstane (CCCC MS 371), and the Letters of Anselm (CCCC MS 135).

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Parker probably supplied other materials as well that have not been fully identified, or did not find their way directly into the pre-Lollard history. Conversely, Foxe appears to have provided Parker with his copy of John Brompton’s Chronicon and two variations of Thomas Walsingham’s chronicle, one attributed to Robert de Avesbury (Douce MS 128), which Foxe may have obtained from a John Stevenson and then passed to Parker, who then leant it to William Lambarde, and a copy of Walsingham’s Historia Brevis (Arundel MS 7), which Foxe appears to have obtained independently in the 1550s and used in his Commentarii.71 Parker also appears to have sent Foxe information extracted from his manuscripts whenever he believed that something worthy had been found. For example, there is only one small epitaph provided from Asser’s Life of Alfred in the Acts and Monuments.72 This is the only engagement with that text, which suggests that Foxe never saw it himself. Similar material was supplied from Parker’s copy of the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle.73 A large proportion of the story of King Edgar might derive from fragments supplied by Parker’s household, including material from Simeon of Durham’s chronicle and a text called ‘Ioan Paris’ concerning the succession following Edgar’s death.74 Foxe appears to have also obtained fragments from Parker from Alfred of Rievaulx (CCCC MS 103.8), William de Amour’s De Periculis novissimorum temporum (CCCC MS 103.8), and some miscellaneous parchment leaves (possibly CCCC MS 404.5). By joining Parker’s network, Foxe also benefited from additional access to other Elizabethan scholars, such as William Lambarde, who was working on Anglo-Saxon history, and to a copy of the Crowland Chronicle, owned by the Lord of Arundel. Taken together, these manuscripts, the fragments, and the contacts with other scholars provided Foxe with a unique opportunity to assess, analyse, and compare the varied and diverse manuscript heritage, almost as a whole. No previous scholar had ever had such an opportunity. No one had ever had so much access to so many manuscripts beyond, perhaps John Leland. Essentially, Parker was entrusting Foxe to produce an appropriate interpretation and compile the mass of knowledge into a usable form. He hoped and expected Foxe to describe a Reformation past, for a reformed kingdom, to prepare a new story for Elizabethans to believe in—a new past free of the ties to Roman Catholicism. This is exactly what Foxe did, using the materials that he had written in Book 1 of the 1563 edition and extending them, expanding, and rewriting in part with the materials that Parker provided him. Foxe also made more use of the sources that he had previously used. He also added a few extra of his own.

Printed Texts in the 1570 Edition The most important new source that Foxe provided himself is The New Chronicles of England and France, first published in London in 1516 and

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Sources and Evidence

various times afterwards.75 Its compiler, Robert Fabyan (d. 1513), was a member of the London Drapers’ Company, and his chronicle—a parallel history of England and France—was part of the so-called tradition of London chronicles popular in metropolitan civic circles in the fifteenth century.76 Indeed, Fabyan’s history was the principal vehicle by which this tradition transmitted to Tudor England. All mainstream historians of the era used it in their histories including Polydore Vergil, Sir Thomas More (1478–1535), John Stow (1524/5–1605), Richard Hakluyt (1552–1616), Edward Hall (1497–1547), Raphael Holinshed (c. 1525–1580), and John Bale. The printed edition was not quite the same as the original manuscript. From the 1533 edition onwards, a continuation was added that brought the chronicle from the year 1485 to the third year of Henry VIII. More vitally, however, from the 1559 edition, the content was edited and ‘reformed’ to better reflect a Protestant view of history. Thus the title ‘pope’ became ‘Bishop of Rome’, saints lost the prefix ‘holy’ and ‘blessed’, and Roman Catholic prayers and verses were omitted.77 Foxe obviously felt that the changes were appropriate. When opening Book 3 of his Acts and Monuments, Foxe advertised the New Chronicles as a useful supplement to his own account of the Anglo-Saxon monarchies arguing, ‘They are sufficiently and at large described and taken out of Latine writers into the Englishe toung by sundry autors, and namely in the story or Chronicle of Fabian’.78 Indeed, Foxe consistently returns to Fabyan’s chronicle for points of fact and appears to have also sought out manuscript copies to look for variation. In addition to one of the printed editions (probably the fully ‘reformed’ version of 1559), Foxe also owned MS Cotton Nero C XI. This manuscript contained what appeared to be the second portion of Fabyan’s chronicles starting with Richard I, but C. L. Kingsford has shown that it is really a different London chronicle, now generally called the ‘Great Chronicle’.79 The error came in 1533 when William Rastell (1508–1565) added a continuation to Fabyan in his printed edition. This derived from a variant of the Great Chronicle manuscript that Foxe found and thus conflated the two together. For certain points, Foxe refers to both the printed and manuscript copies.80 Once again, then, Foxe makes use of contemporary printed material alongside the chronicle heritage. The story of Emperor Frederick II’s disagreement with the papacy is one of the few sequences to be entirely rewritten. In 1563, Foxe had relied on Matthias Flacius’ catalogue, now he told the story through two texts that had been published in Basel. These were Nicholas Cisner’s De Frederico II. Imperatore Oratio, printed in 1565 and Pier della Vigne’s Epistolarum Petride Vineis, which was printed in 1566.81 Elsewhere, Foxe made use of Albert Krantz’ Metropolis sive Historia ed ecclesis (published in Basel in 1548). This text appears amongst Foxe’s books in the posthumous list in Lansdowne 819. He also used Pierre Bertrand’s Libellus de iurisdictione ecclesiastica (published in Paris in 1495), Polydore Vergil’s Anglica Historia, and Jacobus da Varagine’s The Golden

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Legend.82 To aid him with Anglo-Saxon genealogies Foxe obtained at least one copy of the popular Breviat chronicle and also John Stow’s A Summary of English Chronicles.83 These were all used in Books 2 through 4 for various stories and sequences. A few others, too, were found from elsewhere, such as Jack Upland, an antifraternal tract that John Day had a monopoly on, or printed works from Basel, such as Nicephorus’ Historia Ecclesiastica and Abdias’, Babyloniæ Episcopi et Apostolorum. Book 1, however, required a different source base from the rest, as its focus was much earlier.

Biblical and Roman History Foxe began the first book of the second edition of the Acts and Monuments with biblical history. This series of sequences relied on Scriptural references (generally taken from the Geneva Bible), a selection of contemporary printed texts, such as the Commentarius ad Edictum Henrici Secundi by Charles du Moulin (1500–1566), and sources favourable to the Roman Church, particularly the papal decretals. Taken together, these sources enabled Foxe to compare the Church of the ‘flourishing time’ with the Church that he believed to have been taken over by Satan. Charles du Moulin’s Commentarius, for example, was welcome ammunition to this cause. It had been written as a response to the Council of Trent, as a French declaration against the changes muted at the first meeting. It used ancient history as its primary means of attack, designed solely to influence the outcome of the second session of the Council.84 Foxe found this useful, especially when combining it with evidence from past councils of the Church, which could also offer some serious questions about continuity, supremacy, and procedure. The decretals are a series of individual collections that recorded canon law and the letters of the popes. Whilst, Jean Chappuis had gathered these together between 1449 and 1505 as the Corpus Juris Canonici, it was only after the Council of Trent that they were printed and then in an updated and amended form.85 Whilst manuscript copies of the complete text were available, many scholars still relied on individual collections. Foxe appears to be one of them. The Lansdowne manuscript helps us to understand the version of the decretals that Foxe used.86 Samuel Foxe lists them in random order, including glosses such as Azo of Bologna’s Summa Codicis and Summa Institutionum. Peter of Blois’ Speculum, Nicholas de Tudeschis’ commentary on the Clementine constitutions, and decretals such as Gregory IX, the Gratian decretals, the ‘Decretorum pars secunda’, and the Justinian decretals.87 The sources for Roman history that follow appear at first glance to be diverse. Foxe cites approximately 70 different sources for his narrative of persecution and Constantine’s conversion to Christianity. The number appears impressive, but is also deceiving. Foxe must have used Eusebius’ Ecclesiastical History. Evidence also suggests that he used Eusebius’ Vita

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Constantini (Life of Constantine). He probably used a copy of Sozomen and Jerome as well, and a few other texts. However, these were occasional uses or checks on the material that Foxe obtained elsewhere. As will be argued in Chapter 4, Foxe mostly relied on the Magdeburg Centuries. In almost every instance where a source is cited, the reference and the corresponding text can be found in one of the first four or five volumes of the history, led by Matthias Flacius, but undertaken as a collective enterprise. Casper von Nidbruck (1525–1593), counsellor in the Habsburg court of Vienna was one of the men involved. John Wigand (1523–1587) and Matthew Judex (1528–1576) were the project editors. Basil Faber (1525–1576), Martin Köppe, and François Boudouin (1520–1573) provided aid.88 These were important people: officials, scholars, clerics. There were many others as well. Fourteen volumes were produced in total, each of which consisted of history over one century, each organised into themes such as ‘leading bishops’, ‘heretics’, and ‘persecution’. The material was like what Bale and Flacius had provided in their respective catalogues, but on a much larger scale. There were verbatim and summarised documents. There were references to diverse works. There was evidence and examples that were almost impossible to find elsewhere. It was a singular treasure trove of evidence that other Protestant scholars could use to build up a new, revised history. All but the last volume would have been available before Foxe finished his work on the 1570 edition of the Acts and Monuments, although Foxe appears to only use the first four or five volumes. These were easy to access. Foxe most likely had his own copies, as the first few were produced by Johannes Oporinus in 1559, whilst Foxe worked as a proofreader. In addition, multiple copies would have been available in London as well. Felicity Heal has identified eight copies held at Cambridge, more extant copies than any other text of its size.89 Additionally, at least 20 copies (of complete and  incomplete sets) can be found across Britain. Alongside the catalogues and the wide array of medieval chronicles available to Foxe, the Centuriators work would prove amongst the most valuable in making the pre-Lollard history in the Acts and Monuments the most diverse, complex, and source heavy history produced in sixteenth-century England.

Conclusions Together, these sources formed the basis for Foxe’s interpretation of the past. Some of them were contemporary, often written by men who held a similar faith as himself. These were useful not only as conveyers of evidence but also for an argument already in alignment with Foxe’s planned revision of history. Foxe did not, however, solely base his arguments on authorities who believed as he did. He did not fall into the trap of limiting his knowledge to predefined statements that agreed with his own. He teased out the evidence, compared it to original sources (where possible), and came to his

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own judgement. As this chapter has shown, Foxe also used evidence that had been written by those who Foxe wrote against: the decretals, the hagiographies, and the chronicles produced by monks. It is how Foxe used these sources that is of most interest. In the following chapters, it will be shown that some of these sources were granted more weight than others. Most were presented and analysed as hostile witnesses or at the very least dubious conveyers of truth, only a handful were considered by Foxe and his colleagues to be friendlier, but even these were not entirely trusted. Foxe remained critical of all his sources, even those closest to him. Even the works of John Bale were not blindly followed. As will be shown, Foxe relied heavily on Bale’s arguments and evidence, but he departed from them at key junctures where he disagreed or felt that the evidence was not convincing. In addition, whilst Parker might have proved crucial in providing Foxe with additional evidence, Foxe did not simply bend to the archbishop’s authority, he independently judged, considered, and analysed the evidence presented to him. Foxe often made mistakes, but then his work is so huge and his time short. Mistakes were unavoidable. More interesting here is the use of the sources that Foxe made in creating an argument and preparing a narrative of the past. Interpretation and method were key. Also of interest is the multiple types of sources that Foxe used. His work is a wide-ranging mosaic of histories, literature, religious tracts, epistles, and miscellaneous documentation. As will become apparent there is a method in how Foxe ordered these materials. Some of the sources are anchors for the others. Extraction from the Magdeburg Centuries by Foxe, for example, told the story of early persecutions without the need to often insert material from other sources. Where Foxe did insert material from elsewhere, it was for specific reasons and always embedded in the core narrative that he had taken from his main source. Later in the pre-Lollard history, Robert Fabyan’s New Chronicles would take on a similar role, albeit on a lesser scale. For the Anglo-Saxon period, the Chronicon attributed to John Brompton would provide the same service. For the reign of Henry III, Matthew Paris’ Chronica Majora would become the anchoring text. Throughout the history, Foxe would refer to the catalogues of Bale and Flacius. This at least is true for the second edition of the Acts and Monuments. For the first edition, published in 1563, a different story emerges on how Foxe compiled his history.

Notes 1. The Fasciculi Zizaniorum is ascribed to Thomas Netter of Walden (1320–1384). John Bale owned the only manuscript, which he passed to Foxe. This is Bodley MS e Musaeo 86. It has been printed as Thomas Netter, Fasciculi Zizaniorum Magistri Johannis Wyclif Cum Tritico: Ascribed to Thomas Netter of Walden, ed. Walter Waddington Shirley (London: Longman, 1858). For more on how Foxe used the manuscript, see J. A. F. Thomson, “John Foxe and Some Sources for Lollard History: Notes for a Critical Appraisal,” Studies in Church History 2 (1965): 251–7, https://doi.org/10.1017/S042420840000526X.

50

Sources and Evidence

2. Samuel R. Maitland, A Review of Fox the Martyrologist’s History of the Waldenses (London, 1837). For more information about the Maitland controversy around Foxe, see David Loades, “The Maitland Controversy,” TAMO, 2004, www.johnfoxe. org/index.php?realm=more&gototype=&type=essay&book=essay11. 3. Maitland, A Review of Fox the Martyrologist’s History of the Waldenses, 43. 4. Ibid., 46. 5. Stephen Reed Cattley, The Acts and Monuments of John Foxe., New and complete ed., vol. 1 (London: Seeley and Burnside, 1841), 239. 6. Compare A&M (1563), 57–62 (57-59, 544-546) with Flacius, CTV (1556), 704–61 or (1562), 445–7. 7. Richard Terry, The Plagiarism Allegation in English Literature From Butler to Sterne (Basingstoke; New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2010); Alastair Pennycook, “Borrowing Others’ Words: Text, Ownership, Memory, and Plagiarism,” TESOL Quarterly 30, no. 2 (1996): 201–30, https://doi.org/10.2307/3588141; B. S.Yamey, “Oldcastle, Peele and Mellis: A Case of Plagiarism in the Sixteenth Century,” Accounting and Business Research 9, no. 35 (1 June 1979): 209–16, https://doi. org/10.1080/00014788.1979.9729160; Max W. Thomas, “Eschewing Credit: Heywood, Shakespeare, and Plagiarism Before Copyright,” New Literary History 31, no. 2 (2000): 277–93. 8. Mary T. Crane, Framing Authority: Sayings, Self, and Society in Sixteenth-Century England (Princeton, NJ; Chichester: Princeton University Press, 1993), 3–4. 9. Patrick Collinson, “John Foxe as Historian,” TAMO, 2004, www.johnfoxe.org/ index.php?realm=more&gototype=&type=essay&book=essay3. 10. Ibid. 11. Foxe’s role as ‘author’ has been most recently discussed in Elizabeth Evenden and Thomas S. Freeman, Religion and the Book in Early Modern England: The Making of John Foxe’s ‘Book of Martyrs’ (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2011), 345–6; but more extensively by John N. King, English Reformation Literature: The Tudor Origins of the Protestant Tradition (Princeton, NJ; Guildford: Princeton University Press, 1983), 69; and John N. King, Foxe’s Book of Martyrs and Early Modern Print Culture (Cambridge; New York: Cambridge University Press, 2006), 23. 12. Eusebius, The Ecclesiastical History of Eusebius Pamphilus, Bishop of Cesarea, in Palestine, trans. Christian F. Cruse, Popular ed. (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Book House, 1955), 14. 13. Such studies include Benjamin Kaplan, An Unhurried View of Copyright (New York; London: Columbia University Press, 1967); Mark Rose, Authors and Owners: The Invention of Copyright (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1993); Neil Hathaway, “Compilatio: From Plagiarism to Compiling,” Viator 20 (1 January 1989): 19–44, https://doi.org/10.1484/J.VIATOR.2.301346; Alastair J. Minnis, Medieval Theory of Authorship: Scholastic Literary Attitudes in the Later Middle Ages, 2nd ed. (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2012). 14. See, as an example, Alfred Hiatt, The Making of Medieval Forgeries: False Documents in Fifteenth-Century England (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2004), www.loc.gov/catdir/toc/fy051/2004426759.html; Robert Edwards, Invention and Authorship in Medieval England (Columbus: The Ohio State University Press, 2017). 15. Thomas, ‘Eschewing Credit: Heywood, Shakespeare, and Plagiarism Before Copyright’, 278. 16. Minnis, Medieval Theory of Authorship: Scholastic Literary Attitudes in the Later Middle Ages, 10. 17. Natasha Simonova, Early Modern Authorship and Prose Continuations: Adaptation and Ownership From Sidney to Richardson (Basingskoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2015).

Sources and Evidence

51

18. Thomas S. Freeman, “‘St Peter Did Not Do Thus’: Papal History in the Acts and Monuments, part three,” TAMO, 2004, www.johnfoxe.org/index.php?realm=m ore&gototype=&type=essay&book=essay17. 19. Compare A&M (1570), 74–5 (61-2) with Eusebius, The Ecclesiastical History of Eusebius Pamphilus, Bishop of Cesarea, in Palestine, 203–5 and Cent II., cols. 173, 176. 20. Freeman, “‘St Peter Did Not Do Thus’: Papal History in the Acts and Monuments”. 21. The source cited is most likely Liutrpand of Cremona, Relatio de legatione Constantinopolitana ad Nicephorum Phocam written in the tenth century. Compare A&M (1570), 206 with John Bale, Scriptorum illustriū maioris Brytannię . . . catalogus . . . usque ad annū hunc Domini 1557 . . . IX centurias continens, etc.: (Scriptorum illustrium . . . posterior pars, quinque continens centurias ultimas) (Basel, 1557), 122, 129. 22. See A&M (1563), 36–51, and (1570), 240–50. Researched by Freeman, “‘St  Peter Did Not Do Thus’: Papal History in the Acts and Monuments,” Appendix 2. 23. For a full list of known sources that Foxe used in the pre-Lollard history in the first (1563) and second (1570) editions of the Acts and Monuments, see the annotated bibliography in Appendix 1. 24. Timothy Graham and Andrew G. Watson, The Recovery of the Past in Early Elizabethan England: Documents by John Bale and John Joscelyn From the Circle of Matthew Parker (Cambridge: Cambridge Bibliographical Society, 1998). This is the same letter published by Henry R. Luard, “A Letter from Bishop Bale to Archbishop Parker: Communicated by the Rev. M.R. Luard,” Cambridge Antiquarian Communications; Being Papers Presented at the Meetings of the Cambridge Antiquarian Society 3, no. 15 (Cambridge, 1865): 157–73. 25. John Wade, “John Foxe the Latinist,” TAMO, 2004, www.johnfoxe.org/index. php?realm=more&gototype=&type=essay&book=essay14. The promised article by James Carley and Thomas S. Freeman is yet to be published, but I am indebted to James Carley for kindly sharing some of their ideas with me about the Lansdowne 819 manuscript. 26. Ralph Hanna, “An Oxford Library Interlude: The Manuscripts of John Foxe the Martyrologist,” Bodleian Library Record 17, no. 5 (April 2002): 314–26. Reference at 315. 27. Translated from the original Latin in Nicholas Trivet, Annales, CCCC MS 152, fo. 108v: Historiam de gestis Anglorum collectam ex Galfr. Monumet., Beda, Will. Malmesb., Petro Pictavensi, fr. Martino Penitentiano et capellano papae et Henr. Huntentunensi habet mr. Horton. Liber inc. Non solum audiendis scripturae sacrae verbis. 28. This annotation appears on the flyleaf, CCCC MS 96, fo. 2v [John Brompton, Chronicon]. It is a blank leaf, except for Foxe’s annotation and another, in a different hand, identifying the manuscript as owned by Peter Osborne and noting a relationship of the chronicle to the Polychronicon by Ranulf Higden. Foxe’s annotation lists as sources William of Malmesbury, Gerald of Wales, Geoffrey of Monmouth, Henry of Huntingdon, Alfred of Rievaulx, Ranulph Castrensis (Ranulf Higden), Asser’s History of Alfred, Simeon of Durham, Alfred of Beverley, Osborne’s Life of Dunstan, and Wulfstan’s Life of St Æthelwold. 29. Compare A&M (1570), 159 with the chronicle of John Brompton in CCCC MS 96, fo. 17v–18r, also available in John Brompton, “Chronicon Johannis Bromton Abbatis Iornalensis,” in Historiæ Anglicanæ scriptores X : Simeon Monachus Dunelmensis. Johannes Prior Hagustaldensis. Ricardus Prior Hagustaldensis. Ailredus Abbas Rievallensis. Radulphus de Diceto Londoniensis. Johannes Brompton

52

30. 31. 32. 33.

34. 35. 36. 37. 38.

39. 40.

41. 42. 43. 44. 45. 46. 47.

48. 49.

Sources and Evidence Jornallensis. Gervasius Monachus Dorobornensis. Thomas Stubbs Dominicanus. Guilielmus Thorn Cantuariensis. Henricus Knighton Leicestrensis. Ex vetustis manusciptis, nunc primùm in lucem editi ; Adjectis variis lectionibus, glossario, indicéque copioso, ed. Roger Twysden (London, 1652), cols. 767–75. Thomas S. Freeman, “John Bale’s Book of Martyrs?: The Account of King John in Acts and Monuments,” Reformation 3, no. 1 (1 January 1998): 175–223, https:// doi.org/10.1179/ref_1998_3_1_008. Freeman, 178. These are the sources used by William Tyndale in his The Obedience of a Christian Man (1528). Simon Fish and Robert Barnes took their argument directly from Tyndale. In A&M (1570), 30–1 Foxe appears to use Flacius, CTV (1562), 201–4, which Flacius had sub-headed ‘Annonius’. The 1556 edition does not contain this sequence. Oliver K. Olson, Matthias Flacius and the Survival of Luther’s Reform (Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz in Kommission, 2002), 238 counts 650 sources but admits that the number depends on how one counts them. For example, Robin B. Barnes, Prophecy and Gnosis: Apocalypticism in the Wake of the Lutheran Reformation (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1988), 76–7 counted 400 sources. See Olson, Matthias Flacius and the Survival of Luther’s Reform, 252–3. See Gregory B. Lyon, “Baudouin, Flacius, and the Plan for the Magdeburg Centuries,” Journal of the History of Ideas 64, no. 2 (2003): 253–72, https://doi. org/10.2307/3654128. See May McKisack, Medieval History in the Tudor Age (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1971), 14. Ibid., 14–17. See Leslie P. Fairfield, John Bale, Mythmaker for the English Reformation (Eugene, Oregon: Purdue University Press, 1976), 115–20; McKisack, Medieval History in the Tudor Age, 14–17; and Fred J. Levy, Tudor Historical Thought, reprint (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2004, first printed 1967), 94–5. Freeman, “‘St Peter Did Not Do Thus’: Papal History in the Acts and Monuments,” fn. 69. Bale, Catalogus, fo. A3r (preface), as translated and discussed in Christopher J. Warner, “Elizabeth I, Saviour of Books: John Bale’s Preface to the Scriptorum Illustrium Maioris Brytainiae . . . Catalogus (1559),” in John Foxe and His World, ed. David Loades (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2002), 91–101. Alan Maccoll, “The Construction of England as a Protestant “British” Nation in the Sixteenth Century,” Renaissance Studies 18, no. 4 (2004): 582–608, https:// doi.org/10.1111/j.1477-4658.2004.00078.x. Fairfield, John Bale, Mythmaker for the English Reformation, 89, 94. Lansdowne 819, fo. 95r. Ibid., fo. 95r–96v. Graham and Watson, The Recovery of the Past in Early Elizabethan England: Documents by John Bale and John Joscelyn From the Circle of Matthew Parker, 27 (J2.37). Ibid. Hanna, “An Oxford Library Interlude: The Manuscripts of John Foxe the Martyrologist,” 315 confirms Foxe’s ownership of Magdalen College Oxford MS 172 whilst Paul Morgan, Oxford Libraries Outside the Bodleian: A Guide (Oxford: Oxford Bibliographic Society; Bodleian Library, 1973), 65 identified this manuscript as the autograph copy. Magdalen College Oxford MS 172, fo. 106v. Graham and Watson, The Recovery of the Past in Early Elizabethan England: Documents by John Bale and John Joscelyn From the Circle of Matthew Parker, 18. William Carye would appear to be the owner of a variety of old manuscripts

Sources and Evidence

50. 51.

52.

53.

54.

55. 56. 57. 58.

59. 60.

61. 62.

53

as discussed by Andrew G. Watson, “Christopher and William Carye, Collectors of Monastic Manuscripts, and ‘John Carye’,” The Library 5, no. 2 (1 June 1965): 135–42, https://doi.org/10.1093/library/s5-XX.2.135. For the second edition of the Acts and Monuments Foxe would call one of his miscellaneous manuscripts Historia Cariana, referencing the fact that he obtained the chronicle from Carye. Watson, “Christopher and William Carye, Collectors of Monastic Manuscripts, and “John Carye”.” The printed edition is William of Newburgh, Rerum Anglicarum libri quinque, recens ceu è tenebris eruti, & in studiosorum gratiam in lucem dati: auctore Gulielmo Neubrigensi (Antwerp: Willem Silvius, 1567). There are at least five extent variants of this manuscript. See Joseph Stevenson, The Church Historians of England: Containing the History of William of Newburgh: The Chronicles of Robert De Monte, vol. 4 pt. 2 (London: Seeleys, 1856), viii–ix. The presence of annotations in the hands of both Bale and Foxe confirms their ownership of the manuscript. See Graham and Watson, The Recovery of the Past in Early Elizabethan England: Documents by John Bale and John Joscelyn From the Circle of Matthew Parker, 97–8 (J2.94). One possibility is Cambridge University Library MS Dd 2.5, which was used for the account of King John in the 1563 edition of the Acts and Monuments. This, however, was more likely owned by Bale than Foxe, before ending up in Parker’s hands. See Freeman, “John Bale’s Book of Martyrs?: The Account of King John in Acts and Monuments,” 209. Hanna, “An Oxford Library Interlude: The Manuscripts of John Foxe the Martyrologist”; and James C. Robertson, ed., Materials for the History of Thomas Becket, Archbishop of Canterbury, vol. 1, 4 vols (London: Longman, Trübner, 1879), xiii. The manuscript is Faustina B viii, fo. 54–121. Graham and Watson, The Recovery of the Past in Early Elizabethan England: Documents by John Bale and John Joscelyn From the Circle of Matthew Parker, 72, 74, 82. This manuscript contains an annotation by Foxe at Arundel MS 5, fo. 118r. The ownership to Peter Osborne is identified in an annotation in Bale’s hand on the first folio, see CCCC MS 96, fo. 1r. This is Twysden, Historiæ Anglicanæ scriptores X, cols. 725–1284, which contains ten different medieval chronicles. See V. J. Goodman, “Brompton, John (f. 1436-c. 1464),” ODNB, 2004, https://doi.org/10.1093/ref:odnb/3518. John Bale’s reference to “Iornalensis” is not in his printed texts, but rather his notebook published as John Bale, Index Britanniae Scriptorum: John Bale’s Index of British and Other Writers, ed. Reginald Lane Poole and Mary Bateson, 1st ed. reprinted / with new introduction & bibliog., by Caroline Brett and James P. Carley (Woodbridge: D.S. Brewer, 1990), 185. As Foxe retains the same citation of “Iornalensis” in the Acts and Monuments it would seem likely that this is Foxe’s source for the attribution and for the manuscript itself. Foxe’s hand can be found at CCCC MS 96, fo. 2v, 17v–18r, 18v, 16r. John Bale adds the identification of John Brompton at fo.1r and most likely offers many other annotations throughout the manuscript. Matthew Paris, Matthai Parisiensis, monachi Sancti Albani: Historia Anglorum, sive, ut vulgo dicitur, Historia minor., ed. Frederic Madden (London: Longmans, Green, Reader, and Dyer, 1866), vol. 1, xliv–lv provides more detail about the Flores Historiarum in the sixteenth-century. At least two hands have made annotations on this manuscript, one of which might be Foxe. The endleaf (BL Cotton Claudius E.8, fo. 267) might be another example where Foxe has assessed the truthfulness of the chronicle. Frank S. Haydon, ed., Eulogium historiarum sive temporis: Chronicon ab orbe condito usque ad annum Domini M.CCC.LXVI., a monacho quodam

54

63. 64. 65.

66.

67. 68. 69. 70.

71.

72.

73. 74. 75.

76. 77.

Sources and Evidence Malmesburiensi exaratum; accedunt continuationes duae, quarum una ad annum M.CCCC.XIII., altera ad annum M.CCCC.XC. perducta est. (London: Longman, Brown, Green, Longmans & Roberts, 1858), vol.1, iii–iv. John Dee owned MS Galba E. VII. See McKisack, Medieval History in the Tudor Age, 10, 73. See Haydon, Eulogium historiarum sive temporis. William O’Sullivan, “The Irish “Remnant” of John Bale’s Manuscripts,” in New Science Out of Old Books: Studies in Manuscript and Early Printed Books in Honour of A.I. Doyle, ed. Richard Bendle and A. J. Piper (Aldershot: Scolar Press, 1995), 374–87, and Honor McCusker, “Books and Manuscripts Formerly in the Possession of John Bale,” The Library 4, no. 16 (1935): 144–65. This letter has led to confusion as it is dated to 1566 in J. Bruce and T.T. Perowne, eds., Correspondence of Matthew Parker, D.D., Archbishop of Canterbury: Comprising Letters Written by and to Him, From AD 1535 to His Death AD 1575 (London, 1853), 286–8 and in Hastings Robinson, The Zurich Letters (Cambridge, 1842), 77–80. However, Norman L. Jones, “Matthew Parker, John Bale, and the Magdeburg Centuriators,” The Sixteenth Century Journal 12, no. 3 (1981): 35–49, https://doi.org/10.2307/2539785, believes that the proper context is 1561. Bruce and Perowne, Correspondences of Matthew Parker, 197–9. Kate McLoughlin, “Magdalene College MS Pepys 2498 and Stephen Batman’s Reading Practices,” TCBS 10 (1994): 525–34. David J. Crankshaw and Alexandra Gillespie, “Parker, Matthew (1504–1575),” ODNB, 2004, https://doi.org/10.1093/ref:odnb/21327 This manuscript was probably CCCC MS 478—an Armenian Psalter. See Bruce and Perowne, Correspondences of Matthew Parker, 265–7 and Walter W. Greg, “Books and Bookmen in the Correspondence of Archbishop Parker,” The Library, 16, no. 3 (1935): 243–79. Douce MS 128, the chronicle attributed to Robert de Avesbury, contains annotations by Parker’s household and Lambarde. One of Lambarde’s annotations refers to Foxe as a previous owner (fo. 163v) and confirms that John Stephenson once owned it. In A&M (1570), 493 (472), Foxe mentions that his ‘story of Robertus Auesbur’ came from the ‘library of J. Stevenson of London’, confirming his use of the same manuscript. See Evenden and Freeman, Religion and the Book in Early Modern England: The Making of John Foxe’s ‘Book of Martyrs’, 156. The evidence for Arundel MS 7 is from Evenden and Freeman, 46. This was taken from Cotton MS Otho A xii, which was destroyed in the Cotton Library fire. Parker made a transcript, which is now CCCC MS 100. The epitaph can also be found in Matthew Parker, ed., Ælfredi Regis Res Gestæ (London, 1574), 35. See MS Cotton Tiberius B IV, fo. 3–86, 88–90 and compare to A&M (1570), 218–9 and the TAMO commentary for that page. See A&M (1570), 220 TAMO Commentary, which cites CCCC MS 60 for ‘Ioan Paris’ and one of the copies that Parker owned of Simeon of Durham. Historians have come to doubt the attribution of the New Chronicles to Robert Fabyan, as most recently discussed by Mary-Rose McLaren, The London Chronicles of the Fifteenth Century: A Revolution in English Writing (Woodbridge, Suffolk; Rochester, NY: D.S. Brewer, 2002), 15–48. Foxe might have used Fabyan in the first edition of the Acts and Monuments as well, but this was in the latter portions of the text. Mary-Rose McLaren, “Fabyan, Robert (d. 1513),” ODNB, 2004, https://doi. org/10.1093/ref:odnb/9054. Robert Fabyan, The New Chronicles of England and France, in Two Parts; Named .  .  . the Concordance of Histories, ed. Henry Ellis (London, 1811),

Sources and Evidence

78. 79.

80. 81.

82.

83. 84.

85. 86.

87. 88.

89.

55

xix–xx and Maccoll, “The Construction of England as a Protestant “British” Nation in the Sixteenth Century”. A&M (1570), 193. Charles L. Kingsford, English Historical Literature in the Fifteenth Century (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1913), 103–4, and more recently discussed in McLaren, The London Chronicles of the Fifteenth Century: A Revolution in English Writing, 15–28. See Arthur H. Thomas and Isobel D. Thornley, The Great Chronicle of London (London, 1938), xvi. See Freeman, “‘St Peter Did Not Do Thus”: Papal History in the Acts and Monuments,” which cites as Foxe’s sources for Frederick II, Nicholas Cisner, De Frederico II. Imp. Oratio (Strasbourg, 1608), 97–102, Pier della Vigne, Epistolarum Petride Vinesi (Basel, 1566), 204–15, 128–30, and Matthew Paris, Chronica Majora, vol. 3, 151–3. The Legenda Aurea was printed in more editions than the Bible before 1500 and it was one of the first books printed by William Caxton in the English language (in 1483). There were nine editions by 1527 and more followed. See Jacobus da Varagine, The Golden Legend: Readings on the Saints, trans. William G. Ryan (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1993), Preface. See Daniel Woolf, Reading History in Early Modern England (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000), 39–47. Sarah Hanley, “What Is in a Name?: ‘Our French Law’,” Law and History Review 28, no. 3 (2010): 827–36, and Robert M. Kingdon, “Some French Reactions to the Council of Trent,” Church History 33, no. 2 (1964): 149–56, https:// doi.org/10.2307/3162977. See Amleto Giovanni Cicognani, ed., Canon Law (Westminster: Newman Press, 1949), 320. See Wilfried Hartmann and Kenneth Pennington, eds., The History of Medieval Canon Law in the Classical Period, 1140–1234: From Gratian to the Decretals of Pope Gregory IX (Washington, DC: Catholic University of America Press, 2008). For the Canons and Decrees that came out of the Council of Trent, see Henry J. Schroeder, Canons and Decrees of the Council of Trent, trans. Henry J. Schroeder (Rockford: Tan Books and Publishers, 1978). Lansdowne 819, fo. 95–6. Ronald E. Diener, “The Magdeburg Centuries: A Bibliothecal and Historiographical Analysis” (Th.D. Diss., Harvard University, 1978); Lyon, “Baudouin, Flacius, and the Plan for the Magdeburg Centuries,” and Jones, “Matthew Parker, John Bale, and the Magdeburg Centuriators”. Felicity Heal, “Appropriating History: Catholic and Protestant Polemics and the National Past,” Huntington Library Quarterly 68, no. 1–2 (2005): 109–32, https://doi.org/10.1525/hlq.2005.68.1-2.109.

Works Cited Manuscripts Arundel MS 5—Ranulf Higden, Polychronicon BL Cotton Claudius E.8—Flores Historiarum CCCC MS 96—John Brompton, Chronicon CCCC MS 152—Nicholas Trivet, Annales Douce MS 128—Robert de Avesbury, De Gestis Mirabilibus Regis Edwardii tertii. Faustina B viii—Quadrilogus

56

Sources and Evidence

Lansdowne 819—miscellaneous papers of John Foxe Magdalen College Oxford MS 172—William of Malmesbury, Gesta Pontificum Anglorum

Printed Bale, John. Index Britanniae Scriptorum: John Bale’s Index of British and Other Writers, edited by Reginald Lane Poole and Mary Bateson. 1st ed. Reprinted/With New Introduction and Bibliography by Caroline Brett and James P. Carley. Woodbridge: D.S. Brewer, 1990. ——— Scriptorum illustriū maioris Brytannię . . . catalogus . . . usque ad annū hunc Domini 1557 . . . IX centurias continens, etc.: (Scriptorum illustrium . . . posterior pars, quinque continens centurias ultimas). Basel, 1557. Barnes, Robin B. Prophecy and Gnosis: Apocalypticism in the Wake of the Lutheran Reformation. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1988. Brompton, John. “Chronicon Johannis Bromton Abbatis Iornalensis.” In Historiæ Anglicanæ scriptores X : Simeon Monachus Dunelmensis. Johannes Prior Hagustaldensis. Ricardus Prior Hagustaldensis. Ailredus Abbas Rievallensis. Radulphus de Diceto Londoniensis. Johannes Brompton Jornallensis. Gervasius Monachus Dorobornensis. Thomas Stubbs Dominicanus. Guilielmus Thorn Cantuariensis. Henricus Knighton Leicestrensis. Ex vetustis manusciptis, nunc primùm in lucem editi; Adjectis variis lectionibus, glossario, indicéque copioso., edited by Roger Twysden, 725–1284. London, 1652. Bruce, J., and T. T. Perowne, eds. Correspondence of Matthew Parker, D.D., Archbishop of Canterbury: Comprising Letters Written by and to Him, From AD 1535 to His Death AD 1575. London, 1853. Cattley, Stephen Reed. The Acts and Monuments of John Foxe. New and complete ed. Vol. 1. London: Seeley and Burnside, 1841. Cicognani, Amleto Giovanni, ed. Canon Law. Westminster: Newman Press, 1949. Collinson, Patrick. “John Foxe as Historian.” TAMO, 2004. www.johnfoxe.org/ index.php?realm=more&gototype=&type=essay&book=essay3. Crane, Mary T. Framing Authority: Sayings, Self, and Society in Sixteenth-Century England. Princeton, NJ and Chichester: Princeton University Press, 1993. Crankshaw, David J., and Alexandra Gillespie. “Parker, Matthew (1504–1575).” ODNB (2004), https://doi.org/10.1093/ref:odnb/21327. Da Voragine, Jacobus. The Golden Legend: Readings on the Saints, translated by William G. Ryan. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1993. Diener, Ronald E. “The Magdeburg Centuries: A Bibliothecal and Historiographical Analysis.” ThD diss., Harvard University, 1978. Edwards, Robert. Invention and Authorship in Medieval England. Columbus: The Ohio State University Press, 2017. Eusebius. The Ecclesiastical History of Eusebius Pamphilus, Bishop of Cesarea, in Palestine, translated by Christian F. Cruse. 3rd ed. Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Book House, 1856. Evenden, Elizabeth, and Thomas S. Freeman. Religion and the Book in Early Modern England: The Making of John Foxe’s ‘Book of Martyrs’. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2011. Fabyan, Robert. The New Chronicles of England and France, in Two Parts; Named . . . the Concordance of Histories, edited by Henry Ellis. London, 1811.

Sources and Evidence

57

Fairfield, Leslie P. John Bale, Mythmaker for the English Reformation. Eugene, Oregon: Purdue University Press, 1976. Flacius Illyricus, Matthias. Catalogus Testium Veritatis, Qui Ante Nostram Aetatem Pontifice Romano Ejusque Erroribus Reclamarnt, Jam Denuo . . . Emendatiori et Auctior Editus. Strasbourg, 1562. https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=PWV eAAAAcAAJ. ——— Catalogus Testium Veritatis, Qui Ante Nostram Aetatem Reclamarunt Papae: Opus Varia Rerum, Hoc Praesertim Tempore Scitu Dignißimarum, Cognitione Refertum, [. . .]. Basel, 1556. www2.uni-mannheim.de/mateo/camenahist/autoren/ flacius_hist.html. Flacius Illyricus, Matthias, Johann Wigand, and Mattheus Judix. Ecclesiastica historia, integram ecclesiae Christi ideam quantum ad locum, propagationem, persecutionem, tranquillit., doctrin., haereses, ceremonias, gubunationem, schismata, synodos, personas, miracula, martyria, religiones extra ecclesiam: singulari diligentia et fide ex vetustissimis et optimis historicis, patribus et aliis scriptoribus congesta per aliquot studiosos et pios viros in urbe Magdeburgica. 14 Vols. Basel, 1559. Foxe, John. “Acts and Monuments.” TAMO, 1563. www.johnfoxe.org. ——— “Acts and Monuments.” TAMO, 1570. www.johnfoxe.org. Freeman, Thomas S. “John Bale’s Book of Martyrs?: The Account of King John in Acts and Monuments.” Reformation 3, no. 1 (1 January 1998): 175–223. https:// doi.org/10.1179/ref_1998_3_1_008. ——— “‘St Peter Did Not Do Thus’: Papal History in the Acts and Monuments.” TAMO, 2004. www.johnfoxe.org/index.php?realm=more&gototype=&type=essa y&book=essay17. Goodman, V. J. “Brompton, John (f. 1436–c. 1464).” ODNB (2004). https://doi. org/10.1093/ref:odnb/3518. Graham, Timothy, and Andrew G. Watson. The Recovery of the Past in Early Elizabethan England: Documents by John Bale and John Joscelyn From the Circle of Matthew Parker. Cambridge: Cambridge Bibliographical Society, 1998. Greg, Walter W. “Books and Bookmen in the Correspondence of Archbishop Parker.” The Library 16, no. 3 (1935): 243–79. Hanley, Sarah. “What Is in a Name?: ‘Our French Law’.” Law and History Review 28, no. 3 (2010): 827–36. Hanna, Ralph. “An Oxford Library Interlude: The Manuscripts of John Foxe the Martyrologist.” Bodleian Library Record 17, no. 5 (April 2002): 314–26. Hartmann, Wilfried, and Kenneth Pennington, eds. The History of Medieval Canon Law in the Classical Period, 1140–1234: From Gratian to the Decretals of Pope Gregory IX. Washington, DC: Catholic University of America Press, 2008. Hathaway, Neil. “Compilatio: From Plagiarism to Compiling.” Viator 20 (1 January 1989): 19–44. https://doi.org/10.1484/J.VIATOR.2.301346. Haydon, Frank S., ed. Eulogium historiarum sive temporis: Chronicon ab orbe condito usque ad annum Domini M.CCC.LXVI., a monacho quodam Malmesburiensi exaratum; accedunt continuationes duae, quarum una ad annum M.CCCC. XIII., altera ad annum M.CCCC.XC. perducta est. London: Longman, Brown, Green, Longmans & Roberts, 1858. Heal, Felicity. “Appropriating History: Catholic and Protestant Polemics and the National Past.” Huntington Library Quarterly 68, no. 1–2 (2005): 109–32. https:// doi.org/10.1525/hlq.2005.68.1-2.109.

58

Sources and Evidence

Hiatt, Alfred. The Making of Medieval Forgeries: False Documents in Fifteenth-Century England. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2004. www.loc.gov/catdir/toc/fy051/ 2004426759.html. Jones, Norman L. “Matthew Parker, John Bale, and the Magdeburg Centuriators.” The Sixteenth Century Journal 12, no. 3 (1981): 35–49. https://doi.org/10.2307/2539785. Kaplan, Benjamin. An Unhurried View of Copyright. New York and London: Columbia University Press, 1967. King, John N. English Reformation Literature: The Tudor Origins of the Protestant Tradition. Princeton, NJ and Guildford: Princeton University Press, 1983. ——— Foxe’s Book of Martyrs and Early Modern Print Culture. Cambridge and New York: Cambridge University Press, 2006. Kingdon, Robert M. “Some French Reactions to the Council of Trent.” Church History 33, no. 2 (1964): 149–56. https://doi.org/10.2307/3162977. Kingsford, Charles L. English Historical Literature in the Fifteenth Century. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1913. Levy, Fred J. Tudor Historical Thought. Reprint. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2004. Loades, David.“The Maitland Controversy.” TAMO, 2004. www.johnfoxe.org/index. php?realm=more&gototype=&type=essay&book=essay11. Luard, Henry R. “A Letter From Bishop Bale to Archbishop Parker: Communicated by the Rev. M.R. Luard.” Cambridge Antiquarian Communications; Being Papers Presented at the Meetings of the Cambridge Antiquarian Society 3 (1865): 157– 73, 15. Lyon, Gregory B. “Baudouin, Flacius, and the Plan for the Magdeburg Centuries.” Journal of the History of Ideas 64, no. 2 (2003): 253–72. https://doi.org/10.2307/3654128. Maccoll, Alan. “The Construction of England as a Protestant ‘British’ Nation in the Sixteenth Century.” Renaissance Studies 18, no. 4 (2004): 582–608. https://doi. org/10.1111/j.1477-4658.2004.00078.x. Maitland, Samuel R. A Review of Fox the Martyrologist’s History of the Waldenses. London, 1837. McCusker, Honor. “Books and Manuscripts Formerly in the Possession of John Bale.” The Library 4, no. 16 (1935): 144–65. McKisack, May. Medieval History in the Tudor Age. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1971. McLaren, Mary-Rose. “Fabyan, Robert (d. 1513).” ODNB (2004). https://doi. org/10.1093/ref:odnb/9054. ——— The London Chronicles of the Fifteenth Century: A Revolution in English Writing. Woodbridge, Suffolk and Rochester, NY: D.S. Brewer, 2002. McLoughlin, Kate. “Magdalene College MS Pepys 2498 and Stephen Batman’s Reading Practices.” TCBS 10 (1994): 525–34. Minnis, Alastair J. Medieval Theory of Authorship: Scholastic Literary Attitudes in the Later Middle Ages. 2nd ed. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2012. Morgan, Paul. Oxford Libraries Outside the Bodleian: A Guide. Oxford: Oxford Bibliographic Society; Bodleian Library, 1973. Netter, Thomas. Fasciculi Zizaniorum Magistri Johannis Wyclif Cum Tritico: Ascribed to Thomas Netter of Walden, edited by Walter Waddington Shirley. London: Longman, Brown, Green, Longmans & Roberts, 1858. Olson, Oliver K. Matthias Flacius and the Survival of Luther’s Reform. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz in Kommission, 2002.

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O’Sullivan, William. “The Irish ‘Remnant’ of John Bale’s Manuscripts.” In New Sceince Out of Old Books: Studies in Manuscript and Early Printed Books in Honour of A.I. Doyle, edited by Richard Bendle and A. J. Piper, 374–87. Aldershot: Scolar Press, 1995. Paris, Matthew. Matthai Parisiensis, monachi Sancti Albani: Historia Anglorum, sive, ut vulgo dicitur, Historia minor, edited by Frederic Madden. London: Longmans, Green, Reader, and Dyer, 1866. Parker, Matthew, ed. Ælfredi Regis Res Gestæ. London, 1574. Pennycook, Alastair. “Borrowing Others’ Words: Text, Ownership, Memory, and Plagiarism.” TESOL Quarterly 30, no. 2 (1996): 201–30. https://doi.org/10.2307/3588141. Robertson, James C. Materials for the History of Thomas Becket, Archbishop of Canterbury. Vol. 1. 4 Vols. London: Longman, Trübner, 1879. Robinson, Hastings. The Zurich Letters. Cambridge, 1842. Rose, Mark. Authors and Owners: The Invention of Copyright. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1993. Schroeder, Henry J. Canons and Decrees of the Council of Trent, translated by Henry J. Schroeder. Rockford: Tan Books and Publishers, 1978. Simonova, Natasha. Early Modern Authorship and Prose Continuations: Adaptation and Ownership From Sidney to Richardson. Basingskoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2015. Stevenson, Joseph. The Church Historians of England: Containing the History of William of Newburgh: The Chronicles of Robert De Monte. Vol. 4, pt. 2. London: Seeleys, 1856. Terry, Richard. The Plagiarism Allegation in English Literature From Butler to Sterne. Basingstoke and New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2010. Thomas, Arthur H., and Isobel D. Thornley. The Great Chronicle of London. London, 1938. Thomas, Max W. “Eschewing Credit: Heywood, Shakespeare, and Plagiarism Before Copyright.” New Literary History 31, no. 2 (2000): 277–93. Thomson, J. A. F. “John Foxe and Some Sources for Lollard History: Notes for a Critical Appraisal.” Studies in Church History 2 (1965): 251–7. https://doi. org/10.1017/S042420840000526X. Wade, John. “John Foxe the Latinist.” TAMO, 2004. www.johnfoxe.org/index.php? realm=more&gototype=&type=essay&book=essay14. Warner, Christopher J. “Elizabeth I, Saviour of Books: John Bale’s Preface to the Scriptorum Illustrium Maioris Brytainiae . . . Catalogus (1559).” In John Foxe and His World, edited by David Loades, 91–101. Aldershot: Ashgate, 2002. Watson, Andrew G. “Christopher and William Carye, Collectors of Monastic Manuscripts, and ‘John Carye’.” The Library 5, no. 2 (1 June 1965): 135–42. https://doi. org/10.1093/library/s5-XX.2.135. William of Newburgh. Rerum Anglicarum libri quinque, recens ceu è tenebris eruti,  & in studiosorum gratiam in lucem dati: auctore Gulielmo Neubrigensi. Antwerp: Willem Silvius, 1567. Woolf, Daniel. Reading History in Early Modern England. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000. Yamey, B. S. “Oldcastle, Peele and Mellis: A Case of Plagiarism in the Sixteenth Century.” Accounting and Business Research 9, no. 35 (1 June 1979): 209–16. https:// doi.org/10.1080/00014788.1979.9729160.

3

The First Edition

In 1545, John Foxe resigned his fellowship at Magdalen College Oxford, essentially declaring to the world that he was a convert to the religious reform movement. According to his modern biographers, Foxe then married Agnes Randall on 3 February 1547.1 This marriage occurred soon after he had taken up the role of a private tutor under the patronage of the Duchess of Richmond. There he published several translations of Protestant polemics, made a case against excommunication, and called for a new code of canon law. He was also ordained a deacon by Nicholas Ridley in 1550 and met John Bale, who set him on a different scholarly path that led to the publication in 1554 of the Commentarii. This was Foxe’s first attempt to write a history of the Reformation, focused on England, and starting from the persecution of Lollardy. Between his first meeting with Bale and the publication of the text that would eventually evolve into the Acts and Monuments, the boy-king Edward VI died, and the Catholic Mary came to the throne. The Commentarii was therefore published in Strasbourg and not in London as, most likely, Foxe had planned. Instead, he was an exile along with many other Protestant reformers. This is the moment when Foxe became embroiled in Edmund Grindal’s project to memorialise those who were persecuted back in England. Foxe went (or was sent) to Basel to write the Latin edition, which eventually turned into his second commentary, the Rerum, published there in 1559, soon after Elizabeth had replaced Mary on the throne.2 Foxe returned to England shortly afterwards. Foxe’s life in Edwardian England and his subsequent exile is the context for the work that he would be employed upon for the rest of his life. In Basel, Foxe had not only worked on the writings and stories of martyrs that Grindal provided him, but he had also lived in collegium with John Bale and other exiles, almost certainly helping Bale with his extended edition of the Catalogus. He also helped to see through the press of Johannes Oporinus (for whom he worked as a proofreader), Matthias Flacius’ Catalogus Testium Veritatis, and the early editions of the Magdeburg Centuries. Not only would these works prove invaluable to Foxe when compiling his own history but also they provide context for his thought processes and influences at this crucial moment in time.

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The first edition of the Acts and Monuments was published in March 1563. Whilst Foxe had conceived of his previous Latin histories as commentaries on the Reformation, he would only conceive of his Acts and Monuments as an ecclesiastical history from the second edition onwards. It is unwise to claim the 1563 edition as either commentary or ecclesiastical history. It was something in between. For the most part, this edition is a glorified translation of the Rerum, albeit greatly extended and expanded with new information. The history of the true church is short, inserted at its beginning as a prologue to the martyrological commentary. Foxe does compare himself to Eusebius and his queen to the emperor, Constantine in one of his prefaces, but stops short of making a declaration of the genre. Perhaps that allusion sparked the idea of expanding the Acts and Monuments back in time to encompass all Christian history. Matthew Parker, Archbishop of Canterbury, would become key to making that happen. In the early 1560s, however, Foxe was not thinking a great deal about the ancient past. When he did start to consider it and when he began compiling a short history of Christianity as Book 1 of that edition, he did so, it would appear, as a prologue to his martyrological commentary. This sets the first edition of the Acts and Monuments apart from the later editions, a fact largely concealed by the nineteenth-century printings of the work which combined all the early variants together.3 The John Foxe Project (TAMO), online edition enables scholars to examine the differences more easily. Thus a chapter focused on the first edition is needed. It is the first time that Foxe attempted a history of the Christian past beyond the Lollards, and whilst it provides the basis for what followed in the 1570 edition, it is unique in of itself. So what does the first edition look like? There is a total of five books, of which only the first is focused on history before the fifteenth century. Book 2 focuses on the Lollards, Book 3 on the early Reformation, Book 4 on the reign of Edward VI, and Book 5 on the persecutions of Mary I. The edition begins with a series of prefaces and then in Book 1 15 pages of an introductory argument regarding the perceived differences between the early ‘primitive’ church and the latter church of Foxe’s own day. The rest of Book 1 (approximately 121 pages) are essentially a series of sequential case studies, each offering an outline of a key event that either demonstrated the continuance of a true church, eternally persecuted or the gradual corruption of the Roman Church. Of these, Foxe spends much of his time refuting the claim that Thomas Becket was a martyr. A total of 39 pages out of 120 are devoted entirely to that subject, with a further five pages placing Becket into the wider context of the contemporary ecclesiastical and political situation. In comparison, the ‘case study’ sequence on Gregory VII covers 15 pages, the resulting corruption of the papacy, around 26 pages, and another 15 pages for the sequence on King John. Other sequences, focused on stories such as the Waldensian heresy, the crusades, and other monarchs and popes receive, at best, a handful of pages each. The key sequences then, as shown in Figure 3.1, follow a roughly chronological order, focusing on a combination of English and continental history,

168

1211

733 5606

3348

3029

4675

5296

3492

5654 9187

12687

14263

Figure 3.1 Length of narrative sequences in the Acts and Monuments, 1563, Book 1 (counted by the number of words)

Edward I and II

Frederick II

Henry III

Albigensian Crusade

Monastic Orders and Innocent III

King John

Richard I

Thomas Becket and Henry II

Waldensians

Frederick Barbarossa

Hildebrand

Gregory the Great

The four ages of the church

Difference between the early church and latter church

43401

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but it is also an unbalanced representation of the past. Foxe spends over double the page count on Thomas Becket than on any other single subject in Book 1 and barely leaves room for any kind of analysis of the Albigensian Crusade or Frederick II, both of which would become vital to revealing papal autocracy in the second edition. A surprising amount of space is granted to King John, but almost nothing on Henry III or Richard I, to say nothing of the near total absence of the Anglo-Saxon era and the early Anglo-Norman monarchs. The reason for these selections and for the length of time spent on each subject coalesces around the sources that Foxe used to compile the account. In this chapter, it will become clear that Foxe relies heavily on the narrative and argument pre-prepared by other Protestant writers. Thus events in the past that had already found interest by previous reformers take precedence, whilst other potential areas of interest fall to the background or are hardly mentioned at all. This is not very surprising. It would seem obvious and sensible for Foxe to have focused on those aspects of the past which had already been identified as useful or necessary for revision so that he could re-tell history in the Protestant image. The subjects that William Tyndale (c.1494–1536) had chosen, or Robert Barnes (c.1495–1540) in the Henrician and Edwardian periods, were just as valid and important in the Elizabethan period. These were inevitably the contentious issues, especially those that focused on past events that exemplified or demonstrated difference or rejection of Roman Catholic doctrine or authority. That is not to suggest that the pre-Lollard history is unoriginal. Foxe compiles each sequence from a wide range of sources and inserts his own opinion and arguments on top of them. What this does suggest, however, is that much of this new compilation is more an extension of what had already been written, rather than a complete overhaul of the traditional historical story. It also explains why some topics receive more space than others. Foxe used what he had available. He used the arguments already formed. There is also a time factor at work. Foxe regularly complains that he had only a limited time to complete his book, a fact that J. F. Mozley furthers by arguing that an agreement with John Day was only secured late in the summer of 1561.4 Elizabeth Evenden and Thomas Freeman have additionally found clues in the print markup in Book 1 that suggest a hasty printing process.5 Chances are high, then, that Foxe came to the pre-Lollard history late in the process, having only a short time to compile an account that properly prologues the story of Reformation. There may have been little time to provide more than a loosely connected series of case studies largely pre-written by other Protestant scholars. If this is true, then what Foxe does manage to do with these separate accounts, the amount of work involved in compiling and ordering them, should still be considered a considerable achievement even if the result is somewhat patchy.

64 The First Edition

A Comparison of Two Churches The beginning of Book 1 reflects the speed with which Foxe worked. He opened with a comparison, asking his readers to consider the question of what the ancient, original church looked like and to compare that image to the Roman Church that now existed. He provided evidence of those aspects that appeared to differ and asked questions meant to undermine key features of Church authority. Identification of the sources that Foxe used to achieve those arguments is difficult to ascertain. Foxe certainly makes extensive use of the Catalogus Testium Veritatis by Matthias Flacius. He also appears to use the occasional example from papal decretals. There is some use of John Bale’s Catalogus and perhaps also the hagiographical writings by Bartolomeo Platina and Ortwin Gratius.6 Foxe moves from one topic to another, one example to another example, within only a few sentences. It is therefore almost impossible to identify, with certainty, every element that forms the text. Ironically, the opening sequence of Book 1 is the most original portion of the pre-Lollard history. Foxe almost certainly relies on contemporary Protestant literature for much of it, but he also delves deeper, explores wider, and, most likely, relies on a relatively larger source base. Perhaps Foxe began this way, with the intention of continuing with an in-depth revision of history, but soon found that it took too long and decided instead that an easier solution was necessary. What can be argued with more confidence is that the comparison between old and new was not a unique idea that Foxe devised himself. He was inspired, perhaps even instructed to take this route, because another statesupported work had already proven that it was a powerful approach to defending the religious settlement, whilst simultaneously undermining the Roman establishment. In 1562, John Jewel (1522–1571) anonymously published a short pamphlet entitled Apologia. It took the form of an outline of basic principles, which Jewel believed the Elizabethan reformed Church of England should aspire. The approach was to compare doctrine. What did the contemporary Roman Catholic believe? What did the apostolic church claim? What did the Church of England defend? Jewel focused on the essential differences. He considered diverse topics: the nature of God, Jesus Christ and the Holy Ghost, the role of the minister, the right to clerical marriage, the role of Scripture, the intrinsic nature of the Mass, the role of ceremonies, and the purpose of prayer. He asked, what agrees with Roman doctrine and church order? What differs? Jewel concluded that Roman Catholic proponents accused them of propagating ‘newe perswasions and wicked doctrine’, but that such claims were ‘manifestly false’ and that rather ‘many thousands of our brethren in these last twenty years have borne witness unto the truth’.7 Less successfully, Jewel argued that the popularity of the reformed faith and the Roman Catholic inability to suppress it was proof in itself: surely God would have defeated them if they did not speak the truth?

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The approach proved popular. Two years later, there was an English translation, produced by Anne Bacon (mother of the then 1-year-old, to-be philosopher Francis Bacon), and then in 1565 and 1566/1567 two defences written again by Jewel, after the Roman Catholic polemist, Thomas Harding (1516–1672) had attempted an attack on its contents.8 The controversy that the Apologia caused, the concern amongst Catholic sympathisers to attack its arguments, all showed to the Elizabethan elite that the approach was powerful, successful, and extremely useful to their cause. What made the Apologia so powerful though? Gary Jenkins has argued that the approach Jewel took sought first-and-foremost to ‘erode’ the early church as unified under any conceivable form of Catholic domain.9 What Catholics claimed as safe ground for their history, was not as strong or secure after all, at least if one believed Jewel’s arguments. Peter Milward, meanwhile, has claimed that part of the problem for Catholic critics was the fact that Jewel had written so generally.10 The examples were taken from multiple sources, they were linked together into a torrent of challenges, offered line by line, sentence by sentence. A decent response was not easy to formulate. The opening of the Acts and Monuments offers a similar statement which is almost certainly intended to invoke the memory of Jewel’s Apologia and provide a similar challenge in offering multiple claims, diverse examples, and rapid sentence-by-sentence attacks. The focus is different, however, reflecting Foxe’s interests in the past, more than Jewel’s. Foxe compares evidence that there was no diversity of monasteries before the first millennium nor was transubstantiation a known belief, that the Mass was practiced using a wide variety of customs, that decrees and decretals did not alter the state of the Church until later, that there is no evidence that Rome declared or was accepted as the supreme head of the Church and that the papacy was not able to raise taxes across Christendom. Foxe also, and at length, focused on the thorny issues of images, apparel, and prohibition of meat, claiming, These came in neither with religion, nor by religion, but by inuasion: not by righte, but by mighte: and not so much receiued, as obtruded.11 The sentence demonstrates the core of Foxe’s beliefs about English history. He claims that error occurred in the Church by invasion and force, and asserts that ‘so longe as truth by learning, coulde be suffered to defend her selfe’ ancient histories could provide a host of ‘testimonies’ and ‘examples’.12 The claim mirrors one that Jewel had made in his Apologia that arguments made by the Romans often had the ‘colour of truth’ but were there to deceive, not teach.13 Corruption of the pure faith was to be viewed, as Foxe argues, as a malign foreign imposition, something alien and false to be rejected. Specifically, on images, Foxe argues, ‘The walles of the christen Temples were bare, long before they were pictured wyth any Imagery’, that 330 bishops consented and decreed against images in the first century and that Gregory III commanded images to be taken down and ‘not to be worshipped’. On the

66 The First Edition prohibition of meats, Foxe argued that such practices were not enforced but encouraged as ‘free exercises of deuotion’.14 On apparels, Foxe argued, ‘I se that a false opinion of antiquitie deceiueth many’. Foxe gives two examples, one from the ninth-century king of West Francia and Holy Roman Emperor Charles the Bald (reigned 840–877), who listed apparel as of lesser importance than true doctrine, and another from the classical theologian and historian Jerome (c. 347–420), whom Foxe quotes as arguing that ‘in garmentes there is no difference, nor any commendation’.15 On this issue, Foxe was not quite aligned with the Elizabethan position. An attempt would soon be made by some of the returning exiles to avoid the wearing of vestments, and Foxe would be amongst those who were punished for their nonconformity. The consideration of the issue here is almost certainly his attempt to defend his own position before the issue grew into that crisis. These issues were considered in some detail, but it was the issue of clerical marriage that formed the greater part of this opening sequence. In 1554, the staunch Roman Catholic bishop, Stephen Gardiner (c. 1495–1555), with his subordinate Thomas Martin (1520–1592), had written a rebuttal to John Ponet’s A Defense for Marriage of Priests by Scripture and Auncient Writers to argue that priests had always been banned from marriage and that deviation on this matter was unlawful and wrong.16 Ponet had issued a defence in 1556, and Foxe now added his own opinion on the matter as part of his comparison of churches. He did so without directly mentioning Gardiner, Martin, or Ponet, instead offering the reader an ambiguous reference to Gardiner’s rebuttal, stating only that there was ‘a certain late English wryter of our country, entiteling his boke, against the unlawful marriage of priestes’.17 Foxe dismissed the book, emphasising instead a list of five points from the Sixth Ecumenical Council held in Constantinople between AD 680 and 681, which had briefly legalised clerical marriage. The ruling was overturned soon afterwards, but it was enough to disprove the absolute continuity of clerical abstinence that Gardiner and Martin had claimed.18 Foxe appears to have made his vague reference to Gardiner’s book so that only learned readers might be able to identify it. He also claimed to have uncovered an attempted fraud that occurred soon after the Council at Constantinople, arguing, ‘In the Laten booke of councels [. . .] in diuers new impressyons, [they] haue suppressed this cannon, because by like, it maketh little wyth their purpose’.19 The accusation is a glimpse into the methods Foxe must have used to analyse his sources. The standard copies of the decretals ‘omitted’, as Foxe put it, the legalisation allowing clerical marriage, but in several ‘auncient’ copies and one that Foxe calls ‘true written’, these laws remained, all but forgotten. The copy is most likely one that Foxe owned (as detailed in the Lansdowne 819 manuscript which lists a ‘Decretalia Gregorii’) or possibly one that he consulted either in Basel or soon after his return to England. By making this claim, Foxe not only attempted to discredit the idea argued by Gardiner and Martin that priests had always been banned from marriage

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but also to claim that the Roman Church had hidden the fact that this was not always so. Foxe achieved this aim by identifying variation in papal law from claims made in the sixteenth century by the same church. This was not the only time that he would do so. Indeed, Foxe appears to have held a special interest in examining and using papal decretals for this type of purpose. Around 1560, Foxe had most likely written the anonymous A Solemne Contestation of Diuerse Popes, in which he extracted information from papal decretals and deployed them as evidence of papal corruption in the voice of Antichrist itself.20 The short book promised nothing ‘feyned or forged’ except ‘than the Popes themselfes in theyr owne Persones speake and write in theyr owne Lawes and Canones’.21 Foxe cited as his evidence, the popes own ‘Canons, Decres, Decretales, Clementines, Extrauagantes, Bulles, Epistles, and commen Glose’.22 The narrative form is entirely different from what Foxe wrote to open the Acts and Monuments, but the familiarity with the decretals and other papal sources is similar enough to suggest a significant connection. Indeed, in the second edition of the Acts and Monuments, Foxe would reprint the entire work without any change or editorial alteration.23 If Foxe compiled A Solemne Contestation as soon as he had returned to England from exile (or perhaps before), then the opening of the Acts and Monuments with a similar, but extended, argument makes sense, especially reframed in imitation of the Apologia. It also, as Freeman suggests, indicates that Foxe had begun work, at the very least, on pre-Lollard papal history before he began the work on the Acts and Monuments in earnest.24 Taken in its entirety, this sequence is just as powerful as the one Jewel wrote in the Apologia. Using a diversity of historical texts and from evidence derived directly out of the ancient church councils and decrees, Foxe attempted to disprove claim after claim that the Roman Church held any ancient authority. He argued that comparison revealed only variation and difference. The Church had therefore lied. What the history showed instead, Foxe claimed, was a better alignment with the reformed faith. The old church was the same as his church. It was not what the Church of Rome had become. In both the Apologia and the Acts and Monuments, the comparison between the contemporary church and the ancient church offers a consensus that the past is imbued with ‘truth’ where it agrees with the general precepts of Protestant faith and found to be in error whenever it altered from that past. Claims of what seemed like purposeful erasure in the historical record helped to confirm this belief and at the very least prove that the Roman Church was not always truthful and honest. The argument becomes even more powerful when supported not only by Scripture but also by the canons and laws and the very words of Catholic priests. For Foxe, especially, that kind of understanding of the past was indebted to the idea of prophecy as a guiding force and as an explanatory paradigm. Such an explanation is exactly what follows in the next sequence, which Foxe sub-titles ‘A Certaine Brief Description of the 4 Ages of the Churche’.25

68 The First Edition

The Four Ages of the Church This is the first outline of the prophetic framework that Foxe attempted, and it is almost entirely taken from Bale’s Image of Bothe Churches in detail, if not in form. Foxe not only outlines the idea of four ages—the suffering age, the flourishing age, the age of Satan, the age of reform, and, an additional fifth age, final judgement—but also uses the opportunity to embed early history into that framework. The first age is extremely short. It contains only one attack on the Roman Church and not much else. Foxe cites evidence from Eusebius that Peter was not exalted above all the other disciples in his lifetime.26 The purpose was to weaken Rome’s claim of superiority. The papal claim to have derived their authority from Peter’s line would be lessened. Foxe offers more for the second age. Indeed, he splits it into two: the ‘flourishing age’ in which the Church ‘grew vp, by litell and litell, through the mighty gift of God, to a more complet state’ and the ‘middle age’ where the Church ‘decresed in spiritual stre[n]gth’ whilst simultaneously ‘increased in worldly power, riches, donations, possessions, & authoritie’.27 The differentiation is important. Of the first portion, Foxe notes how Constantine the Great became the first emperor to convert to Christianity. He also describes how the Church fathers then assembled ‘to discus such matters as apperteyned to faythe’. There is another attack on the Roman Church here. Foxe makes the point that there was no universal bishop, but only a ‘whole churche of Christe’, which was ‘deuided into .iiii. patriarchal seates’: one in Jerusalem, one in Antioch, one in Rome, and another in Alexandria. There is, however, something missing. In the second edition of the Acts and Monuments, Foxe would dedicate considerable space to the early persecutions of Christians that occurred before Constantine’s conversion. There is nothing here on that subject at all. This gap in Foxe’s knowledge, or at least a gap in what he considered at this time to be important, will be considered in the next chapter. It is, nonetheless, worth noting here. For now, Foxe considered the time from Christ to Constantine to be one of peace and slow growth in the Church. The ‘middle age’ which follows, describes the decline. At first, Foxe shows his readers that Rome defended the patriarchy, rebuffing the Bishop of Constantinople when he attempted to reign supreme over the whole church. The Bishop of Rome even argues that ‘euery pouince ought to be subiect to his owne metropolitane’.28 Foxe then describes how subsequently the Roman Bishop tried to convince the African churches that it was the supreme head of the Church by falsifying the canons of the Nicene Council. These beginnings of decline would only increase as the ages progressed. The third age is described as one of blindness in which the Church increasingly focused on ‘wordly pompe, auarice, & tiranny’.29 Foxe lists the various corruptions that he had uncovered arguing that ‘here came in the time that the reuelation speaketh of, when Sathanas, the old serpent, being tied vp for

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a thousand yere, was losed for a certaine space’.30 Key to his interpretation is the label of necromancer and sorcerer that sources used to describe Pope Silvester II. Foxe based his account on Bale’s catalogue, arguing that Silvester had obtained his power by allegiance to Satan.31 England also makes its first appearance. Foxe refers his readers to the Norman Conquest, claiming the land as ‘molested, & neuer lightly long quiet fro[m] enemies’. He describes, also, the long-lasting controversy between the Archbishop of York and the Archbishop of Canterbury over their own supremacy starting with Lanfranc and Thomas, and then Richard and Roger. In doing so, Foxe gets into difficulty over the word Duroberni in his sources. Using John Brompton’s Chronicon, Foxe comes to the wrong conclusion that Augustine was Bishop of Dover.32 Such a conclusion resulted in a convoluted attempt by Foxe to justify and understand the historical basis for the authority of Canterbury. This argument was only made mute part way through the second edition when Foxe discovered in William of Malmesbury’s Gesta Pontificum Anglorum that Canterbury had once been called Duroberni.33 Unwilling and unable to alter the pages most likely already printed, Foxe inserted the new information and simply declared that ‘the matter is not great’, despite the obvious attention that he had already given to the subject. The fourth age is the most detailed of all. Indeed, the rest of Book 1 is used to tell the story of the age of Satan. Whilst he wrote the first edition, Foxe believed this moment to have begun roughly around the time of Silvester II and the Norman Conquest, and for it to have come to full fruition during the pontificate of Gregory VII. On the conscience of this pope, Foxe places all the ‘myschefe, of pride, pompe, stoutness, presumption and tiranny’ that would next occur in the Roman Church.34

The Tyranny of Gregory VII The story of Silvester II was the first moment in the Acts and Monuments where a specific pope is highlighted and his pontificate examined and analysed in detail. Gregory the Great follows, but mainly to demonstrate the origins of the controversy between York and Canterbury, and to briefly touch on the missionary role of Augustine. The story that follows is of Gregory VII, otherwise called Hildebrand, whose pontificate (1073–1085) corresponded with the prophesied release of Satan from his 1,000-year imprisonment. Foxe calls him the ‘souldiour of Sathan’, demonstrating his claim through a description of deviations and corruptions that occurred during his pontificate. The first of these ‘deviations’ returns Foxe to the subject of clerical marriage. Gregory denounced it, but not without consternation in France. Foxe tells the story of how the French bishops complained against the edict, claiming it as against the will of God and, importantly, that it suggested to them that the pope was ruling ‘not by the spirit of god, but by Satha[n]’.35 The satanic

70 The First Edition accusation sticks. As further evidence, Foxe offers a series of letters written by Cardinal Benno (c. 1020–1088), who believed that Gregory had a book of Necromancy, which he carried around with him and once read ‘sodenly there came about them the messengers of Sathan’.36 In another example, Foxe cites the words of Gregory himself, who ironically complained that ‘me[m]bers of satha[n] haue rise[n] vp against me’ as well as ‘the princes of this world’ and some of the clergy.37 The second attack by Gregory is against secular authority, specifically exploiting and exacerbating pre-existing contentions between Holy Roman Emperor Henry IV (reigned 1056–1105) and Otto, Duke of Bavaria (reigned 1061–1070), and then, subsequently, defeating and humiliating the emperor to assert his own authority as superior. The argument that Foxe presents is that Gregory and subsequent popes would seek any opportunity to ‘worke his feates’ to ‘aduaunce the dominion of the Romish seat aboue all other bishops, and also to presse downe the authority of temporall rulers, vnder the spiritual men of the church’.38 Similar sentences are repeated later in the text identifying multiple attempts over the next 600 years by the pope to exert authority over secular rulers. As a result, this story receives the rare bestowment of a woodcut image, one of only three in the pre-Lollard part of the book. The image depicts Henry, his wife, and child pilgrimaging barefooted in winter to the papal palace to beg forgiveness for his supposed crimes. The title exclaims that the emperor was forced to wait three days and nights at the gate before Gregory would see them. The emperor had tried to dispose of Gregory but failed, was excommunicated, and suffered rebellion by the German principalities. He had no choice but to submit. This was not the end of the story, however, as Foxe next tells how Henry IV rejected an attempt to grant legates a voice in Germany, resulting in a second excommunication, warfare, and eventually the Council of Brixia in which Henry installed a new pope as a replacement. Gregory died not long after. As referenced in the previous chapter, to tell these stories, Foxe borrowed from Platina’s Lives of the Popes and Lambert of Hersfeld’s Annales, but lifted most of the sequence from the catalogues of Matthias Flacius and John Bale. Flacius’ contribution was particularly important, supplying verbatim copies of Cardinal Benno’s letters, which associated the pope with satanic influences.39 Bale, meanwhile, supplied a useful narrative, built on a variety of sources, that identified Hildebrand as a Machiavellian figure, working in the shadows and manipulating (and murdering) until he, himself, became pope.40 Bale and Flacius both supplied the citation to Lambert of Hersfeld, which possibly directed Foxe to check that source, which then supplied him with details of the synods at Mainz and Erfurt, as well as evidence for clerical resistance to the pope’s mandates on clerical marriage.41 Platina’s Lives of the Popes acted as a secondary check on the material that Flacius and Bale supplied, but was mainly cited to offer his readers extra verbatim evidence should they wish to pursue the story further.42

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Frederick Barbarossa and Waldensian Persecution The sequence on Frederick Barbarossa, who reigned between 1155 and 1190, continues the theme of contention between the papacy and empire, bringing the story to the twelfth century. This again is taken entirely from the catalogue of Bale in the form of a pre-prepared argument and again results in a woodcut, which this time depicts a fictitious occurrence where Pope Alexander III (reigned 1159–1181) treads on the neck of the emperor to demonstrate his eventual conquest over him.43 Whereas Foxe had seemingly followed some citations in the catalogues to their sources for Gregory VII, for Barbarossa, he does little more than re-phrase the story that Bale had supplied him. For example, through the lens of Bale, Foxe described Barbarossa as a ‘stout pillar’ against the papacy, writing, The Emperor all this whyle, sittyng quietlye at home: began to consider with himself, how the pope had extorted from the Emperours (his predecessors) the inuesting and induing of prelates: how he had pylled and poled all nations by his Legates: and also hath bene the sower of seditio[n]s through al his Impery.44 This is a direct translation from Bale’s Catalogus, as is the subsequent narrative segment describing the investiture contest, leading to the election of Alexander as pope. Barbarossa supported the alternative candidate, who would become known as the antipope, Victor IV (reigned 1159–1164), as Alexander had refused to co-operate with him, challenging the emperors’ authority. Thus, for this first sequence, Bale had written, While these thinges were doinge, the Emperour abydinge at home, remembred with himselfe howe the Pope had taken from the Emperours the former right of inuestinge of prelates and by his Legates had summoned all nations together, & had sowed t[he] seede rebellion through all his Empyre, taken homage & fealtye of all the bishops of Germanye.45 Foxe, therefore, offers very little of his own to the story of Barbarossa. Indeed, the only element of this sequence not taken from Bale or provided by Day (in the form of a woodcut) was provided from Flacius’ catalogue.46 Foxe next continues his theme of persecution by the papacy in the twelfth century by trying to demonstrate that the Waldensian heretics were more accurately conceived of as proto-protestants. To do so, Foxe continues his reliance on Flacius’ catalogue, of which he provides an almost word-for-word translation and, additionally, uses the Fasciculus Rerum Expetendarum ac Fugiendarum by Ortwin Gratius (1475–1542) for a letter from the Waldensians to the King of Hungary.47 The story that was told of the Waldensian’s from Flacius and Gratius attempted to claim—based on limited evidence—that they were ‘erected by

72 The First Edition God as some sparkle yet of the trewe light of the Gospell’ and that, therefore, they shared a similar faith with Lutherans and with other later so-called heretical groups such as the Hussites and Lollards.48 All were to be newly reclaimed as true believers and maintainers of the faith in a time when it was otherwise largely lost. Lack of evidence of what these heretical groups really believed, rather than what Roman inquisitors and persecutors claimed, however, was almost insurmountable. Foxe had more evidence for the Lollards, but other groups, such as the Waldensians, posed a challenge. Often the claim of similarity could only be made as a probability or possibility, and the focus of these narratives instead had to rest on a lesser claim of unfair persecution and attack by the Roman Church. Such a reading was, anyway, rather opportune for Foxe as it slotted nicely into the themes of his pre-Lollard history built up through stories of contention between emperors and popes, but next as foundation for the most controversial topic of all: the supposed sainthood and martyrdom of Thomas Becket.

Thomas Becket It was Henry VIII and Thomas Cromwell who destroyed the reputation of Thomas Becket, not Foxe. The king had Becket’s shrine dismantled in September 1538, visiting Canterbury to witness the iconoclastic act first-hand. On the same day, John Bale, then working as a playwright in the employ of Cromwell, put on a play (now lost) for the king’s pleasure called ‘Against the Treasons of Thomas a Becket’. Two months later, a royal proclamation was issued arguing, Thomas Becket, sometime Archbishop of Canterbury, shall no longer be named a saint, as he was really a rebel who fled the realm to France and to the Bishop of Rome to procure the abrogation of wholesome laws, and was slain upon a rescue made with resistance to those who counselled him to leave his stubbornness. His pictures throughout the realm are to be plucked down and his festival shall no longer be kept, and the services in his name shall be razed out of all books.49 The eradication of Thomas Becket was to be total and uncompromising.50 The desecration and destruction of Becket’s shrine and burial site had only been the start. As the proclamation declared, Henry had ordered all images of Becket to be torn down; his name was to be deleted from all books; services were to ignore him; festivals were to be expunged from the calendar. There is plenty of evidence to support the fact that this did happen. The rood screen of Burlingham St Andrew in Norfolk, for example, has Becket’s image heavily scratched out and defaced.51 The archepiscopal and prerogative seals of Canterbury were altered from scenes of Becket’s martyrdom to a scene of the crucifixion, whilst the seal of the corporation of

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London was similarly altered.52 Eamon Duffy has described how the surviving manuscripts and printed Books of Hours also go some way to confirm obedience by the English population, most of which have Becket’s name blotted or sliced out.53 John Bale in 1544 and 1546, and William Thomas (d. 1554) in 1552 led attacks in print against Becket.54 Alterations in existing texts were also enforced. The 1542 and 1559 publications of Robert Fabyan’s New Chronicles erased much of Becket’s history and demoted him from ‘blessyd archebishop’ to ‘trayterous byshoppe’, and his death is described as ‘slain’ not ‘martyred’ as Fabyan had originally written.55 Henry VIII demanded nothing less than a statewide forgetting of the archbishop who had once challenged a king and had been made one of the most popular and wellknown saints in Western Christendom. One could be forgiven to think that Foxe needed to do very little regarding Becket. Surely, the job was already done. Nothing could be further from the truth. Anne Duggan describes how Becket became an icon for recusant Roman Catholics in the latter half of the sixteenth century.56 Despite the Henrician programme of eradication, Becket retained his popularity around the country. For Foxe, Becket was not only a necessary target to be vilified but also one that proved useful to his overarching theme of antagonism between the Church and State. Foxe begins his account by arguing that the mark of a martyr should be that they die ‘for the churche’ and not for temporal purposes. He states that ‘to contende with princes’ does not make a martyr and furthermore that men of religion have a duty only to their prince as ordained by God.57 In short, Foxe admonishes Becket for failing the Church and his king in equal measure. Most of what follows is taken directly from one principal source: the Quadrilogus, printed in Paris in 1495 as a combination of hagiographies on Becket, or in manuscript form as Cotton Faustina, B VIII. Most of the sequence is a virtual word-for-word translation, but obviously Foxe did not wish to follow his source in any of its claims to Becket’s saintly characteristics. He made alterations and erased those elements of the text that failed to support an alternative claim of treason. To do so, Foxe relied on other sources to add new details that better supported his claims, specifically the chronicles of Roger of Hoveden, John Brompton, and William of Newburgh. Once again, Foxe also integrated ideas and arguments from John Bale’s catalogue, which itself captured the core arguments made in the reign of Henry VIII, designed to obliviate entirely the popular memory of and devotion to Thomas Becket. In each case, these insertions enabled Foxe to formulate a new cohesive revision of Becket’s history, steeped in Henrician polemic, but also in contemporary and near-contemporary evidence. Coherence is important here. The method that Foxe chose to discredit Becket relied entirely on showing that most sources agreed on a variety of facts that could build an alternative picture of Becket as a traitor. Foxe

74 The First Edition needed to show that underneath all the hagiographical components was a true history that differed from the one that had grown up around the supposed saint. Therefore, Foxe uses the chronicle attributed to John Brompton specifically to show that his chronicle agreed with the Quadrilogus on the initial point of contention between the archbishop and king: that certain members of the clergy had committed theft or even homicide and whether they should be tried by the king’s judges or not. Foxe also enlists William of Newburgh on this point, confirming that the Quadrilogus was correct to suggest that it was Becket himself who refused to allow secular authority over these clergymen.58 The use of Roger of Hoveden’s chronicle, meanwhile, provided confirmation that Henry II had sought a settlement with Becket, but that it was the pope who had refused the offer. The chronicle also showed that there are some elements of variance with the account in the Quadrilogus concerning the order of events in which Becket attempted to flee from England.59 Foxe also inserted evidence in the marginalia. The Quadrilogus suggested that the Bishop of London had threatened Becket with a sword. Foxe wrote, ‘Hoveden refereth not this saying to the byship of Lo[n]don, but to the archbyshoppe of yorke’.60 Although Foxe offers doubt here, it is nonetheless a statement seeking coherence. The possibility of one bishop attacking another with a sword seems unlikely, but that two sources refer to the same event, even if they ascribe a different culprit, increases the seeming likelihood that it did happen in some form or another. Selective use of the material in the Quadrilogus is another method that Foxe used to make the hagiographical texts tell an alternative story than what they originally intended. Based on the background information on Becket, Foxe could offer an opinion that the archbishop refused the advice or counsel of others, that he was ‘a man of a stoute nature: severe, & inflexible’, and that in his mind threats and flattery were ‘to him bothe one’.61 Foxe begrudgingly admits also that Becket had useful and pleasing skills, including knowledge of civil law and courtly etiquette, and a good memory, recounting how Becket was popular in his early life but hated once he took up the archbishopric. Foxe asserted, ‘Certayne monkes, and priestes and such as were perswadded by them, who magnified hym not alitel, for upholding the liberties of t[he] church that is, the lice[n]tious lyfe and exces of chruchme[n]’ were to blame for giving Becket power to betray his king.62 Those who had already yielded to a false life supported Becket. Those who still understood the truth saw him for who he really was. Foxe sums up his characterisation by asserting, Amongst all other, theise vices he had most notable, and to be rebuked. Full of deuotion, but without all trew religion. Zelous, but clene w[ith] out knowledge. And therefore as he was stiffe and stubbern of nature, so a blinde conscience being ioyned with all, it turned to playne rebellion. So superstitious he was to the obedience of the Pope, that he for got his obedience to his natural and moste beneficiall kinge.63

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Foxe interlaces his opinion pieces with evidence, mainly a series of correspondences taken from the Quadrilogus, involving the pope, Henry II, the French king, various bishops, and Becket himself. The purpose was to discredit the archbishop and the traditions that had been built up around him. It was also to suggest once again that the pope was an agitator of this mischief. Letters from Pope Alexander—some of which Foxe printed— served to empower Becket on his path of disobedience to the king, even when the other bishops wished to submit. Foxe led his readers to read in these letters the inconstancy of both Becket and the pope against the secular power of the king, arguing that Becket’s complaints stood ‘upon church goodes, liberty or rather licentiousnes of priestes, making of deans, titles of churches, superioritie of crouning the king’, all issues that did not defend the Church but rather rebelled against secular authority.64 In short, the sequence of Becket’s life, with all its primary source evidence, is a political one. In ending the story from the Quadrilogus, Foxe suggested to his readers that they should judge him by ‘his own acts’ and from the ‘facts’.65 Foxe supports the suggestion by providing more evidence, this time testimony directly from his two near-contemporary sources: the aforementioned William of Newburgh and, via Bale, Caesarius’ Dialogues.66 Both authors asserted that Becket was most interested in protecting the Church from secular interference and less interested in tackling the issue of vices and corruptions from within. Both also queried the sanctity of Becket at an early date. Foxe makes good use of William of Newburgh, who wrote less than 20 years after Becket’s death. There were claims here that Becket deserved no praise for ‘his doinges and actes’, for it ‘came no vtility but onely the anger and the stirring vp of the king, whereupon afterward sprang so great mischiefes’. A wise man, William argued, might have been more ‘circumspect’.67 Similarly, Caesarius offered Foxe a question that had been raised in Paris in the thirteenth century, querying whether Becket had been saved or damned: To this question answereth Roger a Norman, t[hat] he was worthy death and damnation, for t[hat] he was so obstinate against Goddes minister his king. Co[n]trary Peter Ca[n]tor a Parisian disputed, saying and affirming t[hat] hys miracles were great signes and tokens of saluation, and also of great holynesse in that ma[n], affirming moreover that t[he] cause of t[he] churche dyd allowe and confyrme his martydrome, for the which church he dyed.68 Helen Parish argues that Foxe exploited these early criticisms to frame his account of Becket as an offering of nothing more than a political quarrel between church and king.69 Faith and religion had nothing to do with it, and, ergo, Becket could have no claim to sainthood at all. Certainly, the inclusion of evidence from William and Caesarius at the end of the long narrative powerfully made this point. What Foxe did not do, however, was to attempt a challenge to the multiple claims of miracles. The only exception was a brief

76 The First Edition reference to the miraculous nature of the archbishop’s blood. On this one occasion, Foxe is, unsurprisingly, dismissive. He argues that even the disciples had never been granted such power. The claim was absurd. Foxe, therefore, consciously avoided the subject of miracles, perhaps not wanting to risk reminding his readers of the miracles claimed for the archbishop, which might lead them down a dangerous path, or, perhaps, unwilling to enter such contentious issues without more time to consider the possible implications or, perhaps, as an additional tactic designed to neuter Becket of his saintly powers and present him wholly within a secular discourse. The claim that Becket was no martyr but a traitor is repeated at various points in the subsequent parts of the Acts and Monuments, but never in detail. In Book 2, a marginal note stresses that Becket’s death does not count as martyrdom.70 In Book 3, when describing the death of John Frith, Becket is described as ‘no saint but da[m]pned in hell’, whilst in Book 4, Bishop Bonner is warned that he could end up dead like Becket.71 The destruction of Becket’s shrine does, however, receive more attention. This is recorded in Book 3.72 Foxe yet again records that Becket was stubborn and that he was canonised by the pope ‘because he had bene a champio[n] to maintain his vsurped authority’.73 Foxe also reiterates that there is nothing in the recorded histories of Becket ‘wherby he shuld be called a saincte’ but rather the evidence, Foxe claims, suggests that he was a ‘rebell and traitor to his prince’. None of this is new. Foxe prints the ordinances of Henry VIII, which ordered the eradication of Becket in name and image, the deletion of his feast days, and all other observances so that ‘his graces louinge subiectes shalbe no longer blindly led and abused to commit Idolatry, as they haue done in times passed’.74 Nothing more is said on the subject. Foxe’s account of Becket, whilst forming the largest sequence in the preLollard history, was, therefore, largely a re-editing of a pre-existing compilation and an attempt to neuter Becket of his religious trappings by presenting his story in a secular and political context. Such a revision of a past event was, once again, not original to Foxe himself. In his The Examination of John Oldcastle, John Bale described Becket as having ‘dyed vpon his owne sekynge onlye’ for the reason of ‘maynteynynge the wanton lybertees and superfluouse possessyons of the Romyshe churche here within Englande’.75 In his Acta Romanorum Pontificum, Bale argued that Becket was a rank traitor to his prince, but one propped up by the pope as a means of placing the king under his power.76 Bale briefly describes Becket’s story, placing it into the context of the similar contention between the pope and emperor and arguing that Pope Alexander acted as the devil against Frederick II, whilst Becket ‘raged’ as the devil’s lieutenant against the king in England.77 This material also appeared in Bale’s Scriptorum and Catalogus.78 It is, however, in his second book The Actes or Unchast Examples of the Englysh Votaryes (1551) where Bale provides his most detailed account of Becket’s life. Bale breaks his account down into chapters:

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The freshe and lusty beginninges of Thomas Becket His chastity at Stafford, and stoughtnesse at Clarendon Antichrist he preferreth to hys kynges obedynce Articles for whome Becket is admitted the popes martyr Becket stateth the popes churche, by confronding heretikes His traitorous end, and advauncement above Christ And false miracles and Canonisation of Becket King Henry smelleth out Antichrist and is again blinded

The outline differs significantly from the one that Foxe provided in 1563, but offers much of the same argument. Bale focuses on disproving the miracles afforded to Becket, which Foxe does not. Bale lists the individual hagiographical accounts of Becket, whilst Foxe lumps them together under the simple title of Quadilogus. Conversely, Foxe provides lengthy insertions of letters and laws, none of which appear in Bale’s Votaryes. Whilst Foxe clearly does not use Matthew Paris as his own source for Becket, as Bale does, Foxe does appear to borrow some material from Bale and certainly, the argument Foxe makes is essentially little different. There is one last item of interest. The one miracle that Foxe included in his narrative—regarding the miraculous cure that Becket’s blood was meant to cause—derived directly from Bale’s Votaryes. Under the sub-title ‘And False Miracles and Canonisation of Becket’, Bale provides the same citation as Foxe to Caesarius’ Dialogues and gives the same description.79 The short, bullet-point styled ending which draws in the events of Henry II’s reign after Becket is also here, suggesting that Foxe borrowed heavily from Bale for this portion of his narrative.80

Richard and the Crusade Foxe has much less to say about Richard the Lionheart than he had about Becket. This was the king who had abandoned England in favour of a crusade, a king whose absence had left England to the mercies of corrupt prelates and authoritarian dictatorships, a king who refused to focus on governing his kingdom instead seeking adventure abroad. Medieval chroniclers tended to judge Richard positively, based entirely on his warrior prowess. Few, if any, dispute this claim, but some early commentators were not entirely convinced that Richard’s brand of kingship equalled good governance.81 There certainly was a dark side to Richard’s crusading zeal. Ralph V. Turner and Richard R. Heiser have noticed that the king used England as an ‘inexhaustible treasure house’ to fund his wars.82 Richard’s early chroniclers appear to agree. William of Newburgh called the late king irresponsible. Ralph Coggeshall, in his Chronicon Anglicanum, complained bitterly that Richard had overtaxed his subjects in the last years of his reign. For Foxe, these fragments of complaint filtered down to him via The Actes or Unchast Examples of the Englysh Votaryes. In that book, Bale had

78 The First Edition considered the king as little more than a tool of Antichrist: a king ‘sworne to defende all Antichristes affaires’ as Bale succinctly put it.83 The core of the argument was that the crusade had been a rouse devised by Rome to ‘occupye their whole realme to their Romyshe maisers’.84 Foxe made use of this, telling stories of how the nobility and bishops left behind had abused their power. Two laymen and two prelates were selected to rule in the king’s stead. It was the bishops, William de Longchamp of Ely (d. 1197) and Hugh de Puiset of Durham (c.1125–1195), who fell out in another dispute over supreme authority, providing the pope with an opportunity to make de Longchamp the de facto ruler of England whilst the king was away, thereby placing a puppet of his own making in charge. Foxe, following Bale, describes Longchamp disparagingly as a man who used religion to prop up his own ‘pompe and ambition’ and a man who, when eventually defeated, revealed his cowardly nature.85 A second theme also emerges from Bale. He tells a fable in which the king is warned by a man named Fulco or Gwalter that he would bring ruin to his kingdom if he did not marry off his three daughters before he died. The king replied that he had no daughters. Fulco explained that their names were pride, greed, and luxury. The king understood the message—his crusade had been for his own glory, his heavy taxation of the realm his pride and greed. According to the tale, Richard repented, giving gifts to the Templars, the Cistercian monks, and the prelates of the Church. Bale and Foxe alike saw in this story evidence that Richard was far from the ideal monarch as many chroniclers claimed, but rather an abuser of his realm and people. Both Bale and Foxe followed Ralph of Coggeshall’s complaint that the king heavily taxed England in the last years of his reign. They also noted that the king drained the country dry to fund his crusade, stating that lordships, castles, offices, and privileges were sold, and that the king would have sold London if he could have. Whilst Foxe once again relied on Bale to compile his own narrative, he did also look to a handful of medieval sources to add detail and to offer an example, such as the Annales of Roger of Hoveden and the Polychronicon of Ranulf Higden.86 However, the sequence remained short and detail spare. More would be written on Richard for the second edition, but for now, Foxe seemed in a hurry to return to more useful stories, particularly the rebellion of King John against the papacy.

King John John is rarely given a positive assessment by chroniclers. Most contemporary writers described him in the negative, and near to Foxe’s own time, William Shakespeare would cement that view in his historical play. A story placing John as a tyrant and the baronage as England’s best hope for freedom and liberty did not address the needs of a Protestant past, resulting in the development of a parallel and alternative reading of the evidence. During the sequence Foxe wrote that John was

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compassed about on euery side with enemies, and seing the great daunger t[hat] was like to followe, & him self to be brought to such a straight, that no other way could be fou[n]d to auoyde the present destruction bothe of his persone and the realme also, but vtterly to bee subuerted, & specially fearing the French kyng, was enforced to submit him selfe to that execrable mo[n]stre and Antichrist of Rome.87 Foxe writes John as a defender of the realm and faith against papal interference and greed, but also as a king defeated by superstitious prophecies and a disloyal baronage. In doing so, Foxe follows a revision of history that had already been made in the 1520s and 1530s, when William Tyndale, Simon Fish, Robert Barnes, and John Bale had all proposed King John as a protoreformer. Tyndale’s The Obedience of a Christian Man and Fish’s A Supplication for the Beggars made this argument in the 1520s as a precursor to Henry VIII’s reforms. Tyndale argued for the divine right of kings and claimed that this had been historically misattributed to the pope, whilst Fish made a direct attack on the Roman Church, accusing it of avarice and treason, and calculating that the Church held a disproportionate share of England’s wealth and resources.88 Robert Barnes enlarged upon these themes in 1531 in his Supplication, a work that he had written to appeal to Henry VIII during his divorce proceedings with Katherine of Aragon.89 In the meanwhile, John Bale, then under the patronage of Thomas Cromwell, wrote and had enacted a play called King John.90 In each instance, John was promoted and identified as a prototype for Henry VIII—an example of an English monarch who had attempted to defend his divine right and the independence of England, from an over-zealous papacy. The fact that John had failed was no matter; there were lessons that could be learned so that Henry’s war with the pope could be more successful. Foxe took up this revised narrative in the Acts and Monuments, adding to it a cautionary tale of what would result if the nobility of his own day rebelled against Elizabeth. To do that, Foxe took the story further into the reign of John’s successor, Henry III, depicting the realm as conquered by papal tyranny and overwhelmed by over-zealous taxation. All of this, however, might not have been written by Foxe alone, or even at all. In 1998, Thomas Freeman put forward an intriguing proposition that John Bale had written the King John sequence and that, even more conjecturally, it was originally intended as the promised third part of his Actes or Unchast Example of the Englysh Votaryes.91 Key to Freeman’s argument is the appearance of a different corpus of source materials that Foxe does not use anywhere else in the first edition of the Acts and Monuments, a particularly irregular pagination, and a claim that the style and focus are more akin to Bale than to Foxe. There is other evidence as well that is suggestive. The source for the list of monastic orders that follows John’s story is still unidentified, but would

80 The First Edition certainly fit Bale’s interests well and, furthermore, especially aligns with what Bale had promised for his third part of the Englysh Votaryes, which would declare the crafty vpholdinge of their [monks] prowde degrees & possessyons, by the wilye and subtile slayghtes of the .iiij. orders of frires. And [th]e fort part shal manifest their horrible fall in this lattre age by tha[t] grou[n]ded doctrines of the true preachers & writers.92 The profile of Pope Innocent III additionally aligns closely with the King John sequence and the list of monastic orders, suggesting that this, too, could be claimed as Bale’s work, something that Freeman himself suggests.93 As a canon at Canterbury, Bale spent the early 1560s refreshing his play on King John for an Elizabethan audience, confirming that this era of history was fresh in his mind. His death in 1563 is also timely. Bale would most likely have realised that he had no time left to him to finish the third part of his Votaryes. It would seem natural that Bale would entrust his unfinished work to Foxe for incorporation into the Acts and Monuments, especially as it was Bale, himself, who had first declared the need for such a history, written by an expert in Latin and the humanist style, as far back as 1544. Bale had put forward that argument in his chronicle on John Oldcastle, arguing, A worthy worke were that afore God & manne I wolde wyshe some lerned Englyshe ma[n]ne (as there are now most excellent fresh wyttes) to set forth the Englyshe chronycles in theyr ryght shape as certen other landes hath done afore them all affeccyo[n]s set a part. I can not thynke a more necessarye thynge to be laboured to the honour of God bewtye of the realme, erudicyon of the people and commoditie of other landes next the sacred scripture of the Byble than that worke wolde be.94 John Foxe and his Acts and Monuments certainly fit with this description. This set of sequences concludes with the prophecy of Hildegard and a description of the begging friars as a ‘se[n]seles people’, self-obsessed, and abusive of charity. Both narrative segments were taken out of Flacius’ catalogue but were most likely included by Foxe to tie-in with the material Bale had provided him.95

Conclusions The ending of Book 1 is full of apocalyptic doom. The failure of King John in his fight for English independence had resulted in a lengthy period of papal autocracy, played out in a short sequence telling how Cardinal Otto had heavily taxed England and abused his power during the reign of Henry III. It also told of the multiplication of monastic ‘sects’, resulting in the solidification of wealth in the monasteries and a diversification of faith. Foxe also told of another controversy between the papacy and empire, this time an attempt by Emperor Frederick II to assert his divine right of authority. The heretical group from the Languedoc region of France known as the

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Albigenses or Cathars are also mentioned, again with a focus on understanding the precepts of their faith, but again, because of a lack of unbiased evidence, Foxe defaults to a claim that the pope persecuted them as he foresaw a threat to his secular authority. Foxe concludes the book with a message for his readers that you haue heard and do vnderstand the miserable thraldom and captiuitie of this realme of Englande and the clergye of the same, who before refused to take parte w[ith] king Iohn, theyr natural prince againste the forrein power of the Pope, and now how miserably they are oppressed & scourged of the same Pope.96 At the same time, Foxe offers a message about continental events, suggesting that ‘the case of Germanye and of the Emperour Fredericke the second was then as much or more pitiful’. Although there is evidence in these sequences that Foxe consulted his collection of medieval chronicles to provide various small details, most of the text is taken directly from Bale or Flacius. As elsewhere in the pre-Lollard history, Foxe has done little more than expand on a previous Protestant assessment of past events. His use of the original chronicles is, therefore, piecemeal and mainly focused on a select few points, providing verbatim or summarised documentation as additional proof. The pre-Lollard history in the first edition of the Acts and Monuments is, therefore, somewhat superficial compared to what Foxe would achieve over the next seven years. It is a disjointed history, focusing on English events one moment and continental events the next, with only a partially successful attempt to unify them into a single narrative. Some sequences are rushed and lacking in detail, whilst the sequence on Thomas Becket is granted one-third of the total page count. Nonetheless, this was the foundation for all that followed. Foxe incorporated almost everything that he had written in the first edition, into his second edition, often without any significant change or alteration. Most of what Foxe adds builds on the arguments already made. The foundation is itself founded on an English and continental revision of the past, written piecemeal over a 50-year period. Almost everything that Foxe includes is based directly on Reformation literature, especially the catalogues of John Bale and Matthias Flacius. The sequence on Gregory VII is based on both catalogues, Frederick Barbarossa on Bale’s catalogue and the Waldensians on Flacius’ catalogue. Whilst most of the sequence on Thomas Becket is extracted from the Quadrilogus, it is again to Bale and Flacius that Foxe turned for interpretation, the story of Richard I derived from Bale’s The Actes or Unchast Examples of the Englysh Votaryes, and potentially the sequences on King John, monastic orders, and Innocent III are from Bale’s drafts for the third part of that text. The brief sequence on Henry III appears to be mainly taken out of one or another version of Matthew Paris’ chronicle, a source used also for King John, and thus perhaps suggesting again a connection to Bale’s drafts. Finally, the sequence on Frederick II returned

82 The First Edition to both catalogues. Only the opening sequence comparing the older church with the more recent appears to be an entirely new compilation without basis in contemporary writings, but even here Foxe appears to borrow the idea from John Jewel. None of these observations negates Foxe’s role as compiler or author. The entire pre-Lollard history is original to the Acts and Monuments, even if much of it is derivative from other Protestant histories. Foxe did add evidence and examples from older chronicles where he could, following up on various references in contemporary texts. When Elizabeth Evenden and Thomas Freeman argue that Foxe explored more material in the first edition then is sometimes assumed, they are indeed correct.97 From a close reading of the text and comparison to possible sources, there would appear to be a minimum of 22 sources used by Foxe, and that does not include the material he probably inherited directly from Bale or other potential sources that have not become obvious during this examination. Foxe was also the first to use Bale’s prophetic framework as a basis for a detailed history. What had been written before, even by Bale and Flacius, was repurposed and re-organised to fit this pattern. This made Foxe’s version of history unique. No one else had conceived of the English and Christian past exactly in those terms before, at least not in as much detail. Nonetheless, this was only a beginning. The second edition would expand the pre-Lollard history from 1 book of around 112,750 words to 4 books of a combined 650,000 or so words. The prophetic framework would alter, the stories lacking detail would grow, and a new reliance on ancient and medieval chronicles would remove any danger of the account appearing in any way derivative.

Notes 1. Thomas S. Freeman, “Foxe, John (1516/17–1587), Martyrologist,” ODNB, 2004, https://doi.org/10.1093/ref:odnb/10050. 2. Patrick Collinson, Archbishop Grindal, 1519–1583: The Struggle for a Reformed Church (London: Jonathan Cape, 1979), 79–82. 3. Thomas Freeman, “Texts, Lies, and Microfilm: Reading and Misreading Foxe’s ‘Book of Martyrs’,” The Sixteenth Century Journal 30, no. 1 (1999): 23–46, https://doi.org/10.2307/2544897. 4. James Frederic Mozley, John Foxe and His Book (London: Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge, 1940), 129. 5. Elizabeth Evenden and Thomas S. Freeman, Religion and the Book in Early Modern England: The Making of John Foxe’s ‘Book of Martyrs’ (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2011), 114–16. 6. It is not always possible to tell which source Foxe uses at the start of Book 1, as this sequence is a summary of evidence that could be taken from any number of sources. However, elements of the sequence do compare well. See A&M (1563), 17–23 (939-941, 20-23) compared with Flacius, CTV (1556), 317–19, 34, 129, 30–3, 40, 23–7, 188–96, or (1562), 221, 20–4, 74–5, 17, 24–5, 13–14, 163–5; Bale, Catalogus, 69–72, and the Gratian Decretals in Emil A. Friedberg and Aemilius L. Richter, eds., Corpus iuris canonici, 2 vols (Graz, 1879), vol. 1, 780 (causa 16, c. LIX) and 115 (Dist. 31 c. XIII), as example. It is known that

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7. 8.

9. 10. 11. 12. 13. 14. 15.

16.

17. 18.

19. 20. 21. 22.

23.

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Foxe owned a copy of the Gratian decretals at some point in his life as it is listed in Lansdowne 819, but it was also a key source in the A Solemn Contestation, which Freeman has suggested was a source that was used extensively. See Thomas S. Freeman, “A Solemne Contestation of Diverse Popes: A Work of John Foxe?,” English Language Notes 31, no. 3 (1994): 38. John Jewel, Apologia Ecclesiæ Anglicanæ (London, 1562), fo. 8v. The Apologia was translated into English as John Jewel, An Apologie, or Aunswer in Defence of the Church of England, Concerning the State of Religion vsed in the Same, translated by Anne Bacon (London, 1562). For more information and details on the controversy that resulted between Jewel and Harding, see Thomas Parker, English Reformers (London: S. C. M. Press, 1966), 3–57. Gary W. Jenkins, John Jewel and the English National Church: The Dilemmas of an Erastian Reformer (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2006), 58, www.loc.gov/catdir/toc/ ecip059/2005007479.html. Peter Milward, “The Jewel-Harding Controversy,” Albion: A Quarterly Journal Concerned With British Studies 6, no. 4 (1974): 320–41, https://doi.org/ 10.2307/4048202. A&M (1563), 19 (941). Ibid. Jewel, Apologia Ecclesiæ Anglicanæ. A&M (1563), 19–20 (941, 20). Ibid., 22. On the issue of apparel Foxe differs from the official stance, which enforced certain vestments in the English Church. For details, see Judith Anderson, “The Vestiarian Controversy under Cranmer and Its Treatment by Foxe,” in Translating Investments: Metaphor and the Dynamics of Cultural Change in Tudor-Stuart England (Fordham: Fordham University Press, 2005), 78–111. Thomas Martin and Stephen Gardiner [attributed], A Traictise Declaryng and Plainly Prouyng, That the Pretensed Marriage of Priestes, and Professed Persones, Is No Mariage: But Altogether Vnlawful, and in All Ages, and Al Countreies of Christendome, Bothe Forbidden, and Also Punyshed: Herewith Is Comprised in the Later Chapitres, a Full Confutation of Doctour Poynettes Boke Entitled a Defense for the Marriage of Priestes (London, 1554). John Ponet was the first to suggest that Gardiner was involved in the publication. See Helen L. Parish, Clerical Marriage and the English Reformation: Precedent Policy and Practice (Aldershot, Hants; Burlington, VT: Ashgate, 2000), 17, which is further supported by James A. Muller, Stephen Gardiner and the Tudor Reaction (New York: The Macmillan Company, 1926), 317. A&M (1563), 21–2. Foxe most likely took the claim against Gardiner from a combination of the decretals of Gregory IX, see Friedberg and Richter, Corpus iuris canonici, 115– 17 (Dist. 31 c. 13–14 and 32 c. 1–18), and Flacius, CTV (1556), 44–9 or (1562), 28–30. A&M (1563), 22. As argued by Freeman, “A Solemne Contestation of Diverse Popes: A Work of John Foxe?” Ibid., 35. John Foxe [attributed], A Solemne Contestation of Diuerse Popes, for the Aduaunsing of Theyr Supremacie: Quoted and Collected Faithfully out of Their Own Canon Law, According to the Very Wordes, Stile, and Tenor of the Same Theyr Own Canons, Decres, Decretales, Clementines, Extrauagantes, Bulles, Epistles, and Commen Glose Vpon the Same. Histories and Stories of Romane Bishops [et]c. In Forme and Wordes, as Their Are to Be Seane, and Found by the Quotations Here Vnto Annexed (London, 1560), title page. A&M (1570), 946–61 (blank).

84 The First Edition 24. 25. 26. 27. 28. 29. 30. 31. 32. 33. 34. 35. 36. 37. 38. 39. 40.

41. 42.

43.

44. 45.

46. 47.

48. 49.

Freeman, “A Solemne Contestation of Diverse Popes: A Work of John Foxe?”, 40. A&M (1563), 23–32. Ibid., 23. Ibid., 24, 25. Ibid., 25. Ibid., 26. Ibid., 27. Bale, Catalogus, 142–3. Compare A&M (1563), 32 with Brompton, cols. 971–2. Compare A&M (1570), 240 with Malmesbury, GP, 59–61. A&M (1563), 45. Ibid., 38. Ibid., 39. Ibid., 43. Ibid., 40. Taken from Flacius, CTV (1556), 324–5 or (1562), 223. Bale, Catalogus, pt. 2, 145, 160 or John Bale, Acta Romanorum Pontificum (Basel, 1559), 197–209 (also available via John Bale, The Pageant of Popes, Contayninge the Lyves of All the Bishops of Rome, From the Beginninge of Them to the Yeare of Grace 1555, trans. by John Studley (London, 1574), 82–6. See Lambert Hersfeld, Lamberti Hersfeldensis Annales, Ex Recens., ed. Ludwig F. Hesse (Hanover: Monumenta Germaniae historica (MGH), 1843), 217–8, 230. Bartolomeo Platina, B. Platinae . . . de Vita & Moribus Summorum Pontificum Historia, Cui Aliorum Omniū . . . Pontificum Res Gestæ Sunt Additæ, Nunquam Antehac in Uulgus Datæ . . . De Falso et Uero Bono Dialogi Tres . . . Panegyricus in Bessarionem . . . Oratio Ad Paulum. II., Etc, ed. by Onofrio Panvinio (Cologne, 1562), 149–55, https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=WkxnAAAAcAAJ. Compare A&M (1563), 51–2 with Bale, Catalogus, 200–2 or Bale, Acta Romanorum Pontificum, 249–58 (Bale, The Pageant of Popes, Contayninge the Lyves of All the Bishops of Rome, From the Beginninge of Them to the Yeare of Grace 1555, 176). For more on the story behind the woodcut, see Thomas S. Freeman, “‘St Peter Did Not Do Thus’: Papal History in the Acts and Monuments,” TAMO, 2004, www. johnfoxe.org/index.php?realm=more&gototype=&type=essay&book=essay17. A&M (1563), 51. Taken from the translation by Bale, The Pageant of Popes, Contayninge the Lyves of All the Bishops of Rome, From the Beginninge of Them to the Yeare of Grace 1555, 175. This appears in Bale, Acta Romanorum Pontificum, 244 and Bale, Catalogus, 179: Domi consistens Imperator, dum hæc gererentur, considerate quod Papa prius ius inuestituræ prælatorum Cæsaribus præripuisset, per legatos suos nationes omnes compilasset, et defectionis semina sparsisset per totum imperium, ab omnibus Germaniæ episcopis homagium ac fidelitatis iuramentum exegit. Flacius, CTV (1556), 369–77 or (1562), 247–9. See A&M (1563), 57 TAMO Commentary, which claims that Foxe used Flacius, CTV (1562), 705–9, 711–12, 721–7, 757–9. These, however, appear to be references to the 1556 edition. See instead Flacius, CTV (1562), 445–51. The commentary also claims that Foxe used Ortwin Gratius, Fasciculus rerum expetendarum ac fugiendarum (Cologne, 1535), fos. 87v–88r, 92r–93r. In addition, Freeman, “A Solemne Contestation of Diverse Popes: A Work of John Foxe?”, 38, argues that Foxe used Gratius for his 1559 Commentarii, whilst in exile at Basel. A&M (1563), 57. ‘Henry VIII: November 1538 16–20’, “Letters and Papers, Foreign and Domestic of the Reign of Henry VIII,” British History Online, 1893, www.british-history. ac.uk/letters-papers-hen8/vol13/no2/pp353-369.

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50. The destruction of Thomas Becket and his Shrine at Canterbury are discussed in detail in Anne Duggan, Thomas Becket (London: Arnold, 2004) and Margaret Aston, Broken Idols of the English Reformation (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2015), chap. 4. 51. Eamon. Duffy, Stripping of the Altars: Traditional Religion in England, 1400– 1580, New ed. (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1994), 160. 52. Aston, Broken Idols of the English Reformation, 369. 53. Eamon Duffy, Making the Hours: English People and Their Prayers 1240–1570 (Yale: Yale University Press, 2011), 151–7. 54. John Bale wrote this work under a pseudonym: Henry Stalbrydge, The Epistel Exhortatorye of an Inglyshe Chrystian Vnto His Derely Beloued Cou[n]Trey of Ingland: Agaynst the Pompouse Popysh Bisshops Therof, as yet the True Membres of Theyre Fylthye Father the Great Antychryst of Rome (Antwerp, 1544 and London, 1548). See also William Thomas, Il Pellegrino Inglese Ne’l Quale Si Difende Innocente (Zurich, 1552). 55. May McKisack, Medieval History in the Tudor Age (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1971), 96. 56. Duggan, Thomas Becket, 241–2. 57. A&M (1563), 62-3 (546-547). 58. Compare A&M (1563), 67 (551) with William of Newburgh, Rerum Anglicarum libri quinque, recens ceu è tenebris eruti, & in studiosorum gratiam in lucem dati: auctore Gulielmo Neubrigensi (Antwerp: Willem Silvius, 1567), bk. 2, chap. 16. 59. Compare A&M (1563), 66 (550) with Hoveden, vol. 2, 261, and A&M (1563), 72 (646) with Hoveden, vol. 2, 267 and James C. Robertson, Materials for the History of Thomas Becket, Archbishop of Canterbury, vol. 1, 4 vols (London: Longman, Trübner, 1879), 29. 60. Compare A&M (1563), 70 (644) with Hoveden, vol. 1, 265 with Robertson, Materials for the History of Thomas Becket, vol. 1, 34. 61. A&M (1563), 63 (547). 62. Ibid. 63. Ibid. 64. Ibid., 94. 65. Ibid., 98. 66. Bale, Catalogus, 210 as referenced in Evenden and Freeman, Religion and the Book in Early Modern England: The Making of John Foxe’s ‘Book of Martyrs’, 122. 67. Compare A&M (1563), 99 with William of Newburgh, Rerum Anglicarum libri quinque, recens ceu è tenebris eruti, & in studiosorum gratiam in lucem dati: auctore Gulielmo Neubrigensi, Bk. 2, chap. 16. 68. A&M (1563), 100 (932). Taken from John Bale, The First Two Partes of The Actes or Unchast Examples of the Englysh Votaryes (London, 1551), fo. xcvi. 69. Helen L. Parish, Monks, Miracles, and Magic: Reformation Representations of the Medieval Church (London: Routledge, 2005), 102. 70. A&M (1563), 191 (123). 71. Ibid., 549 (493), 770. 72. Ibid., 628–30 (572-574). 73. Ibid., 629 (573). 74. Ibid., 629 (573). 75. John Bale, A Brefe Chronycle Concernynge the Examinacyon and Death of the Blessed Martyr of Christ Syr Iohan Oldecastell the Lorde Cobham, Collected Togyther by Iohan Bale (Antwerp, 1544), fo. 53r.

86 The First Edition 76. Bale, Acta Romanorum Pontificum, 257, or Bale, The Pageant of Popes, Contayninge the Lyves of All the Bishops of Rome, from the Beginninge of Them to the Yeare of Grace 1555, fo. 101v. 77. Bale, Acta Romanorum Pontificum, 249–58, or Bale, The Pageant of Popes, Contayninge the Lyves of All the Bishops of Rome, From the Beginninge of Them to the Yeare of Grace 1555, fo. 97v–102r. 78. For example, Bale, Catalogus, 210. 79. Bale, The First Two Partes of The Actes or Unchast Examples of the Englysh Votaryes, sig. Q4v. 80. Bale, sigs. R1r-S4r. 81. As argued by John Gillingham, Richard I (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1999), 1–5. 82. Ralph V. Turner and Richard R. Heiser, The Reign of Richard Lionheart: Ruler of the Angevin Empire, 1189–99 (Harlow; New York: Longman, 2000), 244–5. 83. Bale, The First Two Partes of The Actes or Unchast Examples of the Englysh Votaryes, fo. 104v. 84. Bale, fo. 106v. 85. A&M (1563), 108 (blank). 86. Compare A&M (1563), 106–9 (blank) with Hoveden, vol. 3, 12–3, 15, 31–3, 36–75, 92–133, and Higden, vol. 8, 82–5, 90–7. 87. A&M (1563), 116 (138). 88. William Tyndale, The Obedience of a Christen Man (and How Christē Rulers Ought to Governe) (Antwerp, 1528), and Simon Fish, A Supplicacyon for the Beggers (Antwerp, 1529). 89. See Douglas H. Parker, ed., A Critical Edition of Robert Barnes’ A Supplication Unto the Most Gracyous Prince Kynge Henry the VIII, 1534 (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2008). 90. See Raymond-Jean Frontain, “‘Dauid in His Most Hevynes’: Bale’s King Johan and the Politicization of the Penitential David Tradition,” Cahiers Élisabéthains 62, no. 1 (1 October 2002): 1–10, https://doi.org/10.7227/CE.62.1.2.; Peter Happé, John Bale (New York: Twayne Publishers, 1996), 89–107; Carole Levin, “A Good Prince: King John and Early Tudor Propaganda,” The Sixteenth Century Journal 11, no. 4 (1980): 23–32, https://doi.org/10.2307/2539973.; Peter Happé, Four Morality Plays (Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1979); and Barry B. Adams, John Bale’s King Johan (San Marino, CA: Huntington Library, 1969). 91. Thomas S. Freeman, “John Bale’s Book of Martyrs?: The Account of King John in Acts and Monuments,” Reformation 3, no. 1 (1 January 1998): 175–223, https:// doi.org/10.1179/ref_1998_3_1_008. 92. Bale, The First Two Partes of The Actes or Unchast Examples of the Englysh Votaryes, 1. Evenden and Freeman, Religion and the Book in Early Modern England: The Making of John Foxe’s ‘Book of Martyrs’, 123, argue that the list of monastic orders is like a roll call in Bale’s play King Johan. 93. Freeman, “John Bale’s Book of Martyrs?: The Account of King John in Acts and Monuments”. 94. Bale, A Brefe Chronycle Concernynge the Examinacyon and Death of the Blessed Martyr of Christ Syr Iohan Oldecastell the Lorde Cobham, Collected Togyther by Iohan Bale, fo. 5v. Evenden and Freeman, Religion and the Book in Early Modern England: The Making of John Foxe’s ‘Book of Martyrs’, 48, argue that Bale was talking about Foxe and he meant, specifically Foxe’s then forthcoming Commentarii. John Wade, “John Foxe the Latinist,” TAMO, 2004, www.johnfoxe.org/index.php?realm=more&gototype=&type=essay&book=es say14., has examined the quality of Foxe’s Latin works and verified that Foxe was indeed, a leading Latinist in his time.

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95. Compare to Flacius, CTV (1556), 650–5 or (1562), 391–3. Bale also mentions Hildegard in his catalogue, but this is not Foxe’s direct source. See Bale, Catalogus, 168. If Foxe is using material from Bale here, it is unpublished material. 96. A&M (1563), 135 (1237). 97. Evenden and Freeman, Religion and the Book in Early Modern England: The Making of John Foxe’s ‘Book of Martyrs’, 122.

Works Cited Printed Adams, Barry B. John Bale’s King Johan. San Marino, CA: Huntington Library, 1969. Anderson, Judith. “The Vestiarian Controversy Under Cranmer and Its Treatment by Foxe.” In Translating Investments: Metaphor and the Dynamics of Cultural Change in Tudor-Stuart England, 78–111. Fordham: Fordham University Press, 2005. Aston, Margaret. Broken Idols of the English Reformation. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2015. Bale, John. A Brefe Chronycle Concernynge the Examinacyon and Death of the Blessed Martyr of Christ Syr Iohan Oldecastell the Lorde Cobham, Collected Togyther by Iohan Bale. Antwerp, 1544. ——— Acta Romanorum Pontificum. Basel, 1559. ——— The First Two Partes of the Actes or Unchast Examples of the Englysh Votaryes. London, 1551. ——— The Pageant of Popes, Contayninge the Lyves of All the Bishops of Rome, From the Beginninge of Them to the Yeare of Grace 1555, translated by John Studley. London, 1574. ——— Scriptorum illustriū maioris Brytannię . . . catalogus . . . usque ad annū hunc Domini 1557 . . . IX centurias continens, etc.: (Scriptorum illustrium . . . posterior pars, quinque continens centurias ultimas). Basel, 1557. Brompton, John. “Chronicon Johannis Bromton Abbatis Iornalensis.” In Historiæ Anglicanæ scriptores X : Simeon Monachus Dunelmensis. Johannes Prior Hagustaldensis. Ricardus Prior Hagustaldensis. Ailredus Abbas Rievallensis. Radulphus de Diceto Londoniensis. Johannes Brompton Jornallensis. Gervasius Monachus Dorobornensis. Thomas Stubbs Dominicanus. Guilielmus Thorn Cantuariensis. Henricus Knighton Leicestrensis. Ex vetustis manusciptis, nunc primùm in lucem editi; Adjectis variis lectionibus, glossario, indicéque copioso., edited by Roger Twysden, 725–1284. London, 1652. Cisner, Nicolaus. De Friderico II: Imper. oratio. Basel, 1565. Collinson, Patrick. Archbishop Grindal, 1519–1583: The Struggle for a Reformed Church. London: Jonathan Cape, 1979. Duffy, Eamon. Making the Hours: English People and Their Prayers 1240–1570. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2011. Duffy, Eamon. Stripping of the Altars: Traditional Religion in England, 1400–1580. New ed. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1994. Duggan, Anne. Thomas Becket. London: Arnold, 2004. Evenden, Elizabeth, and Thomas S. Freeman. Religion and the Book in Early Modern England: The Making of John Foxe’s ‘Book of Martyrs’. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2011.

88 The First Edition Fish, Simon. A Supplicacyon for the Beggers. Antwerp, 1529. Flacius Illyricus, Matthias. Catalogus Testium Veritatis, Qui Ante Nostram Aetatem Pontifice Romano Ejusque Erroribus Reclamarnt, Jam Denuo . . . Emendatiori et Auctior Editus. Strasbourg, 1562. https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=PWVeAAAAcAAJ. ——— Catalogus Testium Veritatis, Qui Ante Nostram Aetatem Reclamarunt Papae: Opus Varia Rerum, Hoc Praesertim Tempore Scitu Dignißimarum, Cognitione Refertum, [. . .]. Basel, 1556. www2.uni-mannheim.de/mateo/camenahist/autoren/ flacius_hist.html. Foxe, John. A Solemne Contestation of Diuerse Popes, for the Aduaunsing of Theyr Supremacie: Quoted and Collected Faithfully Out of Their Own Canon Law, According to the Very Wordes, Stile, and Tenor of the Same Theyr Own Canons, Decres, Decretales, Clementines, Extrauagantes, Bulles, Epistles, and Commen Glose Vpon the Same. Histories and Stories of Romane Bishops [et]c. In Forme and Wordes, as Their Are to Be Seane, and Found by the Quotations Here Vnto Annexed. London, 1560. ——— “Acts and Monuments.” TAMO, 1563. www.johnfoxe.org. ——— “Acts and Monuments.” TAMO, 1570. www.johnfoxe.org. Freeman, Thomas S. “A Solemne Contestation of Diverse Popes: A Work of John Foxe?” English Language Notes 31, no. 3 (1994): 35–41. ——— “Foxe, John (1516/17–1587), Martyrologist.” ODNB (2004). https://doi. org/10.1093/ref:odnb/10050. ——— “John Bale’s Book of Martyrs?: The Account of King John in Acts and Monuments.” Reformation 3, no. 1 (1 January 1998): 175–223. https://doi.org/10.1179/ ref_1998_3_1_008. ——— “‘St Peter Did Not Do Thus’: Papal History in the Acts and Monuments.” TAMO, 2004, www.johnfoxe.org/index.php?realm=more&gototype=&type=essay& book=essay17. ——— “Texts, Lies, and Microfilm: Reading and Misreading Foxe’s ‘Book of Martyrs’.” The Sixteenth Century Journal 30, no. 1 (1999): 23–46. https://doi.org/ 10.2307/2544897. Friedberg, Emil A., and Aemilius L. Richter, eds. Corpus iuris canonici. 2 Vols. Graz, 1879. Frontain, Raymond-Jean. “‘Dauid in His Most Hevynes’: Bale’s King Johan and the Politicization of the Penitential David Tradition.” Cahiers Élisabéthains 62, no. 1 (1 October 2002): 1–10. https://doi.org/10.7227/CE.62.1.2. Gillingham, John. Richard I. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1999. Happé, Peter. Four Morality Plays. Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1979. ——— John Bale. New York: Twayne Publishers, 1996. Hersfeld, Lambert. Lamberti Hersfeldensis Annales, Ex Recens, edited by Ludwig F. Hesse. Hanover: Monumenta Germaniae Historica (MGH), 1843. Jenkins, Gary W. John Jewel and the English National Church: The Dilemmas of an Erastian Reformer. Aldershot: Ashgate, 2006. Jewel, John. Apologia Ecclesiæ Anglicanæ. London, 1562. “Letters and Papers, Foreign and Domestic of the Reign of Henry VIII.” British History Online, 1893. www.british-history.ac.uk/letters-papers-hen8/vol13/no2/pp353-369. Levin, Carole. “A Good Prince: King John and Early Tudor Propaganda.” The Sixteenth Century Journal 11, no. 4 (1980): 23–32. https://doi.org/10.2307/2539973. Martin, Thomas, and Stephen Gardiner [attributed]. A Traictise Declaryng and Plainly Prouyng, That the Pretensed Marriage of Priestes, and Professed Persones,

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Is No Mariage: But Altogether Vnlawful, and in All Ages, and Al Countreies of Christendome, Bothe Forbidden, and Also Punyshed: Herewith Is Comprised in the Later Chapitres, a Full Confutation of Doctour Poynettes Boke Entitled a Defense for the Marriage of Priestes. London, 1554. McKisack, May. Medieval History in the Tudor Age. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1971. Milward, Peter. “The Jewel-Harding Controversy.” Albion: A Quarterly Journal Concerned With British Studies 6, no. 4 (1974): 320–41. https://doi.org/10.2307/4048202. Mozley, James Frederic. John Foxe and His Book. London: Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge, 1940. Muller, James A. Stephen Gardiner and the Tudor Reaction. New York: The Macmillan Company, 1926. Paris, Matthew. Matthæi Parisiensis, Monachi Sancti Albani, Chronica Majora, edited by Henry R. Luard. 7 Vols. London: Rolls Series, 1872. Parish, Helen L. Clerical Marriage and the English Reformation: Precedent Policy and Practice. Aldershot, Hants and Burlington, VT: Ashgate, 2000. ——— Monks, Miracles, and Magic: Reformation Representations of the Medieval Church. London: Routledge, 2005. Parker, Douglas H., ed. A Critical Edition of Robert Barnes’ A Supplication Unto the Most Gracyous Prince Kynge Henry the VIII, 1534. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2008. Parker, Thomas. English Reformers. London: S. C. M. Press, 1966. Pier delle Vigne. Epistolarvm Petri de Vineis, cancellarii qvondam Friderici II Imperatoris, quib. res eius gestæ, memoria dignissimæ, historica fide de scribuntur, & alia quamplurima utilia continentur, libri VI, edited by Simon Schard. Basel, 1566. Platina, Bartolomeo. B. Platinae .  .  . de Vita & Moribus Summorum Pontificum Historia, Cui Aliorum Omniū . . . Pontificum Res Gestæ Sunt Additæ, Nunquam Antehac in Uulgus Datæ . . . De Falso et Uero Bono Dialogi Tres . . . Panegyricus in Bessarionem . . . Oratio Ad Paulum. II., Etc, edited by Onofrio Panvinio. Cologne, 1562. https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=WkxnAAAAcAAJ. Robertson, James C., ed. Materials for the History of Thomas Becket, Archbishop of Canterbury. Vol. 1. 4 Vols. London: Longman, Trübner, 1879. Stalbrydge, Henry. The Epistel Exhortatorye of an Inglyshe Chrystian Vnto His Derely Beloued Cou[n]Trey of Ingland: Agaynst the Pompouse Popysh Bisshops Therof, as Yet the True Membres of Theyre Fylthye Father the Great Antychryst of Rome. Antwerp and London: Printed by A. Scoloker and W. Seres, 1544. Thomas, William. Il Pellegrino Inglese Ne’l Quale Si Difende Innocente. Zurich, 1552. Turner, Ralph V., and Richard R. Heiser. The Reign of Richard Lionheart: Ruler of the Angevin Empire, 1189–99. Harlow and New York: Longman, 2000. Tyndale, William. The Obedience of a Christen Man (and How Christē Rulers Ought to Governe). Antwerp, 1528. Wade, John. “John Foxe the Latinist.” TAMO, 2004. www.johnfoxe.org/index.php? realm=more&gototype=&type=essay&book=essay14. William of Malmesbury. Gesta Pontificum Anglorum = The History of the English Bishops, edited by Michael Winterbottom and Rodney M. Thomson. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 2007. William of Newburgh. Rerum Anglicarum libri quinque, recens ceu è tenebris eruti, & in studiosorum gratiam in lucem dati: auctore Gulielmo Neubrigensi. Antwerp: Willem Silvius, 1567.

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The first edition of the Acts and Monuments appears to have been an immediate success. Just one year after its publication, Henry Bull (d. 1577) advertised the plan for the second edition of Foxe’s history in his own Certain Most Godly, Fruitful, and Comfortable Letters of Such True Saintes and Holy Martyrs (published by John Day in 1564). Meanwhile, John Foxe was rewarded with the Prebend of Shipton under Wychwood in Salisbury Cathedral, providing him with some amount of financial security for the rest of his life. He also moved from the Duke of Norfolk’s mansion into a cheap house in Grub Street, just a few minutes’ walk from John Day’s print house. In his biography of Foxe, Freeman refers to plague in the summer of 1563, speculating that one of Foxe’s daughters might have died. He also highlights the death of John Bale in November of that year, suggesting that this was a great loss for Foxe, but also liberating. Freeman contends that his death ‘removed a somewhat stifling personality, and enabled Foxe to develop in different directions’.1 This is an interesting suggestion, which still requires more exploration. Foxe clearly continues to rely heavily on Bale’s printed work (as demonstrated in Chapters 5 through 7 of this study), but there are signs that he begins to deviate or contest some of the more dubious or uncertain claims that Bale had made. Foxe was more careful. Foxe also took ownership of Bale’s prophetic framework for history, making it his own and altering the time frames based on his own reading of history, with persecution now the main driver for change. What appears in the second edition of the Acts and Monuments and evolves until Foxe’s incomplete Eicasmi seu meditations in sacram Apocalypsim is not what Bale would have imagined for a prophetic schema to history. The examination of sources and methodology in the pre-Lollard history, however, suggests that Foxe never moved away from Bale’s work, but rather made it his own. Foxe had always been Bale’s protégé, and this continues to show in his work. This is not only visible in Foxe’s pre-Lollard history but also, as I Ross Bartlett has shown, in the composition of martyrological stories in the latter portions of the Acts and Monuments, which imitate Bale’s style.2

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An alliance with Matthew Parker is, however, the largest alteration of Foxe’s situation and the most important influence on the development of the Acts and Monuments for the second edition. As previously described, Parker provided Foxe with a large range of complete and partial chronicles and annals, many of which had not been used significantly by historians for centuries. Suddenly, the works of Matthew Paris, Nicholas Trivet, William of Malmesbury, and variant writings of Thomas Walsingham, amongst others, was open to him to an extent that had been beyond possible when Foxe wrote Book 1 of the 1563 edition. Parker, of course, was equally building on the work begun by Bale, but, similarly, he questioned some of the assumptions that Bale had made, most significantly Bale’s identification of a letter to St Ulric and Pope Nicholas I (which will be discussed in Chapter 5). Parker was most likely also inspirational in transforming the Acts and Monuments from a historical commentary and martyrology into a fully formed ecclesiastical history. Foxe had alluded to Eusebius in the prefaces of the first edition and, of course, provided a rough outline of the classical and medieval past in the first book. By the mid-1560s, Parker was not only in the position to support Foxe with his collection of English manuscripts but also he was influenced by the idea that a proper understanding of the past and its sources could support the present religious reforms.3 He had also been in contact with the Centuriators of Magdeburg and by this date had access to at least nine volumes of the Centuries. Foxe also had his connections. Whilst in exile, he and Bale had proofread the first three volumes for its printer, Johannes Oporinus. Whether it was Parker or Foxe himself who suggested that the second edition should contain a much larger and fuller focus on history, the result was the same: an English ecclesiastical history meant to rival and support the German Magdeburg Centuries. These were the contesting and multiple driving forces in Foxe’s mind when he came to write the pre-Lollard history. Foxe knew that he needed to prescribe to the protocols set out by Eusebius if his history was to be accepted. He was also keen, perhaps, to step out of the shadow of Bale, but keener still to build upon the foundation that he had left behind. Foxe might have questioned some of Bale’s claims and arguments, but essentially much of what Foxe added was a continuation of what Bale had started. Foxe’s similar reliance on the catalogue of Matthias Flacius confirms the worth that Foxe saw in these foundational works. Parker provided Foxe with the opportunity to expand, to seek out primary source material, and to unearth through the manuscripts a properly revised and re-interpreted history. This second edition of the Acts and Monuments was eventually published in 1570. It was an enlarged edition containing updated and expanded material related to the Protestant martyrs but also containing four books instead of one on pre-Lollard history. Foxe incorporated into the second edition most of the sequences found in the first edition, and he rarely made significant changes to these. What Foxe did do, however, was to take his story back to the Roman and Anglo-Saxon eras and expand the post-conquest

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era with new documentation, evidence, and arguments. This chapter focuses on Book 1 of the second edition, covering the first 300 years of Christianity including the ten persecutions of Christians and the rise of Constantine as the first Christian emperor. Roman imperial history is probably the least interesting in terms of its appropriation by subsequent writers. To an extent, it could be called perfunctory. It was more important that it was included in the history than it was as a memorial, as a focus for religious devotion, or for future histories. It was partly prologue and partly repetition of Eusebian protocols. The important statement was in its replication of Eusebius’ ecclesiastical history, intricately linking the Acts and Monuments to that long-held tradition. The numerous tales of ancient Christian martyrs, summarised and lacking in detail as they were, were largely used to establish archetypes upon which contemporary Protestant martyrs could be compared. Only a few were ever specifically linked, however, such as Polycarp (69–155)—an old man accused of heresy under Marcus Aurelius (c. 166–167) and Nicholas Ridley (c. 1500–1555), a prominent Edwardian Bishop, of similarly old age.4 Both are metaphorically joined by the words to ‘play the man’, the first time spoken to Polycarp by God, the second by Hugh Latimer, who joined Ridley in the flames. The importance of Book 1 is found more in its construction. Near the beginning of the book, Foxe repeated Bale’s five-age prophetic schema as he had done in the first edition, but by the end of it, Foxe had altered the binding of Satan from the moment of Christ’s passion to the conversion of Constantine the Great, shunting each key prophetical moment thereafter to a date 300 years later. The reason for the alteration is told in Foxe’s own words: ‘Reading the historye of these so terrible persecutions’, the following question presented itself: Why wold God the almighty director of all thinges, suffer his own people & faythful seruaunts, beleuing in his own and onely begotten sonne Iesus, so cruelly to be handled, so wrongfullye to be vexed, so extremely to be tormented and put to death.5 The revelation would appear to derive out of Foxe’s own reading of historical sources, specifically the Magdeburg Centuries. When compiling the first edition, Foxe would appear to have been distantly aware of the persecution of early Christians, now he realised its true extent. His question not only highlighted the level of persecution but also teased out the universal meaning of martyrdom. Foxe concluded that martyrdom is a sign of Satan’s activity in the world and could not occur whilst it was secured and imprisoned. That meant that Thomas Becket, for example, could not have been a martyr nor could any other Roman Catholic born between Constantine’s conversion and the end of the 1,000-year period. Whilst the new timeline posed difficulties for Foxe’s medieval history, it worked to his favour at the other end, highlighting and emphasising the special place of the Lollards as

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martyred proto-reformers, and of course revealing the period of Reformation as another moment of martyrdom and of Satan’s power in the world. The telling of martyr stories in the first 300 years after Christ was therefore important to the overarching themes of Foxe’s history, so was Constantine himself. In the first edition, Foxe had perceived of himself as a modern-day Eusebius, and his queen, Elizabeth as a modern-day Constantine. Although Foxe reduced the allusion in the second edition from a direct comparison to an encouragement for further reform, the importance of Constantine himself increased now that he was the linchpin for Satan’s prophesied imprisonment.

The Characterisation of Constantine Whilst Foxe never quite conceived of England as the sole elect nation as William Haller once argued, he did offer the English a special place in the prophetic framework.6 Because of the execution of various Lollards in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, Foxe could claim that the English were amongst the first to suffer martyrdom after Satan’s release and was one location where the true church had survived as a continuous underground movement. Foxe could also claim England as the birthplace for Constantine—the emperor’s mother had been British and Constantine himself raised on the island. England was therefore deeply involved in the grand narrative from giving birth to the man whose actions bound Satan, to maintaining a true church in the face of great adversity over the subsequent 1,000 years, and one of the first realms to retract antichristian beliefs and authority in the final age before the inevitable final judgement. As a key witness and defender of Christianity in the early church, Constantine became what Warren Wooden would call a ‘tent-pole’ character.7 Looking at Foxe’s work through this lens, it becomes clear that on many occasions, Foxe created a dynamic tension between more-or-less impartial historical fact and a series of biographical sketches which relied more upon interpretative commentary, hearsay evidence, and constructed identities. Carefully orchestrated characterisation enabled Foxe to test key historical moments in terms of the good and bad traits of the main witnesses, and therefore provide a judgement on history as in alignment or out of alignment with Christian faith. If Wooden is right, then Foxe found a means to move beyond the strictly provable evidence without opening himself up to criticisms over fact, at least in theory. The characterisation of Constantine is a case in point. Michael S. Pucci identifies Foxe’s Constantine as embodying an ideal relationship between the Church and State and acting as the model of a ‘true’ Christian leader.8 He is an instrument of Divine Providence, an embodiment of an Old Testament type. In youth, his ‘natural disposition’ was one of eloquence, to think in terms of a good Philosopher and ‘in disputacion sharpe and ingenious’.9 Once emperor, he ‘tooke great payne and trauel for the preseruation’ of the Church and ensured its protection not only from external persecutions but

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also to ‘quieting the inward discentions and disturbance within’ the Church itself.10 He is the ‘singular spectacle for all christian Princes to beholde & imitate’.11 The general characterisation of Constantine is one of perfection, made by God’s protection and support. As a specific example, the narrative on Constantine’s battle with Maxentius identifies him less as a unique person, but more as a biblical archetype. The day before the battle, Constantine is described as worrying over the ‘magical charmes and sorceries of Maxentius’ so God granted him a vision: ‘A great brightnes in heauen, appearing in the similitude of a Crosse’ and the words ‘In Hoc Vince’, ‘in thys ouercome’.12 Following this ‘nightes vision’, Constantine ‘caused a crosse after the same figuracion to be made of golde and precious stone, and to be borne before him in steede of his standard’. Battle was then made. Eventually, the two leaders met at a place where Maxentius had taken down a bridge and replaced it with a false floor. However, the trap made for Constantine became Maxentius’ undoing; he fell into his own pit and drowned. Foxe relates this story along with biblical comparisons. The seventh Psalm provides a message that the righteous may appear weak, but will ultimately prevail against the wicked and describes how the wicked will dig a pit to cause trouble but then fall into it themselves: a parable for Maxentius. Meanwhile, Maxentius’ drowning under the weight of his own armour is described as like ‘Pharao and his host drowned in the red sea’—a befitting parallel which Foxe describes as follows: For as the children of Israel were in long thraldom and persecution in Egipt vnder tyrauntes there, tyll the drowning of this Pharo, their last persecutor: so was this Maxentius & Maximinus & Licinius t[he] last persecutors in t[he] Romain Monarchie of the Christia[n]s, whom this Co[n]stinus fighyng vnder t[he] crosse of Christ, did va[n]quish & set the Christians at libertie.13 Such a description is not historical, but hagiographical or biblical in style and form, telling the reader less about the man or the event but more about how the story should be received and understood. It is true that Foxe somewhat reduced the marvellous in what Eusebius had written about the miracles that inspired Constantine—infusing into the vision natural explanations, such as describing the vision of words in the sky as ‘certain stars of equal bigness, giving this inscription like Latin letters’ and occurring ‘about the going down of the sun’—but this is consistent with early Protestant opinion on supernatural events. Miracles did happen, but only certain types and in specific circumstances, and only within natural law. Constantine’s pre-battle situation was one such example.14 Wooden’s theory that certain historical characters are used by Foxe to carry an idea of history as a test between right or wrong faith, words and actions, combined with Pucci’s description of Constantine as a biblical

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type, provides us with a glimpse into Foxe’s process of analysing sources. It is in the actions of individuals, as told in historical sources, that Foxe can judge the past. This is equally and especially true of martyrs, who are judged by the inner truth of their faith. There has been much research on this subject. For instance, Kimberly Anne Coles sees the martyr archetype as ingrained in the body; its mannerisms before and during execution are unable to lie, thus revealing the inner person and his or her true faith.15 In separate studies, Ryan Netzley, Mark Breitenberg, James Truman, and Seymour Byman have discussed the repetition of gestures, speech, and behaviour in the martyr stories, arguing that the use of repetition connects and harmonises the martyrs together and, potentially, trains Elizabethan’s how to become a martyr themselves.16 Whilst Foxe was quick to emphasise that both the classical and contemporary martyr stories were not replacements for the defunct saints, and thus were not to be idolised; he nonetheless described them in hagiographical terms. Foxe argued that these were heroic mortals and holy men, yet notwithstanding they were men: that is, suche as might haue, & had their falles & faultes, men I say, and not Angels, nor Gods, saued by God, not sauiours of men, nor patrons of grace.17 Nonetheless, the danger of mistake remained mainly because of Foxe following the traditions of martyrology, emphasising the martyrs saintly or biblical characteristics and creating a type of person based on Biblical patristic and medieval hagiographic formulation, rather than emphasising the uniqueness of the individuals themselves.18 William Haller has described such formulation as resulting in every story posing ‘the same question in another set of human circumstances’.19 Angela Ranson calls this ‘interconnected individuals’, emphasising how Foxe characterised each Tudor martyr as part of a unified sub-group that connected each ‘witness’ first by time, showing how each martyr’s life and death corresponded with those who had died as witnesses in the primitive church, and second by space, Latimer was converted by Bilney, Rowland Taylor and John Bradford were converted by Latimer, and so on.20 Each individual witness loses something of themselves in the telling, but become something larger than themselves, part of a collective memory that could shape English cultural and religious identity and become evidence for a continuous history of resistance to the abuses and innovations of the Roman Church. Characterising historical individuals as biblical types, representing them as part of an interconnected group and, furthermore, judging their actions and words according to a criterion of religious faith forms a basis for how Foxe understood the past. The emphasis is on the individual not on the past event itself. The judgement of history is a judgement of faith. As such, it would seem likely that Foxe analysed his sources with just such a protocol in mind. Every single event is looked upon through the actions and words

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of individuals, which are then judged as either right or wrong. William of Saint-Amour (1200–1272), hardly a vital character in Foxe’s overarching story and certainly not a martyr (he was a scholar who wrote against friars) is ousted from his historical context for just such a purpose so that Foxe could identify him as a member of an ahistorical and universal member of the true faithful.21 Cardinal Otto, from the thirteenth century, similarly, is identified as a member of the false church and his actions judged accordingly.22 Augustine would prove similarly archetypal in the Anglo-Saxon history, as would Thomas Becket and King John in the portion of Book 4 dedicated to the Plantagenet kings. The martyrs of Book 1 are treated to the same analysis, although not by Foxe alone. As per the pre-Lollard history in the first edition, Foxe is largely reliant on recent contemporary arguments and their presentation of ancient Roman history. The voice of his narrative, therefore, is not wholly his own. In terms of presentation, though, Foxe is more reliant on an ancient precedence. As shown in Figure 4.1, he began with a new comparison between the Roman Church of his own times and the apostolic church before launching into biblical history—especially concerned with the apostles, Peter and Paul—and then what is termed the ten persecutions of Christians by the Roman Empire. The book ends, unsurprisingly, with Constantine bringing secure to Christianity after a long period of personal trials and victories in battle. Foxe tells of the emperors’ conversion (including an analysis of the miracles), his reign and rule over the Church, the context of his rule in terms of biblical exegesis, and tackles the issue of forgery in the story of the Donation of Constantine. Eusebius was the one who invented such a structure in his fourth-century ecclesiastical history, not only to construct some order to otherwise disparate events but also to align his history with biblical troupes. Ten persecutions aligned with the idea of the ten plagues of Egypt in the Bible, in which ten calamities were sent by God to persuade the release of the Israelites from slavery. Figure 4.1 illustrates a problem with this structure. The persecutions that did occur during the early years of Christianity and before Constantine were sporadic, often localised, and usually dependent on the disposition of individual emperors. This fact is highlighted in the number of words that Foxe dedicated to each incident. The first, second, third, sixth, and ninth are much shorter than the elongated passages on the fourth and tenth persecutions. The rest fall somewhere in between. The concept of the ten specific incidences is therefore largely imaginary. It is nonetheless of no surprise that Foxe would follow Eusebius, aligning his Acts and Monuments to the same formula and embedding much of the same content that Eusebius had provided. Indeed, the ascription of specific persecutors in each period of persecution is relatively the same between Eusebius and Foxe. Both present the first persecution as that of the apostles Peter and Paul, caused by Emperor Nero. The second persecution is claimed to have occurred a decade later under Domitian. A third persecution occurred

2887

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Figure 4.1 Length of narrative sequences in the Acts and Monuments, 1570, Book 1 (counted by the number of words)

Constantine the Great

Tenth persecution

Ninth persecution

Eighth persecution

Seventh persecution

Sixth persecution

Fifth persecution 1279

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Second persecution

First persecution

The first 300 years of the church

Summary of Roman Catholic heresies

St Paul’s Doctrine

Gregory the Great and his epistle

Early church vs latter church

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under Trajan, although Adrian and Antonius Pius are also included, and is characterised by an epistle written by Pliny the Younger to the Emperor, begging for the attacks to cease. Foxe also focuses on the Gallic churches. The fourth persecution under Marcus Aurelius included the famous martyrdom of Polycarp, whilst the fifth persecution under Septimus Severus and Severus Alexander lasted around eight years. The sixth persecution is under Maximinus. This one was short-lived and limited only to the higher clergy. The seventh persecution under Decius and Gallus is the reverse; this is the first universal and organised attack against Christians across the Empire. The eighth persecution under Valerian was smaller but included high profile martyrs such as Cyprian of Carthage and Sixtus II, Bishop of Rome. The ninth persecution is said to have occurred under Aurelian and was again relatively minor, whilst the tenth, and last, under Diocletian and Galerius, was one of the worst, and again universal, across the Empire. The table also highlights a division within the book. The first half focuses on a comparison between the directives for true faith as found in Scripture against the rulings of Rome, taking as its inspiration the comparison between the new and old churches that had opened Book 1 of the first edition, whilst the second half is a more straightforward, but summarised hagiography of Roman imperial history and persecution. This division is also visible in the sources that Foxe used. For biblical history, Foxe relied heavily on a printed French text, on decretals, Scripture, and a small selection of other materials. For the ten persecutions and the story of Constantine, Foxe defaults to one specific source: the Magdeburg Centuries. This chapter will thus move forward with Foxe’s comparison of contemporary and ancient church practices, and the sources used to compile this case before moving on to the telling of imperial Roman history, persecution, and Rome’s eventual conversion.

The Comparison of Churches Everything that Foxe writes in the first half of Book 1, from the first page referencing Cicero (the only part derived from the first edition) through to the outlining of history as five ages, is about preparing the reader for how history is handled and explained across the subsequent 12 books. The description is one of a timeless battlefield and a war of two armies—the faithful and the faithless—one revealed through a proper understanding of the visible and invisible church, the other visible only, and revealed through its non-Christian activities. The concept again came from Bale’s Image of Bothe Churches, claiming that the visible church only refers to the institutional body, not the elect who are ‘invisible’ and known only to God. The comparison is once again designed to undermine the historical authority of the Roman Church by proving, through Scriptural and near-contemporary evidence, that the doctrine, rules, and focus of the Church have altered from its early origins. It is a completely new version of what Foxe had compiled

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in 1563. It is also aligned to another similar sequence that would open the Anglo-Saxon history in Book 2, taken partly from Matthias Flacius’ Catalogus Testium Veritatis but also from Foxe’s own research.23 The purpose is to overturn the awkward and effective question posed by Catholic critics: Where was your church before Luther? In 1568, Thomas Harding had thrown that question at John Jewel and used Foxe as ammunition: ‘Ye must tel vs, where it was before Luther began to preache that ye cal the Gospel. Name the place, where was it?’24 Harding asked Jewel to spell out where his bishops were. What were their names? Where are your learned fathers? Are there none of ‘greater antiquitie, then those late of Foxes making?’ He demanded evidence: ‘Bring forth your Originals, your Registers, your Rolles of Bishops, that followed one after an other by lawful succession’.25 This is exactly what Foxe did, but not quite yet. First, he threw Harding’s registers, rolls, and genealogies back at him, using the words of Scripture, the pope’s own book of canon, and the edicts of early councils and synods to disprove Harding’s other claim that the Roman Church had the historical authority and tradition that the Protestant Church lacked. Foxe dedicates six pages to show that the doctrine of Paul differed from the Roman Church and five more pages to compare directly Roman claims on faith and justification, works and law, the role of sin, penance, gospel law, free will, invocation and adoration, sacraments, baptisms, the Lords Supper, matrimony, civil government, and purgatory. Each topic is supported by Scriptural quotations designed to undermine the Roman position, such as, for example, the role of good works as argued by Paul: ‘Al men be saued originally being regenerated by faith in Christ, before they begyn to do any good worke of charitie or any other good dede’.26 In the margins, Foxe notes, ‘Original sinne original iustice’. Scripture—specifically Romans 8—showed that Paul believed that belief in Christ was first necessary before a good deed could be done in the eyes of God and that man was  born with original sin. Some pages later, Foxe expands on this idea arguing, For where S. Paule teacheth the law to bee giuen to this vse and end, to conuict our transgressions, to proue vs sinners, to shew and condemne our infirmitie, and so driue vs to Christ: they [the Roman Church] take and apply no other end to the law but to make vs perfect, to keepe vs from wrath, & to make vs iust before God.27 Foxe argued that the Roman Church had misapplied good works in multiple ways, firstly by enforcing good work as the building of abbeys and churches, going on pilgrimage, or hearing Mass, fighting for the holy cross, fasting, or praying to idolised saints, rather than helping other men and women. These, he claimed at the same time, ‘are not onely reputed for good workes, but so preferred also before all other workes’. Secondly, the Roman Church mistook good works as a route to God rather than, as Protestants believed,

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the principle of sola fide, that salvation comes through faith alone. As Foxe quoted Paul, good works can only occur once faith in God is secured. Amongst his commentary on Paul’s beliefs, Foxe described the ‘principal branches’ of his faith, claiming them as nothing less than a reflection of the emerging Protestant orthodoxy on these issues.28 Paul was, therefore, an important influence for Foxe and other Protestants in England. Wooden, for example, has argued that Foxe drew his idea of a pure apostolic church from Pauline doctrine, via the lens of Eusebius.29 Another influence is, however, equally as prominent: the Magdeburg Centuries, which also included Paul’s doctrines and a lengthy account of Paul’s life.30 Another influence was the Geneva Bible, where Foxe most likely obtained many of his quotations and interpretations of Pauline doctrine. The Geneva Bible (published in 1557 and 1560) is a controversial source. Dan G. Danner calls it the most popular book on the English market, only equalled by Foxe’s own.31 It is for this reason that Archbishop Parker developed the Bishop’s Bible (published in 1568), specifically to counter its popularity. The King James Bible was similarly produced for that purpose. The reason authority figures disliked the Geneva Bible is only partly explained by its unofficial production, but had more to do with the numerous glosses, annotations, commentary, cross-references, and notes, many of which reflected Calvinist and Puritan doctrine, and some of which undermined the religious settlement secured by Queen Elizabeth.32 It is for this same reason that it remained popular. Foxe used it because of its annotations and glosses; the Geneva Bible provided him with an apparatus for identifying and extracting useful themes and topics, especially those that might discredit the Roman Church. There might be an expectation that citing and interpreting Scripture was the best defence that Foxe could provide against critics such as Harding. Certainly, it was a powerful tool, but because the Roman Church did not recognise the centrality of the Bible in the same way that Protestants did, the stronger weapon was to undermine the historical foundations of the Church itself by quoting back at them the early decretals and canon laws and emphasising passages where difference occurred. The first half of Book 1 is full of such citations, some of which were extracted by Foxe out of the various individual books of decretals, which had already begun to solidify into the Corpus Juris Canonici and would become a central declaration of the Catholic faith in a revised form at the Council of Trent (published in 1586).33 Some, conversely derived from the catalogue of Matthias Flacius.34 Foxe used these decretal references to make his argument. For example, in announcing against the pope’s capacity to dispose of ecclesiastical promotions in the early church, Foxe cited evidence from the councils of Nice and Antioch referencing the decretals in the process and adding additional material related to France, from Charles du Moulin’s Commentarius ad Edictum Henrici Secundi.35 A few pages later, Foxe described how the decrees of the Council of Carthage in AD 420 proved against the pope’s supremacy, taken entirely from the decretals.36 They were

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surprisingly useful for offering doubt over the pope’s claim of supremacy and for any kind of claim of the Bishop of Rome having ancient privileges above any other bishop or prince. The third type of source that Foxe used to counter Roman claims of traditional authority was to undermine contemporary Catholic polemicists by turning their own arguments against them. The best example of this is in the dissection by Foxe of claims made by Albert Pighius (c. 1490–1542), Stanislaus Hosius (1504–1579), and John Eck (1486–1543). These were three prominent protagonists against Protestant reform, who were well known in England.37 Foxe summarised their core argument for the antiquity and ancient authority of the Roman Church as (1) since the time of the apostles, there have been continuously on Earth a known and visible church, (2) only the Church of Rome fits this description, and (3) the Church of Rome must ergo be the Church upon which all other churches owe their allegiance.38 Foxe accepts the first statement, but disputes the rest indicating his belief that the Church of Christ ‘is not bou[n]d to any certaine place, or person, but only to faith’. Foxe points out that statement one only claims a continual Church on Earth and does not limit that claim to one city or person. He argues, That as this trew and sincer faith of Christ is not so geuen, to remaine fixely in one place or Citie alone: so neyther is ther any one church in the world so ordained and appointed of God, that all other churches should haue their recourse vnto it.39 Yet again, it is the individual who is important. Foxe dismisses any description of the Church connected to worldly structures such as an established Church organisation and instead observes that it is a timeless entity, unconnected to geography, and resting only in the hearts of people. In the corrections to the 1570 edition, Foxe expands further on this argument, again using Pighius, Hosius, and Eck. The emphasis is on the twochurch framework, arguing ‘The true church of Christ neither is so visible, that all the world can see it’, but only visible to ‘those which haue spirituall eyes, and be members therof’.40 The elect, only, can see the true church, whilst ‘the wordly eyes of the most multitude can not so do’. Foxe also borrowed from other contemporary writers who wrote in defence of the Church of Rome, bending them to reflect his own ideologies. There is evidence, for example, that Foxe used some of Erasmus’ arguments, citing him on several occasions.41 Stephen Cattley once claimed, without explanation, that Foxe extracted most of the sequence on the jurisdiction and title of the early popes from Charles du Moulin’s Commentarius ad Edictum Henrici Secundi, published in Lyon and Basel in 1552.42 This he did, combining du Moulin’s references to early papal rules and laws with evidence from the decretals.43 Indeed, du Moulin is used frequently in combination through this portion of the text. For instance, the detail of Pragmatica sanctio in Foxe’s attempt to show resistance to early papal supremacy is most

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likely a combination of du Moulin and Flacius’ catalogue.44 The same is true for the next sequence on the manner of election in Rome, but this time in combination also with the decretals and Platina.45 Amongst other portions of text derived from du Moulin is a short story concerning the suit of Lothaire to Pope Leo IV demanding that bishops should be subject to kings and emperors, and that the pope should be accused of treason for suggesting otherwise.46 The first half of Book 1 offers an intensive study of biblical, classical, and contemporary authorities on issues of contention between the Roman Church and Protestant churches to counter the argument of where was your church before Luther. Warren Wooden calls this sequence a key part of the ‘metamorphosis’ of Foxe’s work from a ‘little Latin octavo’, to a ‘massive multivolume work’.47 Foxe developed his polemical arguments, teasing out detail from a wide range of sources to clarify and prove well-rehearsed Protestant positions on matters of faith and doctrine. In the first edition, he had just summarised in a short sequence. This time he delved deep into theological debates. Once done, though, Foxe began again his chronological history, paralleling the rise and fall of the Roman Church with the continuation of the true, but persecuted church.

The Ten Persecutions Most of the second half of Book 1 is about the ten persecutions. Foxe begins with a summary, noting that the punishments suffered were ‘diuerse’, but emphasising that ‘the maner of constancie in all these Martyrs was one’.48 From the very beginning, Foxe emphasises the hagiographical nature of this sequence. This is not a story of individuals who were persecuted, but a story of ‘interconnected’ individuals each defending the true faith in the same manner, both inwardly and outwardly. Although there is a long list of citations to a wide array of printed and manuscript authorities both from England and the continent, recent preliminary studies by the John Foxe Project (TAMO) and as argued in the 2011 study on Foxe’s work by Elizabeth Evenden and Thomas Freeman, confirm that much of the compilation was taken second hand, extracted piecemeal from the earlier volumes of the Magdeburg Centuries.49 Further comparison between the content of Book 1 and the Centuries confirms another statement made by Freeman in 2009: whilst Foxe overwhelmingly relied on the Magdeburg Centuries to write the story of ten persecutions, this does not preclude him from also checking the original sources whenever he was able.50 A close reading of the two texts supports this claim. Often a sequence of text cited to Eusebius, for example, derives directly from the framing of words as found in the Centuries. Often, however, additional detail—even something as simple as a more precise book and chapter reference—indicates that Foxe also checked the Centuriators evidence against the original.

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There are multiple examples that could be shared to prove this point. In the sequence on the first persecution, Foxe describes the death of Peter and his wife citing as evidence Scripture (specifically Luke), Jerome’s De Viris Illustribus, ‘Egesippus’, ‘Abdias’ and Eusebius. Most of the account and the citation to ‘Egesippus’ derives from the Centuries.51 Other elements, plus the other citations do not, however, appear. This suggests that Foxe obtained them from elsewhere. Cattley guesses that Foxe examined a copy of the Pseudo-Abdias text during his time in exile. It had been published in Basel in 1552.52 This is possible, but not certain. Citations to Abdias do appear in subsequent pages of the Centuries, so, if Foxe did have access to a copy it would make sense that he would check it here as comparison and confirmation of the Centuriators interpretation.53 More certain is the use of Eusebius and Jerome. Foxe uses both Eusebius’ ecclesiastical history and Jerome’s De Viris Illustribus elsewhere in Book 1, suggesting that he did consult them here and that he could easily have added more material than the Centuriators provided.54 Independent use of Eusebius is more-or-less confirmed by the number of references and details that Foxe includes, which are not readily available in the Centuries, however, use of Jerome is trickier to identify. Some of the references are uncertain, but some would appear to indicate the independent use of the original, such as the story of Paul’s death and reference to his epistles. These are most likely taken directly from Jerome.55 Another clue is found near the end of the sequence on the fourth persecution, Foxe disputes Bartolomeo Platina’s story of Pius’ veneration of the consecrated bread and wine and the authorship of the work on Easter. This can all be found in Platina’s Vitæ Pontificum, but Foxe is most likely following the reference that he found first in the Centuries, having used the same page a few sentences before to dispute the claims made by Hyginus.56 The story of Polycarp provides another example. Foxe took most of the life and martyrdom of Polycarp directly from the Centuries—the form of his words and the citations suggest this—but then Foxe would appear to have confirmed and checked the story with the original source, Eusebius, adding a more detailed reference in the process.57 There would appear to be moments, also, when Foxe did not check against original sources, or at least his checks did not bring forth any alterations or additions. One such example is the summary of popes from Evaristus to Elevtherius which Foxe cites as taken from Irenaeus, Eusebius, and Nicephorus, but actually borrows entirely from the Centuries.58 Directly afterwards, Foxe cites Nauclerus, Platina, Volateranus, and Eusebius for a story on the martyrdom of Evaristus, but again, this is all taken from the one source.59 When searching for evidence of the fourth persecution, Foxe found in the Centuriators work a sequence that showed a contradiction in the sources concerning the identification of the pope at that time, which cited no less than seven sources.60 Foxe copied the entire sequence whole, including all seven citations, and although, again, he might have checked

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those sources that he had access to (such as Eusebius), there is no sign of it here. Indeed, there are portions of text in Book 1 which are little more than a word-for-word translation of an entire section of the Centuries. One such example is the martyrs made by Julian, in which Foxe copied the entire section verbatim, only altering one thing; he moved the second item on the list to the end of the passage. The most likely explanation is that Foxe had found in the index a second portion where the Centuriators talked about those who were martyred under Julian, including more detail on the second item; a story of how virgin Christian girls at the Heliopolis in the Temple of Venus were stripped, raped, and abused because of their beliefs.61 Foxe combined the two accounts and then added another on the bishop, Marcus Arethusius, taken also from that second section. The sequence on the martyrs at Lyons was similarly extracted whole from one section of the Centuriators text, this time without any alterations at all. This, in turn, was an exact duplicate of what Eusebius had written in the fourth century. On this occasion, there is evidence that Foxe extracted the mediated version from the Centuries rather than rely on the original text because he copies an error that they made in the citation. The Centuriators had cited the second chapter of book five, rather than the first.62 The format and structure of the Magdeburg Centuries encouraged an approach of piecemeal extraction. In total there were 14 volumes produced between 1559 and 1574, covering history from the first century to the thirteenth century. Each volume covered a 100 year period and was further subdivided by a thematic structure, starting with an introduction to the chief events of that century, then a description of how the Church spread, the various persecutions and periods of peace that occurred, the doctrine practiced in the Church, the various heresies, the rites and ceremonies practiced, the chief tenants of discipline and government, the schisms and controversies, the councils, the leading bishops and heretics, a list of martyrs, a list of miracles, and events concerning non-Christian religions such as pagans and Jews.63 The result was an extensive array of documentation and evidence that could be used by others to argue the decline of the Roman church into antichristian practices. There is little doubt that Foxe navigated these volumes using their indices, their thematical and temporal structure, sub-titles, and cross-references. That he used the volumes in this way can be assumed at various points in his work. Foxe seemed to favour specific sections over others, drawing much of his core material from the portions on persecution and peace, martyrs, and leading bishops. Most of the research for the ten persecutions began with the opening section on chief events and the second section on how the Church spread in that century. The rest is added material that fleshed out or added to the basic account. These Foxe tended to take from the sections on discipline and government, and rites and ceremonies. He rarely borrowed from the sections on miracles, political changes, councils, heresies, or schisms.

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The use of the Magdeburg Centuries in these ways, alongside checks and the occasional insertion from sources contemporary or near-contemporary to the period, make up most of the ten persecutions. This does, however, begin to alter for the last persecution, where Foxe is beginning to tell the full story of Constantine the Great. Increasingly the comparison of text between the Centuries and Foxe shows a disconnect and appears to suggest that Foxe is beginning to draw more from the original sources, and limiting his use of the sixteenth-century German ecclesiastical history. The reason is most likely the importance that Foxe attached to Constantine’s story. Another reason might have been because Foxe owned a copy of Eusebius’ other text, the panegyric, Vita Constantini and multiple continuations of Eusebius such as Socrates, Theodoret, and Sozomen, all of whom could comment on Constantine after the fact. The availability of these texts to Foxe is apparent in this sequence. Sozomen’s ecclesiastical history is used as an addition to the Centuries for various stories of persecution in Persia during the tenth persecution.64 One such example is the story of martyrs under the king Sapores. Foxe lists their names, all taken from the Centuries, but two can only be found in Sozomen’s history—Ctesiphon and Symeon.65 Equally, the story of Archbishop Simon who told Vsthazares and other potential martyrs to hold firm, whilst avoiding the fires himself, is also taken primarily from the Centuries but supported with information direct from Sozomen.66 The quotation of a prayer in Latin and English which Foxe claims that Emperor Constantine prescribed for his soldiers cannot be found in the Centuries at all, but is in the De Vita Constantini as Foxe himself cites.67 Furthermore, when describing how Constantine ensured that Scripture was available in Church, Foxe took most of the account word for word from the Centuries but added extra details that can only be found in the De Vita Constantini.68 Most telling, however, is a paragraph near the end of the sequence on Constantine, where Foxe notes an error in the historiography which attributed the authorship of an oration—the Conventum Sanctorum—to Eusebius Pamphilus. Foxe does not mention where he has seen this error, although suggestively it does appear in the Centuries.69 He does state, I alledge the very testimony of Eusebius himselfe in his fourth booke De vita Constant. where he expresse wordes not onely declareth that Constantine wrote such an oration intituled Ad Conuentum Sanctorum, but also promiseth in the end of his booke, to annex the same.70 Foxe offers the page number as ‘211’, perhaps offering a clue to the edition that he used. Unfortunately, thus far, this reference has not led to a definitive edition. It is not in the 1557 edition from Basel by Hieronymus Froben (1501–1563), or the Greek edition of 1544 produced in Paris, neither is it found on page 211 in the 1570 edition by John Christopher that was published in Cologne.71

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Not all citations that Foxe offered to the De Vita Constantini were necessarily genuine, however. As with citations to Platina and Sozomen, some instances more likely derived from the Centuries than the original text (although, once again, it is possible that Foxe confirmed the Centuriators reading). One such example is available in Foxe’s description of the support to Christians offered by Constantinus where both ‘Eusebius in vita Constantine’ and ‘Sozomeno’ are cited. Foxe derived that information and the citation from the Centuries.72 The Donation of Constantine, that great forgery that convinced medieval Europe that Constantine had transferred authority over Rome and the western part of the Empire to the pope, required nothing more from Foxe than a declaration of contempt. Foxe had mentioned it in the first edition, alluding to the denunciation of the Donation by Lorenzo Valla (1407–1457) in his De falso credita and using it as evidence that the apostolic succession was broken in the line of popes, but, instead, ran unbroken through a spiritual descent from hidden and marginal groups.73 In the second edition, the forgery becomes a crucial element in Foxe’s characterisation of Constantine. Valla was not the only late medieval author to denounce the Donation as a forgery. Reginald Pecock (c. 1392–c.1459) had also done so in his Repressor of Over-Much Blaming of the Clergy as had Nicholas of Cusa (1401–1464) in his De concordantial Catholica of 1433. Henry VIII’s advisors had also denounced the Donation in 1534 as part of the preparation work for the Act of Supremacy, which broke England from Rome. In the same year, William Marshall (c.1146–1219) translated Valla’s treatise against the Donation.74 Foxe offers 12 arguments against its existence and, as Michael S. Pucci has claimed, he used Eusebius because he had provided an account that conflicted with the claims made in the Donation itself.75 Foxe might have used Valla as well to make these points, but this is difficult to confirm as the references appear largely to be a rearrangement from the Centuries, which also rely on Eusebius, especially his Vita Constantini, and perhaps other stories in the printed edition originally written by Sozomen, Socrates, Theodore, Rufinus of Aquileia, and Jerome.76 Pucci further claims that Foxe and the Centuriators used Eusebius ‘by default’ rather than through any ‘consistent method of scholarship’.77 This is potentially correct, although such usage of Eusebius is consistent with Foxe’s methods and approach throughout  the Roman history, and not particular to the Donation story. Furthermore, the use of Eusebius here, by Foxe, is as much a decision of the Centuriators as it is one that Foxe himself made.

Conclusions In many ways, the Roman history, which begins the Acts and Monuments, is a product of Eusebius, often through the Lutheran lens of the Magdeburg Centuriators. Except for those portions focused on biblical history and comparison of a primitive early church with a mature latter-day church,

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the underlying sources are those selected and analysed in Magdeburg. Foxe largely limited himself to the role of curator; he selected, re-ordered, occasionally inserted contrary evidence, but generally copied from his single source. Indeed, it is here in Book 1 that Foxe is at his most derivative, but even then, he checked his sources with the originals whenever he could. Foxe shows himself to be a careful historian, albeit a partisan one, in his interpretation. There is a temptation to argue that Foxe lacked knowledge or interest in Roman history because of his over-reliance on the Centuriators. In the first edition of the Acts and Monuments, Foxe included almost nothing about the first ten persecutions or about Constantine himself. He followed Bale in his identification of five ages in which the first began with Christ’s passion and ended with Constantine’s rule. He began the second edition with the same plan in place, identifying the same prophetic framework near the start of Book 1. By the end of Book 1, however, he had changed his mind. The most likely conclusion is that Foxe read the stories of Eusebius and others— often via the Magdeburg Centuries—that revealed to him the true extent of persecution in the early church. This unsettled Foxe and started him on a journey of detailed examination into Revelation as a template for history. Indeed, Foxe’s final incomplete work, the Eicasmi seu meditations in sacram Apocalypsim, was a detailed exegesis of this very topic which included additional alterations from what Foxe had decided before 1570. The question of prophetic history is then one that Foxe would spend the rest of his life trying to understand. It was just one of many historiographical aspects that Foxe had inherited from Bale and continued to develop after his death, but it was a crucial one. Prophecy had become central to Foxe’s understanding of the past but specifically critical to his concept of martyrdom. Through reading about the early persecutions when compiling Book 1, Foxe decided that martyrdom could only occur when Satan was free in the world. The conversion of Constantine resulted in Satan’s binding, thus history over the next 1,000 years could not include any form of martyrdom. It would only reoccur, when Satan returned, in the late fourteenth century. The role of Constantine, also, is crucial to what follows. When Foxe examined Robert Fabyan’s chronicle for evidence on William the Conqueror, he most likely did so with Constantine in mind. When describing the good qualities of Edward I, Foxe most likely compared his qualities with Constantine and against other monarchs throughout history. Many of the martyr stories told in the second volume of the Acts and Monuments, would be paralleled to those in Book 1, although the connection is not so much that one followed the other, but instead that one linked to the other through genre; martyrology dictated the rules and integral to those rules was a linkage between ancient martyrs and modern ones. Reliance on Scripture and early Roman documentation is also important. The use of biblical passages and glosses, the direct attack on contem hagiographies shows that Foxe did spend considerable time trying to understand

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the opposition’s viewpoint and dismantling their claims. Although Foxe was somewhat inspired by John Jewel, and supported by texts by John Bale, Platina, and Charles du Moulin, this earlier set of sequences in Book 1 is where Foxe is most original and of most interest. This is where he sets out his processes and general interpretation of the past. This is where he argues for the value of his history and for the necessary revision of the traditional story. The intention was to prologue and summarise all of what would come over the next 12 books, especially showing that the English story—which would next become his main focus—was only one aspect of a greater whole.

Notes 1. Thomas S. Freeman, “Foxe, John (1516/17–1587), Martyrologist,” ODNB, 2004, https://doi.org/10.1093/ref:odnb/10050. 2. See I. Ross Bartlett, “John Foxe as Hagiographer: The Question Revisited,” The Sixteenth Century Journal 26, no. 4 (1995): 771–89, https://doi. org/10.2307/2543785. 3. See, for example, the following studies that examine Matthew Parker’s collecting interests: Timothy Graham and Andrew G. Watson, The Recovery of the Past in Early Elizabethan England: Documents by John Bale and John Joscelyn From the Circle of Matthew Parker (Cambridge: Cambridge Bibliographical Society, 1998); Norman L. Jones, “Matthew Parker, John Bale, and the Magdeburg Centuriators,” The Sixteenth Century Journal 12, no. 3 (1981): 35–49, https://doi.org/10.2307/2539785; Benedict Scott Robinson, “‘Darke Speech’: Matthew Parker and the Reforming of History,” The Sixteenth Century Journal 29, no. 4 (1998): 1061–83, https://doi.org/10.2307/2543358. 4. Compare A&M (1570), 73 (60) with A&M (1570), 1976 (1937). See Thomas Freeman, “Texts, Lies, and Microfilm: Reading and Misreading Foxe’s ‘Book of Martyrs’,” The Sixteenth Century Journal 30, no. 1 (1999): 23–46, https://doi. org/10.2307/2544897. 5. A&M (1570), 151 (138). 6. William Haller, Foxe’s Book of Martyrs and the Elect Nation (London: Jonathan Cape, 1963). 7. Warren W. Wooden, John Foxe (Boston: Twayne, 1983), 55–8. 8. Michael S. Pucci, “Reforming Roman Emperors: John Foxe’s Characterization of Constantine in the Acts and Monuments,” in John Foxe: An Historical Perspective, ed. David M. Loades (Aldershot: Ashgate, 1999), 29–51. 9. A&M (1570), 152 (139). 10. Ibid., 154 (141). 11. Ibid., 157 (144). 12. Ibid., 132 (119). 13. Ibid., 133 (120). 14. Pucci, “Reforming Roman Emperors: John Foxe’s Characterization of Constantine in the Acts and Monuments,” 40. 15. Kimberly Anne Coles, “The Death of the Author (And the Appropriation of Her Text): The Case of Anne Askew’s ‘Examinations’,” Modern Philology 99, no. 4 (2002): 515–39. 16. Ryan Netzley, “The End of Reading: The Practice and Possibility of Reading Foxe’s ‘Actes and Monuments’,” ELH 73, no. 1 (2006): 187–214; James C. W. Truman, “John Foxe and the Desires of Reformation Martyrology,” ELH 70, no. 1 (2003): 35–66; Mark Breitenberg, “The Flesh Made Word: Foxe’s ‘Acts

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17. 18.

19. 20. 21. 22. 23. 24. 25. 26. 27. 28. 29. 30. 31. 32.

33. 34.

35.

36.

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and Monuments’,” Renaissance and Reformation 13, no. 4 (1989): 381–407; Seymour Byman, “Ritualistic Acts and Compulsive Behavior: The Pattern of Tudor Martyrdom,” The American Historical Review 83, no. 3 (1978): 625–43, https://doi.org/10.2307/1861841. A&M (1570), 113 (100). See Andrew Hiscock, “‘Writers to Solemnise and Celebrate .  .  . Actes and Memory’: Foxe and the Business of Textual Memory,” The Yearbook of English Studies 38, no. 1/2 (2008): 68–85; Alice A. Dailey, “Typology and History in Foxe’s Acts and Monuments,” Prose Studies 25, no. 3 (1 December 2002): 1–29, https://doi.org/10.1080/0144035042000253791; John M. Jones, “The Making of Character: A Study of Biography in John Foxe’s Book of Martyrs” (PhD diss., University of South Carolina, 1993), 15–16. Haller, Foxe’s Book of Martyrs and the Elect Nation, 197. Angela Ranson, “John Foxe and the True, Universal Church,” Retrospectives 4 (2013): 8–21. A&M (1570), 418 (397). Ibid., 355–6 (346, 374). As researched by Elizabeth Evenden and Thomas S. Freeman, Religion and the Book in Early Modern England: The Making of John Foxe’s ‘Book of Martyrs’ (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2011), 77 fn. 47. Thomas Harding, A Detection of Sundrie Foule Errours . . . Vttered . . . by m. Jewel, in . . . A Defence of the Apologie &c. (Louvain, 1568), fo. 32r. Harding, fo. 32r. A&M (1570), 51. Ibid., 57 (36). Ibid., 50, TAMO Commentary. Wooden, John Foxe, 20–1. The references to Paul are too numerous to list here; however, the sequence on his life can be found from Cent. vol. I–II, cols. 586–608. Dan G. Danner, “The Contribution of the Geneva Bible of 1560 to the English Protestant Tradition,” The Sixteenth Century Journal 12, no. 3 (1981): 5–18, https://doi.org/10.2307/2539783. For a brief history of the Geneva Bible and the controversy over its apparatus see Maurice S. Betteridge, “The Bitter Notes: The Geneva Bible and Its Annotations,” The Sixteenth Century Journal 14, no. 1 (1983): 41–62, https://doi. org/10.2307/2540166; Hardin Craig, “The Geneva Bible as a Political Document,” Pacific Historical Review 7, no. 1 (1938): 40–9, https://doi.org/10.2307/3633847. See Henry J. Schroeder, Canons and Decrees of the Council of Trent, trans. Henry J. Schroeder (Rockford: Tan Books and Publishers, 1978). As noted by Evenden and Freeman, Religion and the Book in Early Modern England: The Making of John Foxe’s ‘Book of Martyrs’, 77, who state that the nine pages of Book 1 derive from Flacius, CTV (1562), 306–8, 32–3, 292–3, 470–1, 201–4, 68–9, 261, 270–83, 477–8. Whilst this would appear to be correct, Foxe would appear also to have compared Flacius’ text with the decretals and other sources such as Charles du Moulin, Commentarivs ad edictvm Henrici Secvndi contra paruas Datas, et abusus curiæ Romanæ, et in antiqua edicta et senatus consulta Franciæ contra Annatarum et id genus abusus . . . (Lyons, 1552). Compare A&M (1570), 31 with Emil A. Friedberg and Aemilius L. Richter, eds., Corpus iuris canonici, 2 vols (Graz, 1879), vol. 1, 606, 802–3 [Decreti Secunda Pars Causa IX. Quest. III. and Causa XVI. Quest. VII], and du Moulin, Commentarivs ad edictvm Henrici Secvndi, 12. Although Flacius, CTV (1562), 261 contains the same material, it misses some key lines which are found in De Moulin’s version. Compare A&M (1570), 38–9 with Friedberg and Richter, Corpus iuris canonici, vol. 1, 350–1 [Dist. 99 c. 1–3].

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37. References can be found in various prominent English Protestant works such as John Jewel, Apologia Ecclesiæ Anglicanæ (London, 1562); Robert Crowley, A Setting Open of the Subtyle Sophistrie of Thomas Watson Doctor of Diuinitie, Which He Vsed in Hys Two Sermons Made Before Queene Mary, in the Thirde and Fift Fridayes in Lent Anno .1553. to Prooue the Reall Presence of Christs Body and Bloud in the Sacrament, and the Masse to Be the Sacrifice of the Newe Testament (London, 1569); John Barthlet, The Pedegrewe of Heretiques (London, 1566); John Bale, ed., The First Examinacyon of Anne Ascewe, Latelye Martyred in Smythfelde, by the Romysh Popes Vpholders (Wesel, 1546). Stanislaus Hosius, Confessio fidei catholicae christiana and translations of his De expresso Dei verbo (Of the expresse worde of God) and De origine haeresium nostril temporis (A most excellent treatise of the begynnyng of heresyes in oure tyme), were also available in England, published in 1567 and 1565 respectively. See Stanislaus Hosius, A Most Excellent Treatise of the Begynnyng of Heresyes in Oure Tyme: . . . The Hatchet of Heresies, trans. Richard Shacklock (Antwerp, 1565); Stanislaus Hosius, Of the Expresse Worde of God . . . Translated into English, trans. Thomas Stapleton (Louvain, 1567). 38. A&M (1570), 27–8. 39. Ibid., 28. 40. Ibid., 23 (blank). 41. One such example is A&M (1570), 40, where Foxe argues that the claim to supremacy in ancient texts does not relate to one bishop, but to a general authority of the Church. He cites an epistle of Erasmus. This is not yet identified. 42. Stephen Reed Cattley, The Acts and Monuments of John Foxe, new and complete ed, vol. 1 (London: Seeley and Burnside, 1841), vol. 1, 11. 43. One such example can be found in Foxe, A&M (1570), 31 where Foxe used the decretals and Charles du Moulin. 44. Compare A&M (1570), 29–30 with du Moulin, Commentarivs ad edictvm Henrici Secvndi, 12 and Flacius, CTV (1556), 54–6 or (1562), 32–3. 45. Compare A&M (1570), 30–1 with du Moulin,12, 213, 209–10; Flacius, CTV (1562), 201–4 (which refers to Platina). The 1556 edition does not include this information; Platina, Lives of the Popes, trans. Anthony F. D’Elia (Cambridge, MA; London: Harvard University Press, 2008), 120–2; Friedberg and Richter, Corpus iuris canonici. 77, 239 [Decretio I Pars. Dist. LXIII]. Foxe probably also consulted Bale, Catalogus, 78 where there is a reference to Platina on this subject. 46. Compare Foxe, A&M (1570), 35 with du Moulin, Commentarivs ad edictvm Henrici Secvndi, 10–13. Foxe also used the decretals. See Cattley, The Acts and Monuments of John Foxe, vol. 1, 24. 47. Wooden, John Foxe, 17. 48. A&M (1570), 67 (54). 49. See A&M (1570), 67 TAMO Commentary and Evenden and Freeman, Religion and the Book in Early Modern England: The Making of John Foxe’s ‘Book of Martyrs’, 141. 50. Thomas S. Freeman, “‘St Peter Did Not Do Thus’: Papal History in the Acts and Monuments,” TAMO, 2004, fn. 36, www.johnfoxe.org/index.php?realm=more& gototype=&type=essay&book=essay17. 51. Compare A&M (1570), 67–8 (54-55) with Cent I.II, cols. 561–4. ‘Egesippus’ is probably Hegesippus who was mentioned in John Bale, The Image of Bothe Churches: After Reulacion of Saynt Iohan the Euangelyst (Antwerp, 1545), bk. 2, fo. 80v. This Hegesippus lived after the time of Constantine and wrote De excidio Urbis Hierosolymitanae (On the ruin of the city of Jerusalem), as noted by Cattley, The Acts and Monuments of John Foxe, vol. 1, 101.

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52. This is Abdias of Babylon, Abdiæ Babyloniæ episcopi, & apostolorum discipvli, de historia certaminis Apostolici, libri decem, ed. Wolfgang Lazius (Basel, 1552). See Cattley, The Acts and Monuments of John Foxe, vol. 1, 101. 53. For example, when describing Andreas (Cent I.II, col. 565); John (col. 567), Philip (col. 574). 54. Compare A&M (1570), 67–8 (54-55) with Eusebius, The Ecclesiastical History of Eusebius Pamphilus, Bishop of Cesarea, in Palestine, trans. Christian F. Cruse, 3rd ed. (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Book House, 1856), bk. 3, chap. 30 and Jerome, “Jerome—Lives of Illustrious Men,” in A Select Library of Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers of the Christian Church, ed. Henry Wace and Philip Schaff, vol. 3, 2nd ed. (Oxford; New York: Parker, 1892), 359–84. Reference at 361. As Cattley, The Acts and Monuments of John Foxe, vol. 1, 100 suggests, Foxe misattributes the date for Peter’s martyrdom to Jerome, which does not contain that information. Neither does Jerome mention Peter’s wife. Therefore, Foxe’s actual use of Jerome here is uncertain. 55. Compare A&M (1570), 68 (55) with Jerome, “Jerome—Lives of Illustrious Men,” 362–3. Cattley, The Acts and Monuments of John Foxe, vol. 1, 103 suggests that the epistles were copied and translated by Foxe from the original Greek edition of Jerome. 56. Compare A&M (1570), 91 (78) with Cent II, col. 213 and Platina, Lives of the Popes, fo. 17r-v (as cited by Freeman, “‘St Peter Did Not Do Thus’: Papal History in the Acts and Monuments”. Foxe used the same page of the Centuries alongside Cent II, cols. 111, 212, 141 for the dispute of Hyginus. 57. Compare A&M (1570), 72–4 (59-60) with Cent II, col. 31 and Eusebius, The Ecclesiastical History of Eusebius Pamphilus, Bishop of Cesarea, in Palestine, bk. 4, chap. 15, 143. 58. Compare A&M (1570), 75–6 (62-63) with Cent II, cols. 209–10. 59. Compare A&M (1570), 76 (63) with Cent II, cols. 209–10. 60. Compare A&M (1570), 75 (62) with Cent I.II, cols. 626–8. Both Foxe and the Centuriators cite as authorities, Eusebius, Sabellicus, Marianus Scotus, Ireaneus, Vincentius, Jacobus, and Symoneta Aloysius. 61. A&M (1570), 151 (138). The sequence on the martyrs of Julian is taken from Cent IV, cols. 1428–30, supplemented with the material on the virgins at the Heliopolis, which is Cent IV, cols. 120–1. 62. Compare A&M (1570), 82–5 (69, 70, 70, 72) with Cent II, cols. 24–31 and Eusebius, The Ecclesiastical History of Eusebius Pamphilus, Bishop of Cesarea, in Palestine, bk. 5 chap. 1. 63. For full details on the structure of the Magdeburg Centuries see Ronald E. Diener, “The Magdeburg Centuries: A Bibliothecal and Historiographical Analysis” (Th.D. diss., Harvard University, 1978). 64. Compare A&M (1570), 148–9 (135-136) with Cent IV, cols. 86–7 and Sozomen, “Sozomenus: Church History from A.D. 323–425,” in A Select Library of Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers of the Christian Church, ed. Philip Schaff and Henry Wace, trans. Chester D. Hartranet, vol. 2, 2nd ed. (Oxford, New York, 1890), 179–427, 264–6. 65. Compare A&M (1570), 148 (135) with Cent IV, col. 1427 and Sozomen, 264. 66. Compare A&M (1570), 148–9 (135-136) with Cent IV, cols. 86–7 and Sozomen, 264–5. 67. See A&M (1570), 155–6 (142-143). Foxe cites ‘Eusebius vita Constantini lib 4’. See Eusebius of Caesarea, The Life of the Blessed Emperor Constantine: In Four Books, From 306 to 337 A.D., vol. 1 (London: S. Bagster, 1845), 191. 68. Compare A&M (1570), 156 (143) with Cent IV, cols. 77–8 and Eusebius of Caesarea, 202.

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69. See Cent IV, col. 152. 70. A&M (1570), 157 (144). 71. There are other editions of Eusebius’ Ecclesiastical History published in the late fifteenth-century and sixteenth-century. These have not yet been checked but might offer a further clue. Amongst these are editions of 1548, 1559, 1562, and 1569. 72. Compare A&M (1570), 128 (115) to Cent IV, cols. 47–8. 73. A&M (1563), 237 [marginalia]. As argued in John N. King, “Religious Dissidence in Foxe’s “Book of Martyrs”: Humanism or Heresy?,” Religion & Literature 32, no. 2 (2000): 141–56. 74. Alfred Hiatt, The Making of Medieval Forgeries: False Documents in FifteenthCentury England (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2004), 16, www.loc. gov/catdir/toc/fy051/2004426759.html. 75. Pucci, “Reforming Roman Emperors: John Foxe’s Characterization of Constantine in the Acts and Monuments,” 39. 76. Compare A&M (1570), 156–7 (143-144) with Cent IV, cols. 567–75 and Eusebius of Caesarea, The Life of the Blessed Emperor Constantine: In Four Books, From 306 to 337 A.D, 226. 77. Pucci, “Reforming Roman Emperors: John Foxe’s Characterization of Constantine in the Acts and Monuments,” 39.

Works Cited Printed Abdias of Babylon. Abdiæ Babyloniæ episcopi, & apostolorum discipvli, de historia certaminis Apostolici, libri decem, edited by Wolfgang Lazius. Basel, 1552. Bale, John. The First Examinacyon of Anne Ascewe, Latelye Martyred in Smythfelde, by the Romysh Popes Vpholders. Wesel, 1546. ——— The Image of Bothe Churches: After Reulacion of Saynt Iohan the Euangelyst. Antwerp, 1545. ——— Scriptorum illustriū maioris Brytannię . . . catalogus . . . usque ad annū hunc Domini 1557 . . . IX centurias continens, etc.: (Scriptorum illustrium . . . posterior pars, quinque continens centurias ultimas). Basel, 1557. Barthlet, John. The Pedegrewe of Heretiques. London, 1566. Bartlett, I. Ross. “John Foxe as Hagiographer: The Question Revisited.” The Sixteenth Century Journal 26, no. 4 (1995): 771–89. https://doi.org/10.2307/2543785. Betteridge, Maurice S. “The Bitter Notes: The Geneva Bible and Its Annotations.” The Sixteenth Century Journal 14, no. 1 (1983): 41–62. https://doi.org/10.2307/2540166. Breitenberg, Mark. “The Flesh Made Word: Foxe’s ‘Acts and Monuments’.” Renaissance and Reformation 13, no. 4 (1989): 381–407. Byman, Seymour. “Ritualistic Acts and Compulsive Behavior: The Pattern of Tudor Martyrdom.” The American Historical Review 83, no. 3 (1978): 625–43. https:// doi.org/10.2307/1861841. Cattley, Stephen Reed. The Acts and Monuments of John Foxe. New and complete ed. Vol. 1. London: Seeley and Burnside, 1841. Coles, Kimberly Anne. “The Death of the Author (And the Appropriation of Her Text): The Case of Anne Askew’s ‘Examinations’.” Modern Philology 99, no. 4 (2002): 515–39. Craig, Hardin. “The Geneva Bible as a Political Document.” Pacific Historical Review 7, no. 1 (1938): 40–9. https://doi.org/10.2307/3633847.

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Crowley, Robert. A Setting Open of the Subtyle Sophistrie of Thomas Watson Doctor of Diuinitie, Which He Vsed in Hys Two Sermons Made Before Queene Mary, in the Thirde and Fift Fridayes in Lent Anno. 1553. to Prooue the Reall Presence of Christs Body and Bloud in the Sacrament, and the Masse to Be the Sacrifice of the Newe Testament. London, 1569. Dailey, Alice A. “Typology and History in Foxe’s Acts and Monuments.” Prose Studies 25, no. 3 (1 December 2002): 1–29. https://doi.org/10.1080/0144035042000 253791. Danner, Dan G. “The Contribution of the Geneva Bible of 1560 to the English Protestant Tradition.” The Sixteenth Century Journal 12, no. 3 (1981): 5–18. https:// doi.org/10.2307/2539783. Diener, Ronald E. “The Magdeburg Centuries: A Bibliothecal and Historiographical Analysis.” ThD diss., Harvard University, 1978. du Moulin, Charles. Commentarivs ad edictvm Henrici Secvndi contra paruas Datas, et abusus curiæ Romanæ, et in antiqua edicta et senatus consulta Franciæ contra Annatarum et id genus abusus . . . Lyons, 1552. Eusebius. The Ecclesiastical History of Eusebius Pamphilus, Bishop of Cesarea, in Palestine, translated by Christian F. Cruse. 3rd ed. Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Book House, 1856. Eusebius of Caesarea. The Life of the Blessed Emperor Constantine: In Four Books, From 306 to 337 A.D. Vol. 1. London: S. Bagster, 1845. Evenden, Elizabeth, and Thomas S. Freeman. Religion and the Book in Early Modern England: The Making of John Foxe’s ‘Book of Martyrs’. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2011. Flacius Illyricus, Matthias. Catalogus Testium Veritatis, Qui Ante Nostram Aetatem Pontifice Romano Ejusque Erroribus Reclamarnt, Jam Denuo . . . Emendatiori et Auctior Editus. Strasbourg, 1562. https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=PWVeAAAAcAAJ. ——— Catalogus Testium Veritatis, Qui Ante Nostram Aetatem Reclamarunt Papae: Opus Varia Rerum, Hoc Praesertim Tempore Scitu Dignißimarum, Cognitione Refertum, [. . .]. Basel, 1556. www2.uni-mannheim.de/mateo/camenahist/autoren/ flacius_hist.html. Flacius Illyricus, Matthias, Johann Wigand, and Mattheus Judix. Ecclesiastica historia, integram ecclesiae Christi ideam quantum ad locum, propagationem, persecutionem, tranquillit., doctrin., haereses, ceremonias, gubunationem, schismata, synodos, personas, miracula, martyria, religiones extra ecclesiam: singulari diligentia et fide ex vetustissimis et optimis historicis, patribus et aliis scriptoribus congesta per aliquot studiosos et pios viros in urbe Magdeburgica. 14 Vols. Basel, 1559. Foxe, John. “Acts and Monuments.” TAMO, 1563. www.johnfoxe.org/. ——— “Acts and Monuments.” TAMO, 1570. www.johnfoxe.org. Freeman, Thomas S. “Foxe, John (1516/17–1587), Martyrologist.” ODNB (2004). https://doi.org/10.1093/ref:odnb/10050. ——— “‘St Peter Did Not Do Thus’: Papal History in the Acts and Monuments.” TAMO, 2004. www.johnfoxe.org/index.php?realm=more&gototype=&type=essay& book=essay17. ——— “Texts, Lies, and Microfilm: Reading and Misreading Foxe’s ‘Book of Martyrs’.” The Sixteenth Century Journal 30, no. 1 (1999): 23–46. https://doi.org/ 10.2307/2544897. Friedberg, Emil A., and Aemilius L. Richter, eds. Corpus iuris canonici. 2 Vols. Graz, 1879.

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Graham, Timothy, and Andrew G. Watson. The Recovery of the Past in Early Elizabethan England: Documents by John Bale and John Joscelyn From the Circle of Matthew Parker. Cambridge: Cambridge Bibliographical Society, 1998. Haller, William. Foxe’s Book of Martyrs and the Elect Nation. London: Jonathan Cape, 1963. Harding, Thomas. A Detection of Sundrie Foule Errours . . . Vttered . . . by m. Jewel, in . . . A Defence of the Apologie &c. Louvain, 1568. Hiatt, Alfred. The Making of Medieval Forgeries: False Documents in FifteenthCentury England. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2004. Hiscock, Andrew. “‘Writers to Solemnise and Celebrate .  .  . Actes and Memory’: Foxe and the Business of Textual Memory.” The Yearbook of English Studies 38, no. 1/2 (2008): 68–85. Hosius, Stanislaus. A Most Excellent Treatise of the Begynnyng of Heresyes in Oure Tyme . . . Translated Out of Laten in to Englyshe by R. Shacklock . . . and Intituled by Hym: The Hatchet of Heresies, translated by Richard Shacklock. Antwerp, 1565. ——— Of the Expresse Worde of God . . . Translated Into English, translated by Thomas Stapleton. Louvain, 1567. Jerome. “Jerome—Lives of Illustrious Men.” In A Select Library of Nicene and PostNicene Fathers of the Christian Church, edited by Henry Wace and Philip Schaff. Vol. 3, 359–84. 2nd ed. Oxford and New York: Parker, 1892. Jewel, John. Apologia Ecclesiæ Anglicanæ. London, 1562. Jones, John M. “The Making of Character: A Study of Biography in John Foxe’s Book of Martyrs.” PhD diss., University of South Carolina, 1993. Jones, Norman L. “Matthew Parker, John Bale, and the Magdeburg Centuriators.” The Sixteenth Century Journal 12, no. 3 (1981): 35–49. https://doi.org/10.2307/2539785. King, John N. “Religious Dissidence in Foxe’s ‘Book of Martyrs’: Humanism or Heresy?” Religion & Literature 32, no. 2 (2000): 141–56. Netzley, Ryan. “The End of Reading: The Practice and Possibility of Reading Foxe’s ‘Actes and Monuments’.” ELH 73, no. 1 (2006): 187–214. Platina. Lives of the Popes, translated by Anthony F. D’Elia. Cambridge, MA and London: Harvard University Press, 2008. Pucci, Michael S. “Reforming Roman Emperors: John Foxe’s Characterization of Constantine in the Acts and Monuments.” In John Foxe: An Historical Perspective, edited by David M. Loades, 29–51. Aldershot: Ashgate, 1999. Ranson, Angela. “John Foxe and the True, Universal Church.” Retrospectives 4 (2013): 8–21. Robinson, Benedict Scott. “‘Darke Speech’: Matthew Parker and the Reforming of History.” The Sixteenth Century Journal 29, no. 4 (1998): 1061–83. https://doi. org/10.2307/2543358. Schroeder, Henry J. Canons and Decrees of the Council of Trent, translated by Henry J. Schroeder. Rockford: Tan Books and Publishers, 1978. Sozomen. “Sozomenus: Church History From A.D. 323–425.” In A Select Library of Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers of the Christian Church, edited by Philip Schaff and Henry Wace, translated by Chester D. Hartranet. Vol. 2, 179–427. 2nd ed. Oxford and New York: The Christian Literature Co., 1890. Truman, James C. W. “John Foxe and the Desires of Reformation Martyrology.” ELH 70, no. 1 (2003): 35–66. Wooden, Warren W. John Foxe. Boston: Twayne, 1983.

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From King Lucius to Harold Godwinson

When John Foxe compiled Book 1 of the 1563 edition of the Acts and Monuments, the Anglo-Saxons could not have been further from his mind. There is virtually no trace of their history in that book, and neither is there any reason there ought to have been. Knowledge on the subject had largely stagnated. As Richard T. Vann once argued, the Anglo-Saxons in the sixteenth-century histories of Grafton and Holinshed differ little from the references in the fifteenth-century histories of Fabyan and Higden.1 However, this was beginning to change. Around the early 1560s, a new form of Anglo-Saxon study was emerging that placed original documentation and an alternative study of medieval chronicle traditions at its heart. The starting point was a decision by the chief secretary of state Sir William Cecil to employ Laurence Nowell (1515–1571) as a translator of Old English texts.2 Such employment furnished Nowell with the much-needed opportunity of uncovering old manuscripts, including the only extant manuscript of Beowulf, and to provide a handbook for other scholars in the form of an Old English dictionary. He also created a successor in William Lambarde (1536–1601), a lawyer seeking a new understanding of English law through an examination of ancient law codes.3 Lambarde drew on the foundational work of Nowell gaining also the patronage of Matthew Parker, Archbishop of Canterbury. The result was the Archaionomia, which was published in 1568, and much later a manuscript text, the Archeion, completed around 1591. The impetus to use the Anglo-Saxons for a religious cause, came, however, after the Roman Catholic polemicist Thomas Stapleton published Bede’s ecclesiastical history in 1565 as a means of undermining Protestant claims of historicity.4 Allen Frantzen regards this as nothing less than a political act intended to authenticate the Augustinian conversion for the Roman Church.5 It was also a direct rebuttal to John Bale’s ‘poisoned sence and meaning’, as Stapleton put it, in using Bede to attack Pope Gregory. Bale had extracted the story of Gregory commenting on the angelic features of British slaves that he encountered at the market in Rome. Bede had claimed the story as the moment that the heathen English was brought to Rome’s attention and the instigating reason for Augustine’s missionary journey. In his The Actes or Unchast Examples

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of the Englysh Votaryes, Bale subverted the meaning, sexualising Gregory’s observance of the slaves. By doing so, he sought to demonstrate the impurity and temptation caused by clerical celibacy.6 The publication of Bede, therefore, opened a new front in the war for history. Parker, at least, was well placed to organise the counter-offensive, having already instructed his household to seek out and bring together old manuscripts, including those dated before the Norman Conquest. These were now put to polemical use. Over the next decade, Parker published several texts that included Anglo-Saxon material, such as A Testimonie of Antiquitie (1566), The Gospels of the Fower Evangelistes (1571), and Ælfredi Regis res Gestæ (Asser’s Life of Alfred) (1574). These separate but interconnected acts are a starting point. Just over 50 years later, William Camden would list Nowell as the ‘first in our time’ to make a study of the Anglo-Saxons, with William Lambarde and Parker’s Latin secretary, John Joscelyn labelled as the first to print it.7 History, therefore, remembers Nowell, Lambarde, and Parker via Joscelyn as the men who initiated a new document-based study in Anglo-Saxon history. The alliance between John Foxe and Archbishop Parker meant that the expanded second edition of the Acts and Monuments would also engage with this work of reappraisal. The Anglo-Saxon history can be found in the second and third books, an additional assessment of law codes in the sixth book and evidence from Ælfric’s homily in the eighth book. Taken together, these individual sequences offer a contested view of the Anglo-Saxons. In Books 2 and 3, Foxe predominantly claims a pre-Roman conversion for the British and attempts to marginalise the importance of the Augustinian missionary, arguing that it only resulted in a conversion of the foreign Saxon overlords and not the native subjects. In this telling, the native British retain their apostate faith (bringing forth challenges to Augustine and debating the date of Easter), whilst their Anglo-Saxon overlords cleave to Rome. It is not as simple as this though. Foxe also accepts the missionary activities of Augustine at the same time, claiming it as a foreign source of Christianity, but one that would reduce the strength of the apostolic church over time. Foxe attempts to defend this position by claiming that the Roman Church of this era was at least purer in faith than it would later become. Nevertheless, continual infighting, Viking raids, and Norman defeat are signs that God is displeased. William defeats Harold because the Anglo-Saxons have failed to defend the true faith. It is obvious, though, that neither Foxe nor Parker’s circle of researchers were entirely satisfied with such a reading. Whilst the core of the narrative is built upon a variety of standard and lesser-known chronicles, partly in Foxe’s ownership, and partly borrowed from Parker, it is also increasingly peppered with extracts and documents that most certainly derive from Parker’s gathering of manuscripts and which were intended to reclaim some semblance of true faith for the Anglo-Saxons. Benedict Scott Robinson calls this incremental acceptance of the AngloSaxons as a process of purification.8 Parker’s evidence revealed some aspects

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of doctrine and practice that fitted a Protestant model. Perhaps the AngloSaxons were not entirely without the true faith after all. Whilst there are elements of Parker’s evidence in Books 2 and 3, it is in Book 8 where Foxe copies material from Parker’s A Testimonie of Antiquitie amongst other sources intended to prove firstly that the Mass was once understood only as a symbolic transformation (exactly as Protestants now taught) and, secondly, that someone had attempted to conceal the evidence. The claim was based on variant copies of Ælfric’s Easter homily, of which, John Joscelyn had compared an Old English copy with a Latin one. Joscelyn had found a reference scribbled out in the Latin copy that appeared to disprove a belief in transubstantiation.9 Parker, and now Foxe, saw in this an act of conspiracy. They believed that someone had purposefully defaced the text to conceal the truth. Robinson and others before him have too often focused on Ælfric’s homily as if it somehow explains Foxe’s engagement with this period.10 By doing so, they ignore the main history of the Anglo-Saxons that occupies Books 2 and 3, and focus instead on those portions most influenced by Parker. A wider study, which incorporates the earlier books shows that Foxe was not just a receptacle for the research of others when it came to the Anglo-Saxons, but rather a full partner in the enterprise of reassessment. Foxe reappraised evidence in the medieval chronicles and then weaved it together with the new document-based research. In doing so, he provides a unique assessment of the era and offers some genuine contributions to the new Anglo-Saxon research, adding clarity and precision to the work begun by Nowell, Lambarde, and Joscelyn. The result is a partisan account which categorises each moment as a win or loss for Protestant religion but also one that addresses a variety of antiquarian concerns. So what did this history look like? Foxe began by describing evidence for a Romano-British conversion to Christianity and identified Lucius as a Christianised king who sought confirmation only from Rome. This sequence is relatively short and is quickly followed by a description of the Anglo-Saxon invasion through the tale of Hengist and Horsa. Foxe takes this opportunity to describe the new political situation, stressing that the kingdom was divided into seven parts, explaining what areas those parts contained, and describing the difference between Saxons, Jutes, and Angles. Foxe also provides detailed genealogies and a reminder that the Britons continued to exist in one portion of the country. Nearly as long a sequence, as shown in Figure 5.1, is the story of Pope Gregory and the Augustinian missionary to England. Papal history follows this sequence and then a sequence dedicated to the controversy concerning the date of Easter. Foxe makes it clear that the original custom for Easter came not ‘of Rome, nor of the Saxons: but followed t[he] Britaines, and the Scotyshe bishops’, thus confirming the continuance of an apostolic church and the maintaining foreignness of both Rome and the Anglo-Saxon rule.11 The shorter story of priest’s tonsure that is next told is a direct attack on monastic life, whilst the epitaph to Bede

422

542

2540

2609

5281

4982

4716

7578

7696

Figure 5.1 Length of narrative sequences in the Acts and Monuments, 1570, Book 2 (counted by the number of words)

List of archbishops of Canterbury

The end of the Saxon heptarchy

The Kingdom of Northumbria

Bede

Priests tonsure

Dispute over Easter

Papal history

Gregory the Great

The Anglo-Saxon heptarchy

Ancient Britain

8477

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119

provides a short rebuff to Stapleton and an attempt to reclaim the venerable monk. The rest of Book 2 focuses on individual kings of Northumbria, Wessex, and Mercia, including the fall of Northumbria and the eventual aligning of the kingdoms under one rule. Book 2 closes with King Egbert, and Book 3 opens with him telling the story of a unified England, but also one constantly plagued by an attack from within and without. In terms of structure, it is like Book 2, starting with a table of genealogy, narrating the rule of various kings (including discussions on religion, battles, politics, and morals), sequences on papal history operating as a parallel-narrative, and ending with a list of archbishops. Of these sequences, as shown in Figure 5.2, Foxe spends most of his time on Æthelwulf and Pope Nicholas I, Alfred the Great, and Edgar. In this, Figure 5.2 is somewhat misleading. Æthelwulf’s reign is told in two sequences totalling 3,238 words (less than half the total) with a lengthy sequence in papal history sandwiched in between (accounting for the remaining 4,218 words). The sequence on Alfred the Great is split between his victories over Viking raiders and praise for his support of learning. The sequence on King Edgar is almost entirely focused on the growth of monasticism and Edgar’s support of monastic privilege. Each offers something different to the overarching narrative and support the telling of Anglo-Saxon history as foreign imposition and degeneration in religion.

Genealogy and Lineage One of the most interesting and original pieces in the Anglo-Saxon history is, however, the genealogical tables. The first of these appear as Foxe ends his description of the Christian Briton king Lucius and entrenches an idea of failure in the Romano-British monarchy. The tables contain not only the name of each king but also his heritage as either British, Roman, or ‘Gewissian’ (southern English). The purpose is one of reproach, as Foxe states, By this table maye appeare a lamentable face of a common wealth so miserably rent and diuided into two sortes of people: differing not so much in countrye, as in religion. For when the Romanes raygned: so were they gouerned by infidels. Whe[n] the Britaines ruled, sothey were gouerned by Christians. Thus what quietnesse was or coulde be in the church, in so vnquiet and doubtful daies.12 History has its cycles. This is one of them. Foxe explains invasion and conquest in two ways throughout the Acts and Monuments. The first is in terms of the conqueror as foreign. Implicit in that accusation is an understanding of difference and otherness which leads to novelty. Novelty was seen to upset the true and right order of things, especially in terms of corruption and disorder in the Church. The second is punishment. Foxe ascribes the defeat of Romano-British rule as a failure of state and faith. King Lucius

834

534

420

378

1498

1270

1413

1579

1687

2125

3826

3553

3664

3370

3296

3178

3761

6761

7456

Figure 5.2 Length of narrative sequences in the Acts and Monuments, 1570, Book 3 (counted by the number of words)

List of the archbishops of Canterbury

Oration of King Edgar

Pope Sylvester and the lure of Satan

Harold

Edward the Confessor

Edmund Ironside and Cnut

Aelred

Papal history

Edward the Martyr

Edgar

Edwin

Edmund

Athelstan

Edward the Elder

Papal history

Alfred the Great

Aethelbald

Aethelwulf and Pope Nicholas I

Egbert

Genealogy of kings

8363

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died without an heir and therefore ‘such trouble and varia[n]ce fell among the Britaynes’ as, indeed, ‘it happeneth in all other realms, namely in this our realme of England whensoeuer succession lacketh’.13 Foxe, of course, refers to Elizabeth and the danger he foresaw in her refusal to marry. He feared the cycle might repeat as history itself seemed to tell him that it might. At the start of Book 4, Foxe would again explain the defeat of Harold as a failure of religion and a failure of succession. The result was the Norman occupation. In Book 9, Foxe repeated the polemic of English Protestant exiles (of whom he was one) in admitting failure of Edwardian religious reform: The condition of this realme and the customable behauiour of English people (whose propertie is co[m]monly to abuse the lyght of the Gospell when it is offered) deserued no such benefyte of so blessed a reformation, but rather a contrary plague of deformation.14 The terminology of ‘plague’ recurs often in this history of religious and secular failure. It is there in the defeat of the Romano-British—‘thys great plague could not come to the Britaynes wythout gods permission’—it is also present when William defeats the Anglo-Saxons—‘now the fift time that the said land with the inhabitance therof hath been scourged by the hande of God’.15 Punishment and retribution are therefore a direct result of insufficient rulership. It is a lesson from history, a natural cycle negotiated between monarch and God. It is history as judgement. Right rule or wrong rule. The testament of Scriptural prophecy enacted through time. This is the sense of the past that Foxe understood, not linear or progressive, but cylindrical and repetitive. The genealogical tables listing Anglo-Saxon monarchs convey a similar meaning and purpose. Foxe lists roughly 109 kings in total spread across seven lists, depicting seven corresponding kingdoms. This is the heptarchy as first described by Henry of Huntingdon in the twelfth century.16 It is a term that Foxe shared with William Lambarde, who was the first to use the division in the sixteenth century in his Archaionomia. Of these kings, as shown in Table 5.1, 33 are listed as slain, 7 deposed, and 10 abdicated to become monks (two of whom were also slain). Although Foxe does not offer such a calculation himself, this accounts for nearly half of the monarchs in the tables. The genealogical tables in Book 2, therefore, demonstrate the same failure of leadership and disruption as the preceding Romano-British. The tables were also necessary for other reasons. Although royal genealogies had been available for decades via the Breviat chronicle, the order, names, and understanding of a divided kingdom were a mess of confusion. A total of nine editions were published between 1551 and 1561.17 John Stow improved somewhat on these in his A Summary of English Chronicles in 1565 and 1570, but it was William Lambarde’s Archaionomia which offered improvement. Not only did Lambarde engage with the division of

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Table 5.1 The number of kings slain, deposed, or abdicated in the Acts and Monuments, 1570, Book 2, 162–165

Kent West Saxons Northumbria Mercia East Saxons East Angles

Slain

Deposed

Monk

Total

3 2 10 8 4 8

1 1 3 2 0 0

0 2 2 2 2 2 [also slain]

18 18 26 20 12 15

heptarchy for the first time but also he began to place each king into the right order. Foxe followed much of this, borrowing from these sources and a variety of fragmented pieces of evidence from his own corpus of manuscripts and printed texts. This work made his rendering unique amongst sixteenth-century attempts to understand the Anglo-Saxon genealogies, and it is the most accurate rendition, agreeing largely with a modern understanding of the period. For example, John Stow had missed several of the early kings that Lambarde and Foxe found. These include the kings of Wessex: Stow had cited Cerdic at the first king and then Ceolwulf as his son. Foxe also puts Cerdic first but claims his successor as Kenricus (Cynric), followed by Chelingus (Ceawlin) and a second Celricus (Ceola) who was the father of Ceolulfus (Ceolwulf). With regards to Kent, Stow had begun with Hengist (as did Foxe) but did not then mention Eosa, Ocha, or Eormenric, all of which are listed in the Acts and Monuments. Foxe also adds details, such as the length of Æthelbert’s reign and the claim that he was the first Anglo-Saxon to receive the Christian faith. When adding a table to Book 3 containing the genealogy of kings from Edgar to William the Conqueror, Foxe inserts familial information, such as children, in the second column, making it even clearer who was who and how everyone fitted together.18 The tables were one-part evidence for the failures of the era and anotherpart academic scholarship, designed to improve and enhance knowledge of the right ordering of Anglo-Saxon history and to provide a basis upon which Foxe could base each sequence of description across the two books dedicated to their history. The genealogical tables, therefore, exemplify the role Foxe provided for himself within the context of the emerging AngloSaxon scholarship of Nowell and Lambarde.

Characterisation To write his own narrative of the Anglo-Saxons, Foxe played to his strengths. It was not enough to show the external threats of Viking raids, or describe the degradation of Roman religion, in general terms. As William Haller has suggested, the narrative was one of recurring struggle, but one envisaged through the individual’s potential for success or failure.19 Foxe wrote,

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Ther were many noughty & wicked kings . . . so some there were agayne (although but few) very sincere and good. But none almost from the first to the last, which was not either slayne in warre, or murdered in peace, or els constrained to make himselfe a Moonke. Such was the rage the[n] and tyranny of that tyme.20 The quotation echoes the emphasis on monarchical failure and infighting contained in the genealogical tables. It also tells us how Foxe will approach his description. He will test everyone according to their defence of the true church and their moral character. The most important of these is Augustine. Cattley believed that Foxe was afraid of Augustine.21 There may be some truth in this. The story was certainly difficult. Protestant scholars were at their weakest when demonstrating the first seed of faith in England. The missionary of AD 597 was instigated by Gregory the Great, carried out by Augustine, and received first by the Kent king Æthelbert. Its key source was Bede, which, of course, supported the Augustinian narrative and had already been promoted as such by Thomas Stapleton. The favoured choice for Protestants of a Romano-British conversion and its survival in parallel to the Roman tradition could still be made, but its source base was weak and fragmentary. Some 50 years earlier, Polydore Vergil had exposed the weak artery of early British history by rejecting Geoffrey of Monmouth as a reliable source.22 Foxe nonetheless tried. The opening pages of Book 2 began not with the Anglo-Saxons but with a list of possible claims regarding the first founding of Christianity in ancient Britain. Foxe begins in this way not to make any conclusive claims that British Christianity had been founded by any one group or person. Foxe was aware that the evidence was not strong enough to do this. Instead, Foxe uses a variety of authorities to show, through a list of claims that it is unlikely that Christianity first came to Britain through a Roman Catholic route.23 His best proof was in the story of King Lucius. This was a story that Foxe needed to reclaim on Protestant terms. Polydore Vergil had already declared Lucius a convert to the Roman Church, reading in Bede his initial conversion to Christianity via the Roman bishop, Eleutherius.24 Reginald Pole had further alluded to the same story as proof of England’s natural allegiance with Rome.25 As Foxe had already conceded that his evidence for a nonRoman conversion was circumstantial, he would be expected to show that Lucius had only requested an alliance with Rome and was already Christianised by one of the routes Foxe had already highlighted. This was quite possible. Felicity Heal has argued that the story of Lucius had the ability ‘to represent and reproduce discourses of difference’ and could, therefore, be interpreted easily by both sides.26 Foxe, however, does not do this. He seems uncertain of the evidence. ‘You haue hard’, Foxe announces, that ‘the Christian faith eyther first brought in, or els confirmed in thys realme of Britaine, by the sendyng of Elutherius’.27 Foxe leaves the two possibilities open, arguing for independence, but not treating such an interpretation as

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a certain fact. Heal argues that Foxe doubted the authenticity of Lucius but had no choice but to embrace his story anyway.28 His other proof for a non-Roman faith was even more dubious, resting as it were in the words of the discredited Geoffrey of Monmouth. Foxe is similarly uncertain of the evidence for Arthur and Uther Pendragon, which he also includes as evidence of a continued Romano-British presence. Foxe inserts the general story but claims many of the acts attributed to them as ‘more fabulous, then that any credit shoulde be geuen unto them, more worthye to be joined with the Iliades of Homere, then to have place in any ecclesiastical history’.29 Such words summed up Foxe’s worries about all the evidence regarding a pre-Augustinian conversion. Foxe believed that a lack of secure evidence required that he leave the door open to initial Roman conversion. Ending his sequence on King Lucius, Foxe concluded, ‘If so be that the Christian fayth and religion was first deriued from Rome to this our nacion by Eleutherius, then let them but graunt to vs the same fayth and religion, which then was taught at Rome’.30 Foxe admits the possibility of original Roman conversion, but argues that the Church then was purer than the Church now. The statement mirrors one that he makes in the sequence on Augustine, particularly on how he considers Gregory the Great: ‘Of all the first Bishops before him in the primitiue tyme, he was the basest: of all them that came after hym, he was the best’.31 Foxe declares Gregory to be a pivot upon which the purity and corruption of the papacy swung. This characterisation within the Acts and Monuments supports the claim of a purer faith, rejecting the ‘poisoned sence’ that Bale had previously spun, which had so outraged Thomas Stapleton. In the Acts and Monuments, Gregory the Great still learned about the heathen English at the marketplace in Rome but ‘being moued and desirous to go and helpe the conuertion of that country, was not permitted of Pelagius and the Romaines for that tyme to accomplish his desire’.32 At the time, Gregory was not yet pope, and unlike Bale’s sexualised tale, Foxe accepts the to-be Bishop of Rome as being moved by genuine concerns of faith. Later in this sequence, Foxe prints several letters that Gregory sent to Augustine once the mission to England had occurred. In two instances, Foxe draws us to a reference in the letter where Gregory accepts his subservience to the emperor. Both times, Gregory ends a letter by signing off with ‘in the reigne of our soueraigne Lord Mauritius most virtuous Emperour’, to which Foxe exclaims in the margin, ‘The Bishop of Rome calleth the Emperour hys Lord’.33 Foxe also took notice of a letter in which Gregory resisted ‘the ambitious pryde’ of John, Patriarch of Constantinople, who wished to become the ‘universal priest’.34 Gregory argued that such a claim would signal the forerun of the Antichrist. The characterisation of Augustine is different. When Gregory instructs Augustine to lead 40 missionaries to Britain, he is described as both reluctant and afraid. Augustine writes to the pope with ‘a sodaine feare’ in his heart, forcing the pope to convince through ‘pithye perswasions’.35 The scene next

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moves to Kent, where Augustine meets King Æthelbert on the Isle of Thanet. After a time, the king converts. Augustine is made archbishop. Now he sends ten questions for Gregory to answer. These ‘interrogations’ or Responsa refer mainly to relations between men and women, clergy and laity. Foxe prints them with the occasional marginal gloss that notes the relative merits of Gregory’s answers according to Protestant opinion. Indeed, Foxe only offers positive comments such as ‘note a worthy saying of Gregory’ or ‘by this rule the marriage of K. Henry with Q. Katherine dowager, was vnlawful’.36 About ceremonies and services, Foxe applauds Gregory as ‘worthy’ for suggesting that a certain local uniqueness should be allowed. About priests’ marriage, Gregory answers that ‘any Clarkes out of holye orders, whych cannot contayne, let them haue their wiues’ to which Foxe notes such custom to be repugnant to the Roman Church of his own day.37 In another letter sent by Gregory to Augustine, the bishop advises his subordinate ‘not to be proude nor pufte vp, for the myracles wrought of God by hym, in conuerting the people of England’.38 Augustine ignores this advice. Foxe narrates that during the dispute over the dating of Easter, a ‘wise man’ suggests to the Bishops of Britain that they should do as Augustine asks if he proves to be a true man of the Church. How would they know it if he is? They ask. The wise man says that a man of the Church would be meek and humble, and would, therefore, ‘rise vp, and courteously receaue you’. At the synod, Augustine does not stand up and, ignoring Gregory’s advice threatens the bishops. He fails the test. Augustine also fails to follow the advice about allowing an element of local custom to take precedence. He threatens war and death if the British bishops did not accept his authority. The threat becomes fact. Hundreds of monks at Bangor, not usually Foxe’s favourites but here described as living ‘with the sweate of their browes, and labour of their own handes’, are slaughtered. Foxe offers his opinion: The autors that write of this lame[n]table murder, declare and say, how the forespeaking of Austen, was here verified vpon the Britaines: which because they would not ioyne peace with their friends, he sayd should be destroyed of their enemies. Of both these parties, the reader may iudge what he pleaseth: I cannot see but both together were to bee blamed. And as I cannot but accuse the one, so I cannot defende the other.39 Augustine is at fault as he showed ‘so litle humilitie’. The British bishops are also at fault for allowing a ‘temporal iniurie’ to stop them from converting the ‘idolatrous Saxons to the way of life and saluation’. Thus, by association, they all failed the monks of Bangor. Foxe is being careful here. Bale in his The Actes or Unchast Examples of the Englysh Votaryes and Parker in his De Antiquitate Britannicae had argued that the slaughter of monks paralleled the massacre of Protestants under Queen Mary.40 The claim sought to damage Augustine’s reputation.

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For Foxe though, it was problematic. A claim of ‘martyrdom’ would have destabilised his prophetic framework and historical chronology by locating the act of persecution outside of those periods in which Satan was loose. This is just one area where Foxe acts independently. He rejects the preexisting Protestant argument for one of his own. The individual is, therefore, the key to understanding how Foxe treated the pivotal moment of Christian conversion. Lucius, Gregory, and Augustine are ‘tent-pole’ characters in the same vein as Constantine. The crucial moment of history told through the actions of these individuals. The character of each tested and revealed in relation to their spiritual and temporal orthodoxy. Foxe might not have been able to prove beyond a doubt that Christianity first came to England through a non-Roman route. His evidence was too weak. He could argue instead that there is some evidence for an apostate conversion but also evidence that the faith received from Rome either in Lucius’ time or in Augustine’s time was purer. Corruption had not yet sufficiently polluted the word of Christ for the Roman Church to be considered antichristian. Foxe achieved this argument not through historical evidence alone, but through characterisation. Facts guided the narrative, but Foxe’s own interpretation of individual acts, writings, and actions enabled him to weave an alternative account without opening himself up to accusations of falsehood. The subsequent sequences on each Anglo-Saxon reign similarly present historical fact alongside the interpretation of individual actions and character. Whilst Foxe considered most Anglo-Saxon kings to have failed in their duty, some he highlighted as a better sort. Near the beginning of Book 2, Foxe provides a list of these kings.41 Æthelbert of Kent was rewarded for first receiving the Christian faith, as are Edwin of Northumbria, Sigebert of East Anglia, and Sebert of Essex. Other rare kings who progressed a form of Christian faith better suited to the Protestant position, Foxe declared as Oswald of Northumbria, Æthelbert of East Anglia, Kenelmus of Mercia, and Edmund the martyr, King of East Anglia. The narrative sequence on Edwin of Northumbria is particularly interesting. Foxe explains that early in life, Edwin desired to marry a Christian woman. As a direct result, the then-king of Northumbria desires him dead. Edwin is forewarned and escapes into exile but is far from safe.42 Although Rædwald, king of East Anglia had offered him sanctuary, plans were made for betrayal. Foxe tells us that ‘as Gods wyl was’, Edwin, again, was warned and again fled. He survives to win his kingdom and defeat his enemies in battle, becoming a Christian king. The forewarning that enabled his escape, Foxe claims, is down to God’s approval. Once king, though, Edwin tests that approval. He is unsure of his conversion. Perhaps in allusion to Constantine the Great’s invocation of Christian belief before heading to battle, Edwin does the same. He avoids another assassination attempt and defeats his enemies every time he invokes Christianity. Once king, he receives ‘great peace’ to the extent that ‘a woma[n] laden with golde might haue gone from

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the one syde of the sea to the other, and no man molest her’.43 This is Foxe in his hagiographical mode. The story fits, however, as it exemplifies the choice that each monarch must make. Success and peace results from the defence of the true Church, suffering results from failure to defend. Whilst not contained in his list of ‘good’ kings, Alfred the Great is the best example of one who exhibited all the right characteristics of kingship and thus, proved successful.44 Foxe announces that there were ‘great and singular qualities in this king worthy of high renowne and commendation’ and that there was no other ruler of the era that could be preferred.45 Alfred undertook ‘valiaunt actes’ in warfare for the preservation of his people; he protected peace and encouraged learning; he set forth ‘prudent laws’, and he practised ‘knowledge of good letters’. Like Edwin, Alfred owed his good rule to God’s providence. Foxe narrates how in youth Alfred was drawn to dalliances with young women but recognising this fault in himself asked God to send him a sickness of the flesh which would remove the urge or ability. This, God provided.46 There is, however, weakness in the argument that Foxe makes about good kingship in this period. Returning to Edwin, after a long period of peace, he nonetheless dies in battle against Cadwallon, king of the remaining Britons and Penda, King of Mercia. The same happens for Oswald of Northumbria, who is slain by Penda. The Anglo-Saxon narrative is still largely focused on infighting and failure, and most rulers fail to gain God’s pleasure. Take Edgar (943–975) and Archbishop Dunstan (909–988) as an example. Earlier scholars had viewed Dunstan leniently. He had rejected papal rules on the dispensation of marriage, which were useful for Henrician arguments on divorce.47 This acceptance changed, however, when it was realised that Dunstan with Oswald (Bishop of York) and Æthelwold (Bishop of Winchester) had masterminded the introduction of clerical celibacy in England. In Foxe’s own words, they ‘replenished diuerse monasteries, and cathedral churches with monkes’ and ‘discharged maryed priestes & Chanons out of their houses, to plant in monkes in their celles’.48 Dunstan, Foxe states, ‘was the chiefest ringleader of thys rase’. Through his ‘motion’, Edgar ‘displaced the priestes, and set in Monkes’. The result is a ‘swarme’ of monks in England’s churches. An insurgency that left bishops ‘neglected’ and ‘driven to shame’ with no choice but ‘to relinquishe the house (such as would not enter the monkishe profession) or ells to become monkes: such as had nothing els to staye upon’.49 Edgar is driven to ‘superstition’ because of these councillors. At first, Foxe is clear that Edgar is otherwise a virtuous and princely king. He is an excellent judge of justice, modest and devout to God, and a seeker of peace. He was ‘studious’ in secular matters and ‘a great mayntenyer he was of religion, & learnyng’.50 Then, a page later, Foxe lists his vices amongst which are cruelty, murder, and lust. Edgar, for example, was especially known for deflowering maidens. Foxe adds another vice for good measure; that of blind superstition and support of ‘idolatrous Monkery’. What is the purpose of this? At the end

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of Book 3, Foxe adds an epitaph to Edgar which he admits is ‘out of order’. This was probably found by Parker’s household and passed to Foxe at the last minute.51 The oration has three purposes. First, to show ‘the religious zeale and deuotion of kynges’ to the Church. Second, to show ‘the dissolute behauiour and wantonnes of the clergie’. Three, to show ‘the blynd ignoraunce and superstitio[n] of that tyme’. Foxe calls these three judgements evidence of ‘how ignorant that time was of the true doctrine of christes faith’. This sums up the position Foxe has taken on the Anglo-Saxons; there is a failure here to uphold true religion. There is something more as well. Through the two readings of Edgar’s character— one positive, one negative—Foxe describes a flawed man. Part pure, part corrupt. The ambiguity that Robinson saw in Foxe’s narrative of the AngloSaxons plays out in Edgar’s narrative.52 The king is imperfect. The Church too  has become imperfect. Advice is gained from bishops, supportive of a religion that does not hold fast to its origins. Such colouring of the historical narrative keeps alive the possibility of redemption. The two churches—one hidden and true, the other revealed false—is conveyed in the complexity of individuals. Take Ine of Wessex (688–726) as a second example. Foxe remonstrates this king for allowing the practice of priests shaving their heads (a prelude to Edgar’s overturning of the priesthood). The practice of clerical tonsure was, to Foxe, the result of ‘the dreaming phantasies of Monkes of that time, falselye grounding vpon the example of Peter: whom by no olde monument of any auncient recorde they can euer proue’.53 The critical commentary begins with a sequence out of Bede’s ecclesiastical history in which Foxe claims all of Bede’s reasonings as flawed as they show no similarity to Scriptural teachings. It ends with Foxe informing his reader that Ine abdicated to become a monk. His reasons for doing so are interesting. Ine made his decision ‘by the importunate perswasion, and subtile policie of his wife Ethelburge’.54 In an earlier sequence, Foxe told of how Offa of Mercia had married off his daughter, Eadburh, to Beorhtric of Wessex, only for Eadburh to poison her new husband. She fled to France, offering her ‘beautie’ to the king, but ‘she chused rather hys son’ and thus ended up in a monastery. There she played ‘the harlot with a monke’ and ended up in ‘penurie and miserye’.55 Offa’s wife was also troublesome. Offa had murdered King Æthelbert because his queen had ‘false suspicion’ of his intentions. Foxe calls the queen the ‘worker of this vilanie’ and in the margins moralised the story as evidence of ‘the vayne suspition & wicked councel of a woman’.56 Offa, as penance, also abdicates and becomes a monk. The combined themes of powerful but flawed women (and the danger they might pose), and the occasion of kings abdicating the throne for a monastic cell seem to be related to the unease Foxe felt in narrating such stories. Other kings who became monks included Ceolwulf (Celulfus) and Egbert. Nothing is said of the reason Ceolwulf became a monk. Foxe does note, though, that he joined the order at Lindisfarne, and it was he who introduced

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wine and ale, whereas before only milk and water had been allowed. The king, therefore, corrupted discipline for his own gain and comfort. Of Egbert, the hint is given that his abdication is more serious, causing the downfall of the Northumbrian kingdom. Foxe lists Egbert’s successors as all slain or banished, one after the other until the ‘kingdome dyd lye voyde and waste’.57 Foxe leaves only hints and half-comments like these with regards to his views of abdication in favour of monastic life. That changes near the end of Book 2, where Foxe summarises a question for his readers: How many of them, of kings were made monkes: how deout they were then to holy church and to the church men, and especiallye to the church of Rome. But the church men then were much otherwise in lyfe, then afterward they declared the[m]selues to be.58 As Foxe had shown, abdication risked peril for the stability of the kingdom and the faith of its people. It was a failure for secular stability. It was a failure of religion too. Foxe noted the positive; these kings were at least demonstrating faith. Foxe also rehearsed his motif that the Church and monasteries were not as corrupted yet as they would become (or at least showed themselves to be). Nonetheless, the Anglo-Saxon kings were deceived. Whilst they erected monasteries and abdicated to become monks out of a place of ‘deuotion & zeale’, this was really ‘blinde ignorance’ and ‘zealous superstition’. By doing so, they forsake ‘their orderly vocation of princely regiment’.59 Foxe follows protocol by rarely denouncing a monarch directly. He follows the motif that the failing is in the advisors. Dunstan was an early archetype, but more would follow in subsequent sequences. This brings this study back to the idea of punishment. Foxe repeated the history of Danish raids from AD 852 onwards, mainly in narrative form and usually in discrete sequences. Their story, like that of papal history, became side stories to Anglo-Saxon religious and secular failure. It was, though, through an anonymous manuscript that Foxe outlines his thoughts on the subject.60 In t[he] primitiue church saith he of t[he] Englishme[n], religion did most clerely shyne, in so much t[hat] kinges, quenes, princes and dukes, consuls, and barons, and rulers of churches incensed with desire of the kingdome of heaue[n]: laboryng and striuing emong themselues, to enter into monkerye, into voluntarie exile and solitarye life: forsoke al, & followed the Lorde. Where in processe of time, all virtue so much decayd emong them, that in fraude & treachery none semed like vnto them.61 The result of this ultimate failure, according to the source, was retribution: ‘Almighty God sent vpon them pagane & cruel natio[n]s like swarmes of bees’. The Danes were punishment, made final by the Norman conquest. The ‘swarme’ also included amongst its members, the Church of Rome. The papal sequences appear in short bursts throughout Books 2 and 3 and

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are generally derived almost wholly from Bale’s catalogue and, for the most part, form something akin to an extended genealogical table.62 Foxe reprints his sequence on Sylvester II and adds one on the brief reign of Formosus, noting the story of papal schism and the fact that Formosus rejected the notion of papal supremacy. Of most interest is the myth of the female pope (Pope Joan) and a letter which seems to provide a historical justification for the marriage of priests. These are interesting pieces of evidence, which proved popular with Foxe’s colleagues, especially Bale and Parker. Foxe makes a good deal of the letter between St Ulric, Bishop of Augsburg, and Pope Nicholas I, but appears less favourable to the story of Pope Joan. Thomas Freeman has described this story of a woman who pretended to be a man and became a pope as having a ‘ubiquitous’ presence in Elizabethan controversial literature.63 John Jewel and Thomas Harding had argued over the story’s validity in print. Bale had used the story, as had the Magdeburg Centuriators. Foxe, however, tells the story in less than 300 words.64 Perhaps he sensed its unreliability, or possibly he did not wish to enter a controversy already made notorious between Jewel and Harding. Foxe was more interested in the letter claiming justification for priest’s marriage. This had appeared in the third book of the 1563 edition and is, indeed, the only part of the first edition to transfer into the Anglo-Saxon sequences.65 The letter argues that the pope’s position is one of ‘violence and tyranny to the judgement of all wyse men’.66 Foxe was not the first Protestant writer to use the letter, Martin Luther and Robert Barnes had both used it, as did Bale.67 It was Bale, however, who came to believe that it had been misattributed; he argued that St Ulric and Nicholas I were not contemporaries of one another and that, in fact, the Bishop of Carthage had sent it. Furthermore, the letter had been sent to Nicholas II, not Nicholas I. Whilst Bale had evidence for Volusianus of Carthage it was proved later that he was fictitious. He had never existed. The use of the letter in Book 3 shows nothing of this, but later, in Book 8 Foxe inserted the letter again, awkwardly providing the updated attribution.68 This later attribution formed part of Foxe’s polemic Allegations Against the Six Articles in Book 8. This polemic was designed to dismiss Henry VIII’s anti-reform laws as false doctrine, by using history to disprove the validity of the old monarchs’ articles. The sequence was largely compiled in collaboration with Matthew Parker’s household and additionally relied on a wide array of contemporary writings. Parker supplied Foxe with hagiographies such as Eadmer and Osbern’s life of Oda, the Vita Sancti Oswaldi and Vita Sancti Dunstanti. Foxe also reprinted what amounts to an abridgement of Parker’s A Testimonie of Antiquitie (especially the story of Ælfric’s homily, told at the start of this chapter). Despite the collaboration, the polemic still belongs to Foxe. He is connected to the institutional attempts to use history to support Elizabeth’s reign but not controlled by it. Embedded in the polemic is the letter to Pope Nicholas with Bale’s new attribution. Parker investigated Bale’s claims himself but decided to stay with the original identification.69 Foxe chose to side with Bale.

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The Purification of the Anglo-Saxons The final sequence to consider is not a sequence at all but scattered descriptions affixed to the reigns of certain kings. These are the law codes. In Book 3, Foxe had taken the laws of individual kings from the chronicle attributed to John Brompton.70 In Book 6, however, Foxe inserted the law codes as a whole new sequence and as part of a larger polemic entitled the proud primacy of popes. Here Foxe did not use John Brompton, but rather the newly completed work of William Lambarde. Once published in 1568, the Archaionomia was widely acclaimed as providing the best presentation of the Anglo-Saxon law codes.71 Lambarde had translated them directly from the Old English rather than relying on those that had been transmitted in Latin through the traditional corpus of histories. He did so for legal purposes: to provide precedence for the present through knowledge of past laws. Foxe used them for a different purpose. They were to show that Anglo-Saxon kings had enacted ecclesiastical laws in their own kingdom, revealing as a lie the papal claim that no secular prince ever had such a right, and second, as further proof that the papacy was not the universal head of the Church since primitive times. The fact that Foxe did not use Lambarde’s laws in Book 3 may suggest that he only had access to notes and drafts at this stage. A few elements of Lambarde’s work appear at the start of Book 2 as part of Foxe’s list of possible Romano-British conversion stories and as one of the sources that enabled Foxe to compile a clearer genealogy of Anglo-Saxon kings. Neither use confirms full access. Both could easily have derived through sharing information, whilst both works were in preparation. This is conjecture, but it fits a pattern that can be glimpsed at through the inclusion of other material in Books 2 and 3, and, additionally, in Book 8. The oration to Edgar, Assar’s oration to Alfred, the letter between Lucius and Eleutherius, and material from Lambarde’s Archaionomia all point to provision from Matthew Parker’s household. The two polemics, the proud primacy of popes and the Allegations against the Six Articles, similarly relied on material provided via Parker. This material was transformative. Foxe had used his own sources to test each Anglo-Saxon ruler against a criterion of true faith, finding in almost all instances a distinct failure. Even those who did display religious devotion are generally shown to be misguided by supporting monasteries or even abdicating to become monks themselves, to the great harm of the realm. The evidence that Parker provided to Foxe appears to offer something different. Ælfric’s homily suggested that some of the Anglo-Saxon rituals and services differed from the Roman form, and more closely resembled evangelical beliefs. The law codes of various kings made clearer through Lambarde’s work, revealed secular involvement and command of religious matters, independent of any authority from Rome. The orations to Edgar and Alfred showed that some kings offered good kingship. This is the purification of the Anglo-Saxons that Robinson identifies, which goes further

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than Foxe had done in the majority of Books 2 and 3. Foxe is involved in the process of identifying connections between Anglo-Saxon religious practices and evangelical Protestant practices—he makes editorial choices on the materials provided by Parker—but nonetheless the arguments made in the earlier books reveal a more basic statement about this era, understanding it through a binary judgement on good and bad rule, and true and false religious devotion.

The Use of Sources and Authorities Foxe had founded his narrative of the Anglo-Saxon’s in Books 2 and 3 on Robert Fabyan’s New Chronicles and the anonymous chronicle attributed to John Brompton. These were generally his starting point and his main source of information. Attached to these, Foxe inserted extra material from an array of medieval chronicles, including Roger of Hoveden’s Annales and the Flores Historiarum. Foxe used Bale’s catalogue and his The Actes or Unchast Examples of the Englysh Votaryes for various points of reference, and Flacius’ catalogue for papal history. For genealogies, Foxe added the Breviat chronicle, John Stow’s A Summary of English Chronicles, and Lambarde’s Archaionomia. Polydore Vergil’s history and Jacobus da Varagine’s The Golden Legend feature, but usually as evidence of falsity, rather than fact. Foxe used the Magdeburg Centuries as his main source for RomanoBritish conversion stories, selecting piecemeal those threads that were useful.72 Occasionally, Foxe favoured as his starting point the two chronicles of William of Malmesbury (the Gesta Regum Anglorum and Gesta Pontificum Anglorum) and the Historia Anglorum of Henry of Huntingdon, again used in combination with other medieval texts. This is clear from the structure of the narrative, which relies heavily on one or two of these sources to provide the core narrative, whilst other sources used in those same sequences provide only small additions, corrections, or confirmations. Foxe trusted these sources over others, but nonetheless was careful to compare their evidence, shifting them for what he perceived as truths or falsities, and extracting from them material suitable to his argument, whilst ignoring or distrusting other elements. Ranulf Higden’s Polychronicon, of which Foxe had two copies, was used, but more sparingly. The reason is simple. Both Higden and Fabyan had provided a chronicle which drew on everything else that had gone before. They were therefore useful, but Higden was a monk and Fabyan an alderman. Higden coloured his history in support of the Roman Church, Fabyan was often neutral and where he was not, early reformers had purged those references in readiness for the printing press. It was therefore prudent to reduce the importance of Higden’s history, whilst not dismissing it entirely. Geoffrey of Monmouth meanwhile did appear in the text as a citation, although it is less certain whether Foxe used a copy or derived each instance from intermediary sources such as Bale’s catalogue. At the least, Geoffrey’s name

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was kept to a minimum because it was no longer a source that could be trusted without justification. Bede is another example. The Historia ecclesiastica gentis Anglorum should have been a key witness to early church events, but his history was biased towards a Roman narrative.73 Although Foxe provides a relatively long testimony of Bede calling him a ‘man of worthy venerable memorie’, Foxe was also at pains to show that Bede held his allegiance with Rome and was therefore not unbiased nor entirely trustworthy. Whilst Foxe inserted various citations to Bede in Books 2 and 3, he rarely used it directly as a source of information. The earliest references— as part of the possible Romano-British conversion and the first coming over of Anglo-Saxons—are most likely derived from Bale’s catalogue and Henry of Huntingdon’s Historia Anglorum.74 The ‘interrogations’ are cited by Foxe as taken from ‘Ex decretis Gregorii primus lib. Council. Tom. 2’. Although not certain, this would appear to identify one of Parker’s manuscripts, specifically CCCC MS 320, which contained various passages from Bede including one called ‘Interrogationes beati Augustini episcopi Cantuariorum’, containing the interrogations.75 In the manuscript, this portion of the material is described as ‘Tom 2’. Foxe did use Bede’s ecclesiastical history during his sequence on King Ine. Foxe specifically states that the letter about priests’ tonsure had been obtained ‘in Bede’ and which ‘I have here annexed’.76 The wording is irregular and perhaps suggestive that other citations to Bede were not from the original source, but taken from intermediaries. Again, this is conjecture. There is one more source of note to mention. At various points in the Anglo-Saxon history, Foxe refers to an anonymous text that he calls ‘Historia Cariana’. This manuscript remains elusive, although attempts have been made to identify it.77 On one occasion, Foxe describes it as ‘a certayne auncient written history’ in Latin, compiled in the fourteenth year of Richard II.78 He calls it ‘Historia Cariana’ as a reference to its owner, Willaim Carye. In 1560, Bale had identified Carye as ‘a younge man in Colman Street at London’ who owned a copy of Roger of Hoveden and the Topographia Britanniæ of Gerald of Wales.79 In a notebook, Bale also listed Carye as the owner of various other manuscripts, some of which were unidentifiable.80 Carye must have been quite a collector of old manuscripts. Both John Stow and John Dee had in their collections texts that had once belonged to Carye and Parker too sought them out.81 Together, these references to Carye raise the question of whether there is one manuscript or multiple whenever Foxe refers to Historia Cariana. Either way, the source was useful to Foxe. He consulted it at length for evidence of Romano-British history, including stories of their continuance in the form of King Arthur and Uther Pendragon.82 It was used again to add detail to the Danish raids in Book 3 and again for the reign of King Edmund later in the same book.83 Carye’s manuscript(s) provided Foxe with an opportunity to consult alternative accounts of events, assessing how statements cohered with one another and whether details were different and more useful to his argument than what might be found in the traditional corpus of materials.

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Conclusions At the very least, it is to be observed that the Anglo-Saxon account in the Acts and Monuments is strongly partisan, albeit one that struggles to reach a conclusion on the identity of its subject matter. The sources that Foxe used, taken together, enabled him to weave the story of Anglo-Saxon kingship as a foreign and destabilising entity, superimposed over a weakening but surviving true faithful which had, nonetheless, received punishment for failing to properly defend and spread the faith. This was an awkward reading of the evidence, and Foxe knew it. Parker’s new materials, as Robinson argued, helped Foxe to begin a slow but uncertain process of purifying the Anglo-Saxons by showing that some elements of the faith they did support was of a better sort than previously believed. Ælfric’s homily is one such example where Foxe could show that some elements of the faith were closer to sixteenth-century evangelical beliefs than to their Roman Catholic counterpart. Fragments from Parker’s household helped also to tease out this picture, as did the clearer identification of law codes by William Lambarde, but the attempt to purify the Anglo-Saxons remained somewhat unfinished. A purified Anglo-Saxon story is, therefore, not the reading that Foxe largely presents in Books 2 and 3. It is interesting to note that John Bale had seen in the Anglo-Saxon’s both good and bad traits in much the same way that Foxe would. On the one hand, he was dubious of their religious observances, favouring instead the ancient Britons, but on the other, he admired their capacity for generating exceptional scholars such as King Alfred and Bede.84 By default, Foxe approached the Anglo-Saxon era with the same belief as Bale, but he went one step further by testing the histories that he read to identify these good and bad practices in each individual and make a justified assessment on their religious purity. For the most part, Foxe observed that many rulers were devoted, but that they were equally misguided in their devotion. For Foxe, the Anglo-Saxons had, for the most part, misunderstood their responsibilities. The process of purification of the Anglo-Saxons that Robinson observes also led Rosemond Tuve to argue that Foxe purposefully aligned his ideas with those of Parker, Bale, Leland, and Lambarde.85 This is true, but only to a point. What Tuve and Robinson observe about Foxe’s Anglo-Saxons is more an observation on the additions that Parker offered, than what Foxe originally conceived for the era. Books 2 and 3 more clearly describe the AngloSaxons in terms of ‘good’ and ‘bad’ governance, mostly favouring the latter. It is also worthwhile noting that not all the materials that Parker provided Foxe enabled a discovery of true faith in the Anglo-Saxons. Parker’s materials were also useful for revealing the failures. For example, whilst Foxe was most likely introduced to the idea of Edgar’s list of vices from Bale’s catalogue and, as Helen Parish has argued, borrowed the general interpretation of the tenth-century reforms from Bales’ The Actes or Unchast Examples of the Englysh Votaryes, it is Parker who held the source material.86 The vices

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of King Edgar are partly taken from Eadmer’s vita S. Dunstante.87 Similarly, the use of Osbern’s hagiography of Dunstan to describe Edgar’s vice of blind superstition and the enforced penance of Edgar would appear to come from a manuscript that is heavily annotated in John Joscelyn’s hand.88 A citation to ‘Ex chronico Saxonico Ecclesiae Wigornensis’ (The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle of Worcester) is also likely from Parker.89 The appearance of Simeon of Durham for the controversy over succession and references for ‘monkish’ errors regarding Edgar, would also appear to derive from elsewhere, again probably Parker. Foxe does not usually use Simeon of Durham himself, and the inclusion of Capgrave’s Nova Legend and Crowland’s chronicle might also lead us back to Parker. There is more to be read into these sequences, however, than a partisan rendering of Anglo-Saxon religion. In a more general assessment, it is possible to claim that Foxe did more for the Anglo-Saxon era then is usually appreciated in that he took the time to understand the correct order and sequence of events which were presented to him in the medieval literature. The genealogy of kings was a mess which John Stow had only partially improved. William Lambarde made greater strides in sorting out the confusion, but it is Foxe who presents the best and most accurate order. This is important as it is a detail that was not strictly necessary to prove his polemical and partisan point about the corruption of English religion. This is Foxe acting as a historian, interested in the facts and the correct order. This is Foxe recognising the limitation in his evidence and this is Foxe working with other scholars, especially the Parker household. Such themes that are found in the Anglo-Saxon sequences become stronger when Foxe engages with post-conquest England. The Anglo-Norman dynasty would also be tested by its adherence to true faith and good governance, and again is often found wanting. This, Foxe calls, the fifth plague. Invasion by Romans, raids by Scots, invasion by Saxons, raids by Vikings, and invasion by Normans. The cycle of history repeated: a cycle influenced by Gods pleasure and dissatisfaction, a cycle that revealed in history those moments when true faith adhered and those moments of failure.

Notes 1. Richard T. Vann, “The Free Anglo-Saxons: A Historical Myth,” Journal of the History of Ideas 19, no. 2 (1958): 259–72, https://doi.org/10.2307/2707940. 2. For more on Laurence Nowell’s research, see Retha M. Warnicke, “Nowell, Laurence (1530-c.1570), Antiquary,” ODNB, 2004, https://doi.org/10.1093/ ref:odnb/69731; Robin Flower, “Laurence Nowell and the Discovery of England in Tudor Times,” in British Academy Papers on Anglo-Saxon England, ed. E.G. Stanley (Oxford, 1990), 1–27; Pamela M. Black, “Laurence Nowell’s ‘Disappearance’ in Germany and Its Bearing on the Whereabouts of His Collectanea 1568–1572,” The English Historical Review 92, no. 363 (1977): 345–53. 3. For more on William Lambarde see J.D. Alsop, “Lambarde, William (1536– 1601), Antiquary and Lawyer,” ODNB, 2004, https://doi.org/10.1093/ref:odnb/

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4. 5. 6. 7.

8. 9.

10.

11. 12. 13. 14. 15. 16. 17.

18. 19. 20. 21. 22. 23.

24.

From King Lucius to Harold Godwinson 15921; Retha M. Warnicke, William Lambarde, Elizabethan Antiquary, 1536– 1601 (London: Phillimore, 1973); Raymond J. S. Grant, Laurence Nowell, William Lambarde, and the Laws of the Anglo-Saxons (Amsterdam: Rodopi, 1996). Bede, The History of the Churche of Englande, Compiled by Venerable Bede, Englishman, trans. Thomas Stapleton (Antwerp, 1565). Allen J. Frantzen, “‘Bede and Bawdy Bale’: Gregory the Great, Angels and the ‘Angli’,” in Anglo-Saxonism and the Construction of Social Identity, ed. John D. Niles and Allen J. Frantzen (Florida: University Press of Florida, 1997), 25–32. John Bale, The First Two Partes of The Actes or Unchast Examples of the Englysh Votaryes (London, 1551), pt. 1, 23. William Camden, Remains Concerning Britain, ed. Robert D. Dunn (Toronto; Buffalo: University of Toronto Press, 1984), 32. For a recent summary of AngloSaxon studies post-Parker, see Hugh Magennis, “Not Angles but Anglicans? Reformation and Post-Reformation Perspectives on the Anglo-Saxon Church, Part 2: Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries,” English Studies 96, no. 4 (19 May 2015): 363–78, https://doi.org/10.1080/0013838X.2015.1011889. Benedict S. Robinson, “John Foxe and the Anglo-Saxons,” in John Foxe and His World , ed. Christopher Highley and John N. King (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2002), 56. For more about Ælfric’s Homily, see Michael Murphy, “Religious Polemics in the Genesis of Old English Studies,” Huntington Library Quarterly 32, no. 3 (1969): 241–8, https://doi.org/10.2307/3816966; John Bromwich, “The First Book Printed in Anglo-Saxon Types,” Transactions of the Cambridge Bibliographical Society 3, no. 4 (1962): 265–91. Robinson, “John Foxe and the Anglo-Saxons,” and Michael Murphy, “John Foxe, Martyrologist, and ‘editor’ of Old English,” English Studies 49 (1968): 516–23, also describe Foxe’s engagement with the Anglo-Saxons based on their reading of the Ælfric’s homily sequence. A&M (1570), 177. Ibid., 160. Ibid. Ibid., 1602. Ibid., 161, 237. Huntingdon, 4–5. The first three editions of the Breuiat chronicle were published by John Mychell from 1551. Subsequent editions were printed in London by Jon Byddell. For more details see Daniel Woolf, Reading History in Early Modern England (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000), 39–47, 53. A&M (1570), 193. William Haller, Foxe’s Book of Martyrs and the Elect Nation (London: Jonathan Cape, 1963), 151. A&M (1570), 167. Stephen Reed Cattley, The Acts and Monuments of John Foxe, New and complete ed., vol. 1 (London: Seeley and Burnside, 1841), 428. See May McKisack, Medieval History in the Tudor Age (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1971), 1–25. Foxe’s main source is the Magdeburg Centuries vols. I–III, including Joseph of Arimathea from Cent I.II, 23 and Cent II, 8; Simon Zelotes from Cent I.II, 23; and Peter of Cluny from Cent II, 9. Foxe also uses Bale’s Catalogus, Lambarde’s Archaionomia, a few medieval chronicles, and the papal decretals for a select few details. Polydore Vergil, Anglica Historia: A Hypertext Critical Edition, trans. Dana F. Sutton (Basel, 1555), bk. 2, ch. 11, www.philological.bham.ac.uk/polverg/.

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25. Felicity Heal, “What Can King Lucius Do for You? The Reformation and the Early British Church,” The English Historical Review 120, no. 487 (2005): 593– 614. Reference at 601. 26. Ibid. 27. A&M (1570), 160. 28. Heal, “What Can King Lucius Do for You? The Reformation and the Early British Church,” 608. 29. A&M (1570), 166. 30. Ibid., 159. 31. Ibid., 173. 32. Ibid., 168. 33. Ibid., 169, 172. 34. Ibid., 174. 35. Ibid., 168. 36. Ibid., 170. 37. Ibid., 169. 38. Ibid., 172. 39. Ibid., 173. 40. Hugh Magennis, “Not Angles but Anglicans? Reformation and Post-Reformation Perspectives on the Anglo-Saxon Church, Part 1: Bede, Ælfric and the Anglo-Saxon Church in Early Modern England,” English Studies 96, no. 3 (3 April 2015): 243–63, https://doi.org/10.1080/0013838X.2014.996380. Reference at 246–7. 41. A&M (1570), 167–8. 42. Ibid., 174. 43. Ibid., 175. 44. Foxe does not use Asser’s Life of Alfred, now one of the key sources for Alfred’s reign. The only exception is a short epitaph that was most likely provided by Matthew Parker’s household, who had uncovered the manuscript. The epitaph can be found in Matthew Parker, ed., Ælfredi Regis Res Gestæ (London, 1574), 35. 45. A&M (1570), 200. 46. Ibid., 202. 47. Helen L. Parish, “‘Impudent and Abhominable Fictions’: Rewriting Saints’ Lives in the English Reformation,” The Sixteenth Century Journal 32, no. 1 (2001): 45–65, https://doi.org/10.2307/2671394. For more on this subject see also Helen L. Parish, Clerical Marriage and the English Reformation: Precedent Policy and Practice (Aldershot, Hants; Burlington, VT: Ashgate, 2000). 48. A&M (1570), 212. 49. Ibid., 215. 50. Ibid., 217. 51. A&M (1570), 235–6 (220-221). The oration derives from Parker’s copy of Ælfred of Rievaulx, De genealogia Regum Anglorum, which is now CCCC MS 59. 52. Robinson, “John Foxe and the Anglo-Saxons”. 53. A&M (1570), 182. 54. Ibid. 55. Ibid., 189. 56. Ibid., 186. 57. Ibid., 188. 58. Ibid., 190. 59. Ibid., 191. 60. A&M (1570), 198 TAMO commentary claims that the manuscript was a version of the Flores Historiarum. The use of the descriptor ‘ex vetusto exemplo historiae Carianae’ most likely points to William Carye as owner of the manuscript. 61. A&M (1570), 198.

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62. For a full account of the papal references see Thomas S. Freeman, “‘St Peter Did Not Do Thus’: Papal History in the Acts and Monuments,” TAMO, 2004, www. johnfoxe.org/index.php?realm=more&gototype=&type=essay&book=essay17. 63. Thomas S. Freeman, “Joan of Contention: The Myth of the Female Pope in Early Modern England,” in Religious Politics in Post-Reformation England: Essays in Honour of Nicholas Tyacke, ed. Kenneth Fincham and Peter Lake (Woodbridge, Suffolk, UK: Boydell Press, 2006), 60–79. 64. A&M (1570), 195. 65. Compare A&M (1563), 437 to A&M (1570), 195. 66. A&M (1570), 196. 67. Ibid., TAMO Commentary. 68. A&M (1570), 1359. 69. Catherine Hall, “The One Way Trial: Some Observations of CCCC MS 101 and G&CC MS 427,” Transactions of the Cambridge Bibliographical Society 11 (1998): 272–84. 70. In Book 3, Foxe included the laws of Alfred and Edward at A&M (1570), 207–8 from Brompton, col. 823, 826, 829, and 830; the laws of Athelstane at A&M (1570), 211 from Brompton, col. 840–1, 845; the laws of King Edmund at A&M (1570), 212 from Brompton, cols. 858–62; the laws of Cnut at A&M (1570), 228–9 from Brompton, cols. 918–32; and the laws of Edward the Confessor at A&M (1570), 230–1 from Brompton, col. 957. 71. For more information see Warnicke, William Lambarde, Elizabethan Antiquary, 1536–1601. 72. Compare A&M (1570), 158–9 with Cent. I-III, particularly for Joseph of Arimathea Cent I.II, col. 23 and Cent II, col. 8, Simon Zelotes from Cent I.II, col. 23 and Peter of Cluny from Cent II, col. 9. 73. See John M. Wallace-Hadrill, Bede’s Ecclesiastical History of the English People: A Historical Commentary (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1988), xxxi. 74. Bede is cited when Foxe describes the keeping of Easter in Britain as different than the Roman Church, which is taken from Bale, Catalogus, 66, whilst the list of the kings of Britain which Foxe has cited to Bede, Ranulf Higden, and Geoffrey of Monmouth is most likely from Huntingdon, 575–7. 75. CCCC MS 320, fo. 151r. 76. A&M (1570), 181. Bede, Historia Gentis Anglorum Ecclesiastica: Bede’s Ecclesiastical History of the English People, ed. Bertram Colgrave and Roger A.B. Mynors (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1969), 533–53. 77. Andrew G.Watson,“Christopher and William Carye, Collectors of Monastic Manuscripts, and ‘John Carye’,” The Library 5, no. 2 (1 June 1965): 135–42, https://doi. org/10.1093/library/s5-XX.2.135. 78. A&M (1570), 166. 79. Timothy Graham and Andrew G. Watson, The Recovery of the Past in Early Elizabethan England: Documents by John Bale and John Joscelyn From the Circle of Matthew Parker (Cambridge: Cambridge Bibliographical Society, 1998), 18, 24. 80. John Bale, Index Britanniae Scriptorum: John Bale’s Index of British and Other Writers, ed. Reginald Lane Poole and Mary Bateson, 1st ed. reprinted / with new introduction & bibliog., by Caroline Brett and James P. Carley (Woodbridge: D.S. Brewer, 1990), 477–8. 81. Alfred Hiatt, “Stow’s “Owlde” Manuscripts of London Chronicles,” in John Stow (1525–1605) and the Making of the English Past: Studies in Early Modern Culture and the History of the Book, ed. Ian Gadd and Alexandra Gillespie (London: British Library, 2004), 5–67. 82. A&M (1570), 166. 83. Ibid., 198, 211.

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84. Magennis, “Not Angles But Anglicans? Reformation and Post-Reformation Perspectives on the Anglo-Saxon Church, Part 1: Bede, Ælfric and the Anglo-Saxon Church in Early Modern England,” 245. 85. Rosemond Tuve, “Ancients, Moderns, and Saxons,” English Literary History 6, no. 3 (1939): 165–90, https://doi.org/10.2307/2871550. 86. Parish, “‘Impudent and Abhominable Fictions’: Rewriting Saints’ Lives in the English Reformation,” 45–65. 87. Foxe probably consulted Bale, Catalogus, 138 and then used CCCC MS 371, a copy of Eadmer vita S. Dunstane collected by Parker’s household. 88. This is BL Arundel MS 16. For a more recent version of the hagiography see William Stubbs, Memorials of Saint Dunstan, Archbishop of Canterbury (Vita Sancti Dunstani) (London: Rolls Series, 1874), 135–6. 89. Probably MS Cotton Tiberius B. IV, fo. 3–86; 88–90. This appears in Joscelyn’s lists, see Graham and Watson, The Recovery of the Past in Early Elizabethan England: Documents by John Bale and John Joscelyn From the Circle of Matthew Parker, 58.

Works Cited Manuscripts BL Arundel MS 16—Osbern, Vita S. Dunstane Cotton Tiberius B. IV—Anglo-Saxon Chronicle CCCC MS 59—Ælfred of Rievaulx, De genealogia Regum Anglorum CCCC MS 320—possible source for Augustine’s Interrogations. CCCC MS 371—Eadmer vita S. Dunstane

Printed Alsop, J. D. “Lambarde, William (1536–1601), Antiquary and Lawyer.” ODNB (2004). https://doi.org/10.1093/ref:odnb/15921. Bale, John. The First Two Partes of the Actes or Unchast Examples of the Englysh Votaryes. London, 1551. ——— Index Britanniae Scriptorum: John Bale’s Index of British and Other Writers, edited by Reginald Lane Poole and Mary Bateson. 1st ed. Reprinted/With New Introduction and Bibliography by Caroline Brett and James P. Carley. Woodbridge: D.S. Brewer, 1990. ——— Scriptorum illustriū maioris Brytannię . . . catalogus . . . usque ad annū hunc Domini 1557 . . . IX centurias continens, etc.: (Scriptorum illustrium . . . posterior pars, quinque continens centurias ultimas). Basel, 1557. Bede. Historia Gentis Anglorum Ecclesiastica: Bede’s Ecclesiastical History of the English People, edited by Bertram Colgrave and Roger A.B. Mynors. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1969. ——— The History of the Churche of Englande, Compiled by Venerable Bede, Englishman, translated by Thomas Stapleton. Antwerp, 1565. Black, Pamela M. “Laurence Nowell’s ‘disappearance’ in Germany and Its Bearing on the Whereabouts of His Collectanea 1568–1572.” The English Historical Review 92, no. 363 (1977): 345–53. Brompton, John. “Chronicon Johannis Bromton Abbatis Iornalensis.” In Historiæ Anglicanæ scriptores X : Simeon Monachus Dunelmensis. Johannes Prior Hagustaldensis.

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Ricardus Prior Hagustaldensis. Ailredus Abbas Rievallensis. Radulphus de Diceto Londoniensis. Johannes Brompton Jornallensis. Gervasius Monachus Dorobornensis. Thomas Stubbs Dominicanus. Guilielmus Thorn Cantuariensis. Henricus Knighton Leicestrensis. Ex vetustis manusciptis, nunc primùm in lucem editi; Adjectis variis lectionibus, glossario, indicéque copioso., edited by Roger Twysden, 725–1284. London, 1652. Bromwich, John. “The First Book Printed in Anglo-Saxon Types.” Transactions of the Cambridge Bibliographical Society 3, no. 4 (1962): 265–91. Camden, William. Remains Concerning Britain, edited by Robert D. Dunn. Toronto and Buffalo: University of Toronto Press, 1984. Cattley, Stephen Reed. The Acts and Monuments of John Foxe. New and complete ed. Vol. 1. London: Seeley and Burnside, 1841. Fabyan, Robert. The New Chronicles of England and France, in Two Parts; Named . . . the Concordance of Histories, edited by Henry Ellis. London, 1811. Flacius Illyricus, Matthias, Johann Wigand, and Mattheus Judix. Ecclesiastica historia, integram ecclesiae Christi ideam quantum ad locum, propagationem, persecutionem, tranquillit., doctrin., haereses, ceremonias, gubunationem, schismata, synodos, personas, miracula, martyria, religiones extra ecclesiam: singulari diligentia et fide ex vetustissimis et optimis historicis, patribus et aliis scriptoribus congesta per aliquot studiosos et pios viros in urbe Magdeburgica. 14 Vols. Basel, 1559. Flower, Robin. “Laurence Nowell and the Discovery of England in Tudor Times.” In British Academy Papers on Anglo-Saxon England, edited by E. G. Stanley, 1–27. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1990. Foxe, John. “Acts and Monuments.” TAMO, 1563. www.johnfoxe.org. ——— “Acts and Monuments.” TAMO, 1570. www.johnfoxe.org. Frantzen, Allen J. “‘Bede and Bawdy Bale’: Gregory the Great, Angels and the ‘Angli’.” In Anglo-Saxonism and the Construction of Social Identity, edited by John D. Niles and Allen J. Frantzen, 25–32. Florida: University Press of Florida, 1997. Freeman, Thomas S. “Joan of Contention: The Myth of the Female Pope in Early Modern England.” In Religious Politics in Post-Reformation England: Essays in Honour of Nicholas Tyacke, edited by Kenneth Fincham and Peter Lake, 60–79. Woodbridge, Suffolk, UK: Boydell Press, 2006. ——— “‘St Peter Did Not Do Thus’: Papal History in the Acts and Monuments.” TAMO, 2004. www.johnfoxe.org/index.php?realm=more&gototype=&type=essa y&book=essay17. Graham, Timothy, and Andrew G. Watson. The Recovery of the Past in Early Elizabethan England: Documents by John Bale and John Joscelyn From the Circle of Matthew Parker. Cambridge: Cambridge Bibliographical Society, 1998. Grant, Raymond J. S. Laurence Nowell, William Lambarde, and the Laws of the Anglo-Saxons. Amsterdam: Rodopi, 1996. Hall, Catherine. “The One Way Trial: Some Observations of CCCC MS 101 and G&CC MS 427.” Transactions of the Cambridge Bibliographical Society 11 (1998): 272–84. Haller, William. Foxe’s Book of Martyrs and the Elect Nation. London: Jonathan Cape, 1963. Heal, Felicity. “What Can King Lucius Do for You? The Reformation and the Early British Church.” The English Historical Review 120, no. 487 (2005): 593–614. Henry of Huntingdon. The History of the English People, 1000–1154, translated by Diana E. Greenway. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1996.

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Hiatt, Alfred. “Stow’s ‘Owlde’ Manuscripts of London Chronicles.” In John Stow (1525–1605) and the Making of the English Past: Studies in Early Modern Culture and the History of the Book, edited by Ian Gadd and Alexandra Gillespie, 5–67. London: British Library, 2004. Magennis, Hugh. “Not Angles But Anglicans? Reformation and Post-Reformation Perspectives on the Anglo-Saxon Church, Part 1: Bede, Ælfric and the Anglo-Saxon Church in Early Modern England.” English Studies 96, no. 3 (3 April 2015): 243–63. https://doi.org/10.1080/0013838X.2014.996380. ——— “Not Angles But Anglicans? Reformation and Post-Reformation Perspectives on the Anglo-Saxon Church, Part 2: Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries.” English Studies 96, no. 4 (19 May 2015): 363–78. https://doi.org/10.1080/00138 38X.2015.1011889. McKisack, May. Medieval History in the Tudor Age. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1971. Murphy, Michael. “John Foxe, Martyrologist and ‘Editor’ of Old English.” English Studies 49 (1968): 516–23. ——— “Religious Polemics in the Genesis of Old English Studies.” Huntington Library Quarterly 32, no. 3 (1969): 241–8. https://doi.org/10.2307/3816966. Parish, Helen L. Clerical Marriage and the English Reformation: Precedent Policy and Practice. Aldershot, Hants and Burlington, VT: Ashgate, 2000. ——— “‘Impudent and Abhominable Fictions’: Rewriting Saints’ Lives in the English Reformation.” The Sixteenth Century Journal 32, no. 1 (2001): 45–65. https://doi. org/10.2307/2671394. Parker, Matthew, ed. Ælfredi Regis Res Gestæ. London, 1574. Robinson, Benedict S. “John Foxe and the Anglo-Saxons.” In John Foxe and His World, edited by Christopher Highley and John N. King, 54–72. Aldershot: Ashgate, 2002. Stubbs, William. Memorials of Saint Dunstan, Archbishop of Canterbury (Vita Sancti Dunstani). London: Rolls Series, 1874. Tuve, Rosemond. “Ancients, Moderns, and Saxons.” English Literary History 6, no. 3 (1939): 165–90. https://doi.org/10.2307/2871550. Vann, Richard T. “The Free Anglo-Saxons: A Historical Myth.” Journal of the History of Ideas 19, no. 2 (1958): 259–72. https://doi.org/10.2307/2707940. Vergil, Polydore. Anglica Historia: A Hypertext Critical Edition, translated by Dana F. Sutton. Basel, 1555. www.philological.bham.ac.uk/polverg/. Wallace-Hadrill, John M. Bede’s Ecclesiastical History of the English People: A Historical Commentary. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1988. Warnicke, Retha M. “Nowell, Laurence (1530–c.1570), Antiquary.” ODNB (2004). https://doi.org/10.1093/ref:odnb/69731. ——— William Lambarde, Elizabethan Antiquary, 1536–1601. London: Phillimore, 1973. Watson, Andrew G. “Christopher and William Carye, Collectors of Monastic Manuscripts, and ‘John Carye’.” The Library 5, no. 2 (1 June 1965): 135–42. https://doi. org/10.1093/library/s5-XX.2.135. Woolf, Daniel. Reading History in Early Modern England. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000.

6

From William the Conqueror to Henry II

‘So was he t[he] last that raigned in Engla[n]d of the bloud of the Saxons’, wrote John Foxe when he narrated the story of Harold’s demise during the Battle of Hastings.1 In the closing pages of Book 3, Foxe had recounted Duke William’s victory as won ‘through the just providence of God’ and Harold’s death as just recompense for the murders he had performed and the betrayals of trust that he had committed. In doing so, Foxe encouraged his readers to imagine a parallel between that time and their present, conceiving of the conquest and resultant enthrallment of the country as God’s punishment on an ungrateful English. The people had failed to live up to the precepts of the true faith that God had bestowed upon them.2 Making use of the chronicle attributed to John Brompton, Foxe argued that the English had grown ‘to such dissoluteness, that they left no other realme lyke vnto the[m] in iniquitie’, and from other sources, including the chronicles of Robert Fabyan, Henry of Huntingdon, and William of Malmesbury, that ‘a litle before the invasio[n] of the Normandes’ Edward the Confessor had received a vision, revealing to him that England should be handed over to their enemies after his death because of ‘t[he] great enormitie and misbehaviour of the head dukes, bishops, and abbats of the realme’.3 Whilst Foxe had conceived of the Anglo-Saxons as purer than what would come later, but far from the perfection that they should have been, the Normans brought forth nothing less than enslavement. This was one of those moments where Foxe talked about ‘plague’ as the result of a lapse in the responsibility of the ruling classes to promote the true faith. Foxe used the theory first postulated by Henry of Huntingdon in the twelfth century that England had suffered ‘five plagues’: (1) the invasion of Julius Caesar’s Romans, (2) attacks by the Scots and the Picts, (3) subjugation by the Anglo-Saxons, (4) raids by the Danes, and (5)  conquest by the Normans. For Foxe, the concept was not only a means of explaining the success of foreign invasion but also an opportunity to reprimand the government of his own day for its failings. These were the lessons to be learned: princes who leave ‘no issue or sure successio[n] behind them’ risked the realm to ruin, a foreign marriage was wrought with danger, and

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the ‘righteous retribution and wrath of God’ results from the iniquity and unrighteousness of men. Foxe referred specifically to the failure of Edward the Confessor to provide an heir. Verifying the story with the same set of sources, Foxe argued that Edward ‘made promise to hym [Duke William], that if he dyed without issue, the sayd William should succeed hym in the kyngdome of England’.4 Harold Godwinson further reneged on this agreement by refusing to marry William’s daughter—an act that eventually led to the Norman invasion. Silently, Foxe made it clear that his comparison referred to the unfortunate marriage of Mary Tudor to Philip II of Spain, and as a warning of repetition. Elizabeth’s failure to marry and provide an heir (and if she did marry, the danger of a foreign marriage) could result in a repeated defeat and enthrallment of England, just like the horrors of Norman conquest. Foxe also referred to the responsibility of those men in high position. In the 1550s, John Bradford, a future martyr, had attempted to understand why God had forsaken England. The boy-king Edward had died, and Henry VIII’s first daughter, Mary, had taken the throne, bringing the realm back to papal authority and persecuting those who sought reform. Bradford concluded that it was ‘just punishment for our unthankfulness and horrible contempt’ of the true faith that God had granted the English.5 Jonathan Wright has argued that Protestants who, unlike Bradford, had escaped to exile sought similar answers, needing a means to refute their own pangs of guilt for fleeing whilst others remained.6 Wright argues that what emerged from the debates directly confronted conclusions such as Bradford’s by arguing that there were instances when escape was the preferred option, offering the opportunity and hope for redemption and continuation of the fight. The Norman Conquest and the concept of ‘plague’ revealed the same story of a people ungrateful of God’s benevolence and the consequences that would result from this neglect. Foxe sought to show that Elizabeth’s reign could easily be overthrown again by God if they failed to live up to the expectations of Reformation. Thus Foxe offers his readers a reading of the Norman Conquest which aligns with later seventeenth-century thought, especially what Christopher Hill would call the ‘Norman Yoke’.7 In 1954, Hill argued that scholars and lawmakers began to consider the Anglo-Saxons as having lived in a freer political landscape in which they were all equal citizens. The Norman Conquest deprived the English of these liberties, whilst later concessions, such as the Magna Carta, represented signs of continued resistance to Norman hegemony. The term ‘Norman Yoke’ first appeared in print in 1642, but Hill believed that the idea was based on a much older ‘legend’, embedded in the collective memory of society. This would appear to be what Foxe notices here: a Norman Yoke that came with a papal yoke, the effects of which would reverberate across the centuries.

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Another argument made in the opening of Book 4 returns to Foxe’s sense of the past and his reliance upon the prophetic framework that guided his assessment and selection of sources and the structure of his history. Foxe introduced Book 4 as the fourth booke conteynyng other .300. yeares, from W. Conquerour to the tyme of Iohn Wickleffe, wherin is described the proud and misordered raigne of antichrist, begynnyng to styrre in the church of Christ.8 Whilst it is no longer for Foxe the moment when Satan was loosened, the first millennium instead marked the appearance of the Antichrist. The conquest of England, the resultant subjugation of its nobility and people, and the overturning of the last vestiges of native Christian faith is a symptom of a larger disease spreading across Christendom. In the east, Foxe saw the birth of Mohammad and the looming threat of Islam. In the West, Foxe saw great battles over worldly supremacy play out between pope and emperor, between pope and prince, and, on a smaller scale, between bishop and bishop. The sequences on Silvester II (999–1003) and Gregory VII (1073–1085) were taken whole from the first edition of the Acts and Monuments and embedded into this claim that Satan stirred through the actions of Antichrist. What exactly is the Antichrist for Foxe? It is an entity given power by both the Papacy and the Turk. It is not a being of singular form, but multiple and obscure. Bernard McGinn has described the belief in the sixteenth century as ‘Antichrist divided’, an entity that offered deception and hypocrisy, working as Satan’s ‘human agent’ but not necessarily or usually within individuals but within the office or grouping of individuals.9 Martin Luther labelled the papacy as one form of Antichrist in his Address to the Christian Nobility, The Babylonian Captivity of the Church, and Against the Execrable Bull of Antichrist, all produced in 1520 as a response to his excommunication.10 Such representations were taken up also by Philipp Melanchthon and Matthias Flacius, amongst others, and in England by famous Protestants such as Thomas Cranmer, John Jewel, and John Bale. Antichrist was popular in Protestant thought because it provided an explanation for the abuse that they observed within the Church and, equally, explained the continued threat of Islam.11 It was a shorthand and explanatory device—but also a true belief— for the existence of corruption and denigration during an era of time when Satan was bound. The first half of Book 4 details the beginning of this decline in England in the form of Norman monarchy from William the Conqueror to the calamitous reign of the first Plantagenet king, Henry II and in a succession of contentions between archbishops, especially Lanfranc, Anselm, Thurstan, and Thomas Becket. In the German principalities in the form of Frederick Barbarossa and in the papacy in the form of Gregory VII. The ending of this chapter with Henry II is, of course, artificial as Foxe never conceived of a divisive break in his narrative less than 100 pages into

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the fourth book. This is a division constructed for this study out of necessity. Book 4 is the longest of the pre-Lollard histories and therefore more space is needed to examine its contents. However, there is some actual sense in this division, as this first portion of the book focused largely on foreign imposition on the secular state caused by Norman Conquest, rivalries between English bishops over issues of supremacy, and attacks on princely power. The second portion of the book (Chapter 7) alters focus, examining instead the kind of world that results from these early transgressions. As Figure 6.1 shows, the story of Thomas Becket is still overwhelmingly long compared to the other sequences. Foxe extracted the entire version that he had originally compiled for the first edition, inserting it into the second edition with a small amount of extra detail for the narrative on Henry II and more documentation on Becket. The sequences of Gregory VII and Frederick Barbarossa are similarly taken from the first edition. These contain few significant alterations.12 Meanwhile, the additional sequences, newly created for the second edition generally emphasise contention, first through the subjugation of England by the Normans but then through a series of cases in which the Archbishop of Canterbury and of York compete for influence and power. Although each Norman monarch is introduced by Foxe and granted some space in the narrative, most of their sequences are about disagreements within the Church. As per his Anglo-Saxon history, Foxe continued the practice of following one or two key sources to compile these accounts, to which he might insert variant or additional material occasionally. At this point, the sources are virtually the same, Foxe relied on the chronicles of William of Malmesbury, Henry of Huntingdon, and the Chronicon attributed to John Brompton, each of which provided near eyewitness accounts to events in the twelfth century. Foxe also relied heavily on the secular London history by Robert Fabyan, and, of course, continued to use the catalogues and writings of John Bale and Matthias Flacius.

The Norman Conquest and Lanfranc

5122

Hildebrand William I

12579 2075

William Rufus and Anselm

12320

Henry I and Anselm Papal matters Henry I and Thurstan King Stephen Frederick Barbarossa Henry II and Thomas Becket

7602 2761 4837 2216 4772 47202

Figure 6.1 Length of narrative sequences in the Acts and Monuments, 1570, Book 4, William I–Henry II (counted by the number of words)

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Kingship The story of William I is divided between the end of the third book and the two sequences at the start of the fourth book. In between are the sequences on Silvester II and Gregory VII, embedding the story of Norman hegemony within a larger story of an antichristian appropriation of the papacy. Foxe uses seven sources plus the occasional insertion from Bale’s works and the integration of sequences of relevant text from the first edition to tell this story.13 The core is taken from the chronicles of Robert Fabyan (mainly for secular history) and John Brompton (mainly for ecclesiastical affairs), with the other sources used to add evidence and examples. Foxe begins by writing that William ‘began his dominion ouer this realme of Englande [. . .] not so much by assent, as for feare, & necessitie of time’.14 His source, Robert Fabyan’s New Chronicles, had only stated that William ‘began his dominion ouer this realme of Englande’.15 Foxe, therefore, interpreted from and emphasised more than his source, the claim of a Norman Yoke. The claim that the citizens of London submitted themselves to William despite their earlier promise to assist Edgar Atheling is taken directly from John Brompton’s Chronicon.16 The next sentence returns to Fabyan, telling how it was the Archbishop of York who crowned William on Christmas Day. Foxe adds in brackets a reminder to his readers that this was ‘a duke made a kyng’ relating the story to a continuing theme in the book that over-ambitious nobles often cause disruption and failure. Foxe also made more of the fact that the Archbishop of York crowned William, citing from Fabyan that the Archbishop of Canterbury ‘was absent, or els durst not, or would not come in t[he] presence of the kyng’.17 The sequence continues along similar lines, with Foxe lamenting that William ruled ‘with great severitie & cruelness, toward the Englishme[n]’, mixing elements from Fabyan and Brompton in a near equal measure, and further arguing that by force he chaunged the whole state of the governance of this co[m]mon weale: & ordeyned new lawes at his owne pleasure, profitable to him selfe, but grievous and hurtfull to the people.18 Such an alteration is called unnatural by Foxe. The laws of Edward the Confessor, he claims on the same page, were remembered as the rightful order, upon which many rose up in ‘great commotions & rebellions’, but to no effect. By the end of William’s reign, the conquest is complete. The Norman Barons had been ‘planted & advaunced’ in the ‘landes & possessions of English Lordes’ whom William ‘either expulsed or els beheaded’.19 The clergy, too, had been replaced; English bishops were removed in favour of Norman clerics. A greater reliance on the papacy is also revealed. In one story, taken from Fabyan and Brompton, Foxe told how two cardinals were sent to England in 1070 to attend the Council of Winchester.20 It was this

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council where William replaced many of the English clergymen with Norman clerics. In another story, also taken from Fabyan, Foxe tells how William initially acted favourably towards Stigandus, the Archbishop of Canterbury, but rejected him as soon as the pope demanded it. Once again, the Norman Yoke is conflated with a papal yoke and, again, Foxe makes use of a select few sources—mainly the chronicles of Robert Fabyan and John Brompton— comparing one to the other.21 There are a few other items in William’s reign that are also noteworthy. Near the beginning, Foxe included an odd tale of a comet that appeared in the skies for seven consecutive days, which was widely interpreted as a symbol for the dying out of the English and their replacement by the Normans. The inclusion once again shows that Foxe is open to supernatural events if they have a basis in nature (and help to support his arguments). The inclusion also reflects the sources that Foxe used as most near-contemporary chroniclers refer to it. In this instance, Foxe took the story from the Chronicon.22 Foxe also includes details on the death of William, the Domesday survey, and a list of monasteries that were built during his reign. He also includes a list of 225 Norman Lords and Barons. This list counts all the Barons that arrived in England to take the lands of former Anglo-Saxon magnates. There are a variety of such lists in existence, including one in the Chronicon, but the version here is different.23 Foxe claims that he took it from ‘ordinale ecclesiastici officii’, which is of little help. In the fourth edition (published in 1583), he altered the claim to the ‘Auncient Chronicles of England’, again of little use. The first citation might suggest that Foxe found the list amongst one of the archives that he visited. Foxe had visited Hereford, Lincoln, Rochester, and the Royal Archives in the Tower. He had also received materials from Bath, Chichester, Durham, and York.24 Any of those collections might have supplied Foxe with a list of Norman Barons. Other possibilities include one of Matthew Parker’s manuscripts or material obtained from the now-deceased John Bale.25 Even near to the time, the origin of the list was unknown. In 1655, Thomas Fuller wrote in his The Church-History of Britain that he had tried to trace its origins because he viewed it as one of the most authentic that he had ever seen, but in the end had to admit defeat.26 Lists and genealogical tables appear to be important in the Acts and Monuments. Foxe had already supplied the most accurate genealogy of ancient British and Anglo-Saxon genealogy in the second and third books; in the first edition, he had supplied a list of monastic orders, repeated in this second edition, and each book ended with the succession of the Archbishop of Canterbury, taken from Matthew Parker’s De Antiquitate Britannicæ. In the fourth edition, Foxe added a second list of Norman Barons to supplement the first. This one is possible to trace as Foxe cites Guillaume le Talleur, who had published a chronicle of the Normans at the end of the fifteenth century.27 Also, Foxe is not alone in his interest. Raphael Holinshed had published a similar list in 1577 and John Stow in 1580.28

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The purpose must have been in part to supply historical detail to further establish his credibility as a historian. There was a long tradition reaching back to the twelfth century in England and France of supplying such genealogies. There might also have been an element of appealing to the nobility by offering clues to their family heritage. Most likely, though, Foxe was establishing a historical basis for a polemical argument, much as he had done when listing the Anglo-Saxon monarchies. Throughout Book 4, Foxe repeatedly returns to a claim that the ancestors of Norman Barons undermined attempts by the king to rebuff papal advances. The argument was at its most powerful, in the story of King John, where the root cause of his failure is levelled at a rebellious and disloyal baronage. Once again, as Foxe had stated at the beginning of Book 4, there is an example to be considered here, that ambition undermines the safety of the realm and harms the protection of the true church from outside interference. This was the accusation that Foxe chose to use, more so than any perceived threat and danger of someone or something being foreign or unknown. There were threats from abroad, many of them. The edicts of the papacy and the appearance of its agents on English shores brought with them significant difficulties. Constant warfare with France meant that land was gained and lost. The conquest of England by a Norman duke represented nothing less than foreign invasion. This, Foxe makes clear, calling William a ‘foreine conquerour’ causing ‘outward calamities’ and replacing natives with ‘Normands & foreners’.29 In this sequence, the claim of ‘foreignness’ as a danger and threat is vital to how Foxe understood the era. Yet the word ‘foreign’ or ‘foreigner’ is only used 35 times throughout Book 4, whilst ‘stranger’ is used 58 times (but sometimes positively, to tell of charitable acts), and ‘Italian’ 42 times. In most cases, the use of these terms is here because they appear in Foxe’s sources and are copied verbatim or in summary. Such an example can be found in the sequence on Henry III and the start of the Barons wars, where ‘stranger’ is written 14 times. Whilst Foxe copied this sequence from a combination of the Flores Historiarum, Nicholas Trivet’s Annales, and Walter of Guisborough’s chronicle, most of the references to strangers (alienigenæ) are derived from the Flores Historiarum.30 Matthew Paris was particularly fond of writing about ‘Italians’, appropriating English money, many instances of which Foxe copies.31 Additionally, Foxe, himself, did occasionally identify troublemakers in England as ‘Italian’, particularly the eleventh-century archbishop Anselm, and the early sixteenth-century historian Polydore Virgil. The term ‘Italian’, whilst most often taken from his sources, was, nonetheless, occasionally more useful to Foxe than a general claim of ‘foreigner’ as it identified the outside influence as an agent of the Roman Church. It also, perhaps, reflects his international attitude. Foxe saw the danger of otherness as the result of Antichrist. Antichrist had infected the Roman Church and came in the form of the ‘Turk’, but foreign rulers, traders, and scholars were to be judged by their Protestant credentials—conforming once again to the idea of archetypes—rather than

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being perceived by Foxe as a threat simply because they were not English. Foxe, after all, considered himself primarily a Latinist scholar and a humanist, connected to an international network. The use of someone ‘foreign’ being a threat is therefore used strategically. Rather than express any kind of general xenophobia, Foxe took the claims of his sources and turned them into an attack on the Roman Church. The conquest of England in 1066 did represent a moment when the Normans were a ‘foreign’ threat, but Foxe made it clear that they were also linked, irrevocably, to the Roman Church. That, then, was the story of William I. What about his successors? In the first half of Book 4, Foxe opened each sequence on English royalty with a summary of the monarch’s reign and their character. William the Conqueror is described as ‘wise but glyefull: Riche but couetous: a fayre speaker, but a great dissembler: glorious in victory, and strong in armes, but rigorous in oppressing whome he ouercome, in leuiyng of taskes passing all others’.32 Henry I is praised as a man of ‘knowledge and science in t[he] vij, liberall artes’, with Foxe arguing and emphasising that knowledge and learning ‘doth greatly conduce, to the governement and administration of any realme or countrey’.33 Stephen begins his reign with a lie and his rule is described as ‘vexed with warres’, whilst Henry II is considered a good king who through ‘his great manhode and policie’ augmented the rule of the English across much of the continent.34 William Rufus, meanwhile, is described as follows: So ill liked of the Norma[n]s, that between him and his Lordes was oft dissention. Wherefore (wel nere) all the Normans tooke part against hym: so that he was forced of necessitie to drawe to hym [t]he English men. Agayne so covertous he was, and so immesurable in hys taskes and takynges: in selling benefices: abbays, and byshoprikes: that he was hated of all Englishmen.35 The description places the second Norman king in a negative light, only trumped by the practical non-existence of King Stephen recorded a few pages later. However, the negativity is more a legacy of medieval chroniclers than of Foxe, who offers a more considered appraisal. William of Malmesbury had written that ‘greatness of soul was pre-eminent in the king, which, in process of time, he obscured by excessive severity; vices, indeed, in place of virtues, so insensibly crept into his bosom, that he could not distinguish them’.36 Ranulf Higden claimed that Rufus was open to bribery and was unpopular with everyone, whilst Robert Fabyan noted that Rufus was ‘vnstable of maners so that atwene hym and his lords was often dyssension’.37 Foxe includes much of this but also tells how Rufus refused to allow his subjects to go to Rome.38 He also focused again on the threat of rebellion, noting how Rufus had calmed it early in his reign; this is taken either from Ranulf Higden’s Polychronicon or the anonymously written Eulogium.39 Whilst the Polychronicon recorded that the English nobility was prepared

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to rebel, there is also an element of Bale here, who claimed, specifically, that Norman Bishops desired this rebellion.40 Foxe follows this amendment even though it came from nowhere other than Bale’s imagination. It seems that the idea cohered with Foxe’s beliefs that there were silences and blanks in the chronicle heritage that could be ‘perfected’ and extrapolated. The conflict between William Rufus and his oldest brother, Robert, Duke of Normandy, again offered Foxe the opportunity to ruminate on the topic of rebellion, as did the inclusion of an exchange of letters between Walran of Naumberg and Ludwig ‘the Leaper’, Count of Thuringia (so-called because he leapt into a river to stab the Count Palatine and steal his lands). In these letters, they discussed issues of Christian obedience.41 As elsewhere, Foxe makes the case that open rebellion only serves to undermine resistance to foreign, especially papal, attempts at supremacy. Although Rufus does receive some attention in the Acts and Monuments, the story of his reign is more about contention in the Church than about the king or his rule. The same is true for his successor, Henry I, whose reign is mainly concerned with the conflict between the archbishops. Foxe does mention that the king ‘litle fauoured the vsurped power of t[he] byshop of Rome’, but there is little here of substance.42 On the same page, Foxe describes Henry as a ‘clerke or beuclerke’ as he focused heavily on the administration of the realm. He is also described as learned. This is an important characteristic. Foxe goes on to explain that Henry tried to reform the State and the condition of the clergy, he kept the laws of Edward the Confessor, even reforming them, he disliked excesses and reformed many other things that had been ‘misused’ before his reign. Foxe exclaims in the marginalia ‘what learning doth in a prince’, viewing Henry positively. The sequence that follows on Henry’s successor, King Stephen is short, but mainly because it does not contain an account of fractious bishops. Foxe emphasises the war with Empress Matilda, telling a tale of religious portent in which an ‘old chronicle’ is said to have claimed that Stephen, whilst at Mass, went to offer up his taper, it brake in two peeces. And when t[he] Masse was done, (at what t[he] king should have ben houseled) the rope wherby the pyxe did hange, dyd breake, and the pyxe fell downe upon the altar.43 That same day, Stephen was captured by Matilda’s forces and temporarily imprisoned. The characterisation of Stephen is again negative. This is a king that Foxe describes as violent and bloodthirsty, and a king that is more usurper of the crown rather than its rightful heir, basing the accusation on evidence that Henry I had assigned Matilda as his successor, with her son, Henry, after her. Foxe narrates the story using Fabyan’s chronicle and the Annales of Roger of Hoveden as his core sources, supported by material from Henry of Huntingdon, Ranulf Higden, John Brompton, and Nicholas Trivet.44 He also uses Bale’s Catalogus, adding evidence from there that

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Stephen reserved to himself the right to bestow livings and investing in prelates, one of the few good examples in his reign.45 In general, Foxe tells how William, Archbishop of Canterbury ignored the wishes of the previous king and placed Stephen on the throne instead. Warfare ensued. Foxe could have made more of the fact that an archbishop had caused the disruption, but he seems little interested in it, preferring to move on quickly to the story of Henry II, Matilda’s son, the first Plantagenet King. When Foxe turns to Henry II, it is still essentially the same story of Thomas Becket as told in the first edition of the Acts and Monuments. This time around, however, Foxe bookends the story with a perfunctory summarisation of Henry’s reign taken out of Fabyan’s chronicle.46 Foxe shows that Henry began with a lot of promise. The king subdued Scotland and Wales, had control of Ireland and parts of France, and through marriage had access to the Mount Pyrenees in Spain. He also makes a statement about papal authority by placing the sequence on Frederick II’s contentions with the papacy, and his eventual submission to the pope, between the introduction to Henry II and the sequence on Thomas Becket. Helen Parish perceives the placement as significant.47 It enforced a parallel in which Foxe could emphasise the antagonism between popes and princes, and between spiritual and temporal authority. Other than William I, the Anglo-Norman kings tend to receive little attention from Foxe. He provides background details on their reigns and characters only to support his larger narrative on contentions in the Church. What Foxe describes fits within his wider prophetical framework: the Norman invasion, with the wholesale replacement of Anglo-Saxon nobles for Norman nobles, the tendency towards subjugation, and more particularly the emergence of a religious caste willing to ignore their king in favour of the ecclesiastical authority in Rome, provided evidence that this period saw the decline of the second age. For Foxe, the English situation was systematic of a larger problem that was only beginning to emerge, yet Foxe did not vilify the Anglo-Norman monarchies without just cause. Although much about the two Williams, Henry, and Stephen was negative, Foxe also recognised that there had been attempts to maintain control of Church affairs and resist papal encroachment. On this point, they had fared better than their successors, the Plantagenets.

Rivalry of the Archbishops Lanfranc, Anselm, Thurstan, Becket. They were each Norman archbishops, each, in their time, came into conflict with other archbishops or the king, and each was bound to the pope. For Foxe, each of them was also envisaged as part of a single archetype used to identify evidence of antichristian behaviour in the eleventh and twelfth centuries. The first half of Book  4 contains three core themes: papal corruption, rivalries between bishops, and attacks on princely power. The story of contention involving these four

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archbishops provided the link between otherwise separate stories about the Anglo-Norman kings, imperial contentions with the pope, and stories of necromancy in the papal court, aligning the core themes into a more harmonious narrative. The first is Lanfranc (c. 1010–1089), ‘a Lombard, and Italian borne’, who himself followed in a line of Anglo-Saxon bishops such as Dunstan, Athelwold and Oswald who Foxe had claimed as provocateurs of superstition and ‘monkish’ expansion. Most of the sequence is unchanged from the one that Foxe provided in the first edition, which emphasised the beginning point for a rivalry over primacy between the archbishoprics of York and Canterbury. Foxe tells of how early bishops were required to attend Rome to receive confirmation of their bishopric and that the controversy between York (Thomas) and Canterbury (Lanfranc) erupted once again when the question of primacy was raised. Foxe argues that Lanfranc had little historical evidence to back up his claim that Canterbury was the principal church of the realm, other than pointing to previous contentions between York and Canterbury.48 Foxe adds to this sequence a series of acts which Lanfranc presented at a Council in London, which included his claim that the Archbishop of York should sit on the right hand, the Bishop of London on the left, and the Archbishop of Canterbury in the middle. The acts further included rules for the behaviour of monks: monks should not have belongings, monks and bishops should not leave their diocese without first obtaining permission, none should sell or buy office, and none should have authority over executions. These were all issues that had been brought against the monasteries in the 1530s, suggesting, in Protestant eyes, that the same abuses had continued for centuries. The eighth act brought to the Council by Lanfranc stated that ‘no sorcery nor any diuination should be used or permitted in holy church’—a somewhat ironic rule considering the accusation of necromancy against contemporary popes and particularly useful for Foxe, who would next present his sequence on the sorcerer-pope Gregory VII.49 A further addition returned Foxe to the contentious issue of monks having replaced secular married priests in the churches that had occurred first during the time of Dunstan. Foxe writes, ‘Walkelmus bishop of Wint[chester] had place aboue xl. Canons in stede of Monkes for his part: but this godly enterprise was stopped by stout Lancfranke the Italian Lombard’.50 The inclusion of this argument does not only harken back to a previous contention but also emphasised once again the otherness of monastic life as a foreign imposition, and not genuinely English (or Christian) at all. Lanfranc died early in the reign of Williams’ successor, William Rufus, and was quickly replaced by Anselm (c. 1033–1109). The problems had with Lanfranc were now magnified leading Foxe to argue that it was he who ‘gave no little courage to Thurstanus & Becket his successors: & to other that followed after to do the lyke against their kynges and princes’.51 The Roman Church had made Anselm a saint, so, like Becket, his character required immediate denunciation and the reasons behind his sainthood disproved.

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Foxe combined evidence from the Gesta Pontificum Anglorum, by William of Malmesbury, and the Vita St Anselm by Eadmer for the character of the piece.52 These Foxe verified against a manuscript borrowed from Matthew Parker that contained a copy of Anselm’s epistles.53 The material was also added from fragments of text that Foxe had unearthed during his visit to Hereford, which helped him to document evidence against Anselm. The resulting story, tells of how two rival popes were up for the investiture between 1084 and 1100, and that William and Anselm favoured a different choice: the king selecting Guibert (the future Clement III), whilst Anselm supported Urban. Foxe claims, with no evidence, that the English gentry supported the king’s choice and that Anselm was alone in his selection. The difference of opinion on the election of a new pope led, inexorably to disobedience and contention relating to the potential for appeal to the pope, whoever that should be. Foxe outlines the two cases made. First, William Rufus argued, The custome [. . .] from my fathers tyme hath bene in England, that no person should appeale to the Pope without the kings licence. He that breaketh t[hat] customes of the realme, violateth the power and crowne of t[he] kingdome. He that violateth and taketh away my crowne, is a traitour and enemye against me.54 Anselm, in answer, argued, In such thinges as belong to God, I will yelde and must yeld by good right and dutie, my obedience to the vicare of S. Peter: and in such thynges as belong againe to the terrene dignitie of my prince, in those I wyll not deny to hym my faithful help and counsel, so far as they can extend.55 This first answer seems almost reasonable, but Foxe is clear that any preferential treatment to the pope over that of the king is intolerable. He adds, from Parker’s manuscript, further clarification of Anselm’s intentions: Whosoeuer he were, t[hat] would presume [to] proue it any breach of allegiance of faulty to his soveraigne, if he appealed to the vicar of S. Peter, he was ready to answer at all times to the contrary.56 Whilst this might have been a logical argument in the twelfth century, it would have failed to impress in the sixteenth century. Henry VIII had overturned such claims in his break from Rome, and there were few who could argue for its reversal now. Instead, Foxe could present the case that both sides made and leave it to his readers to understand the meaning. Indeed, turning Anselm’s own words and actions against him becomes something of a preoccupation for Foxe during this sequence. When describing his consecration, Foxe noted how Anselm claimed humility by appearing barefooted. Foxe

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was not impressed, claiming that the king saw insincerity in this action, arguing that the king had procured the position for him at ‘great expense’ but that in demanding his authority direct from Rome (rather than the king), Anselm had stood ‘stoutly’ against him and now, in his coronation, publicly defied him once again by acting meekly whilst simultaneously wearing his ‘popish vestementes’ and proceeding, as Foxe writes it, ‘vnto his popish masse’.57 The material that Foxe had found in Hereford deals with a debate in which Anselm discussed the similarities and differences between the Roman and Eastern Orthodox churches by providing a list of 29 points in which he claimed the ‘Greke church’ differed from the ‘Latin churche’.58 Amongst these, Anselm suggested that using unleavened bread for the Eucharist, ‘the diversitite of customes hurt nothing’. Yet again, the opinion would have appeared naïve to many of Foxe’s readers considering the events of the last few decades. Again, Anselm is criticised for following a ruling of the pope that even Lanfranc had resisted, which conflicted with English law, custom, and rights of kings. Foxe noted how a decree that he had found at Hereford from the pope demanded that the king ‘open sentence of excommunication [. . .] upon all such laye persons [. . .] that shoulde from henceforth conferre or geve any spirituall promotions’.59 In other words, only the pope could invest a priest. Anselm accepted the claim, against the privileges of the king. In summary, Foxe based his sequence on Anselm from a small range of sources and used them to build a core argument that Anselm was a protoBecket and of the same type as Lanfranc, Dunstan and other archbishops before him and the same type as his successor Thurstan. Anselm’s story continued into the reign of Henry I, ending with his death in 1109. The story of Thurstan continues in the same vein, making use of this time not only of William of Malmesbury’s Gesta Pontificum Anglorum but also Walter of Guisborough’s chronicle, Roger of Hoveden’s Annales, and Ranulf Higden’s Polychronicon.60 The story opens with the king having selected Thurstan for the archbishopric of York, only for him to act the traitor by siding with the authority of Rome. He obstinately refused to submit to the authority of Canterbury, forcing the king to settle the matter. Foxe tells how Henry, as the good and obedient subject of the Church that he was, agreed to the disputation and assembled at Salisbury to hear the two sides of the argument. However, at that assembly, the archbishop of Cant[erbury] in no case would yeld nor condescend to geue imposition of hands unto hym, unles he would make his profession of obedience. Thurstane agayne sayd he would willingly receaue and embrace hys benediction, but as touchyng the profession of his subjection, that he would not agree unto.61 The king sided against Thurstan, forcing him to give up his claim to York. Although this would initially appear to be the end of the story, Foxe inserts

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on the same page a marginal note that states that the pope intervened on Thurstan’s side and told him to ‘breaketh promyse with the king’. Foxe proceeds with a summarised update on the situation in Rome. Pope Paschal had died in 1118, replaced briefly by Galasius, who had only lived a year. Afterwards, two rival popes fought for power: one set up in France, Calixtus II, and the other in Rome, Gregory. Foxe tells how it was to Calixtus that Thurstan requests licence to visit from the king on behalf of his church. Henry agrees but sends secret word to the pope that for no reason should he consecrate Thurstan. The pope breaks that promise when Thurstan arrives. What happens at this point is a relative stalemate. Thurstan remains in France, as the king refuses to accept him unless he submits to the authority of Canterbury. In doing so, Foxe attempts to show that Henry was being reasonable by allowing the earlier slight to pass. Thurstan refuses the offer. Eventually, in 1120, the pope sends word that he would interdict both Canterbury and York, and excommunicate the king unless Thurstan could return without the need to subjugate himself to the authority of Canterbury. Under these terms, the king had no option but to acquiesce. The papacy had won the battle. Whilst Lanfranc had caused controversy for claiming the superiority of Canterbury, Thurstan caused the same controversy, claiming York as superior. Foxe makes no comment as to which side he believes, but it is an incidental detail to him anyway. The key point is that Norman bishops were causing disruption to the English Church and State to promote their own careers and had the support of the papacy to overrule their monarch. In so doing, Foxe attempts to align the characterisation of Lanfranc, Anselm, and shortly, Becket by aligning the description of each of them. He had called Lanfranc ‘stout’ and used that word multiple times for Anselm, especially as ‘the stoute champion of poperye and superstition’.62 Thomas Becket is also called stout multiple times and had also been publicly as far back as Henry VIII’s initial denunciation. The term ‘stout’ is not used for Thurstan, however, it seemingly being retained only for the Archbishop of Canterbury. Thurstan is only given cause and inspiration for his dissent by the others. The word ‘stout’ not only paralleled the lesser-known Lanfranc and Anselm to the better-known Becket but also made each of these Anglo-Norman archbishops the same. The parallel between Becket and Anselm was particularly strong. Firstly, both men had sided with the pope against their king; secondly, both archbishops maintained a similar opinion against the marriage of priests; and, thirdly, both had started off as friends of their king and had their bishopric forced upon them. Like Becket, as soon as he took on the role, Anselm had betrayed the king. In the first edition of the Acts and Monuments, the story of Thomas Becket was by far the longest and most important of the sequences in preLollard history. This made it a target for critics. Thomas Stapleton had not only attacked Foxe’s account of Becket in general terms but had provided a detailed commentary, identifying conflicting details, accusing Foxe of lies

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and misrepresentations, and revealing other material in Foxe’s main source, the Quadrilogus, and in other sources, that disproved some of the arguments that had been made. Stapleton argued that Foxe handled Becket too ‘simply’ and ‘coldly’ despite having ‘ministered you so much good matter, prosequting the matter .xj. leaues’.63 The criticism was also precise and targeted. Stapleton argues that Henry II is accidently revealed by Foxe as promoting ‘constitutions and ordinaunces’ that were ‘playne derogatory to many of the Popes Lawes’, thus framing the king as a provocateur and not an innocent as Foxe would have it.64 Foxe had called Becket ‘stout’ in his arguments. Stapleton claimed the same word, but for Henry II instead. The key to Foxe’s argument is the claim that Becket was a traitor, who died for worldly ambitions and not for matters of faith. Stapleton attacked this claim as well listing errors and misrepresentations that he believed Foxe had made. For example, Stapleton calls attention to the fact that Foxe cited only six of the king’s constitutions, three of which he claims were accepted by the Roman Church without issue. Another constitution that Foxe ignored, concerned Stapleton more.65 The king had ordered that none of his servants should be excommunicated without the king’s consent. Stapleton rebuffs this idea, claiming that Becket was in his right to appeal to Rome on this issue as excommunication was not worldly in purpose, but very much a matter of ‘fayth or religio[n]’. Stapleton also quoted Scripture back at Foxe. He argued that the claim that a saint can only die for religious purposes was absurd. St John the Baptist had died for ‘liberty and fredome of speache’, and many martyrs had died not for religion, but were nonetheless accepted without ‘controversy’.66 The miracles ascribed to Becket were also brought into focus. Stapleton claimed these as proof of sainthood.67 These points reflect the diametrically opposite arguments brought into play between Roman Catholics and Protestants in the sixteenth century. Foxe dismissed the miracles as fabricated; he understood excommunication as a secular punishment, but to Stapleton, these were not only justified arguments to make but also they were undeniable facts. In the second edition, Foxe includes everything that he had offered on Becket in the first edition, only removing much of the Latin versions of the epistles. He explained why Becket was not a martyr but a traitor and described his characterisation as taken from the Quadrilogus. Then Foxe offers an odd story about how Polydore Vergil had claimed Becket’s mother to have been of Saracen descent. Foxe ridicules this as nonsense and provides an alternative claim that she ‘came out of the partes bordering nere to Normandie’, again fixing Becket as a Norman foreigner.68 This reference is designed primarily to highlight the absurdities in the Becket tradition. At the same time, Foxe also cites a story from Robert of Cricklade who claimed that a burning torch could be seen from Becket’s mother as she reached up to heaven, which Foxe calls a ‘fabulous vision’, best omitted. In this new edition, Foxe uses several strategies to further discredit Becket. Firstly, Foxe inserts more detail about Becket’s time as chancellor.

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The characterisation at first seems oddly positive towards him, describing how he ‘began to love the mery gestings of the court, to delite him selfe with the great laud of men, and prayse of the people’, but this is to really claim Becket as a hypocrite.69 Foxe tells how Becket ‘had his bridell of silver’ and that the monks feared he would spend all that they had because of his reputation as a courtier and soldier. Foxe mocks Becket and the stories that had arisen around him, intending not to praise but to suggest that Becket ‘played’ his role as a man without conscience might do to raise himself up to a position of power; he ‘left playing the archdeaco[n], and began to play the Chauncelor’ and then ‘plaied also t[he] good souldiour’ before becoming archbishop. Secondly, Foxe uses his evidence to place doubt as to whether Becket had been made a priest before becoming archbishop, or whether, ‘as our most englishe storyes say’, he was made a priest the day before. The point is not pressed, presumably as Foxe did not have enough evidence to back up the claim, but by just stressing that English accounts made this claim gave it a sense of authenticity and again placed suspicion on other histories that might be considered foreign and thus untrustworthy. Thirdly, Foxe provides more evidence that Becket was insubordinate towards Henry II. Foxe inserted into the sequence a series of laws and customs that Becket had agreed to grant and those that he refused, adding them alongside those laws and customs inserted in the first edition from the proclamations of Clarendon.70 This inclusion was most likely another response to Stapleton, who had claimed that Foxe had hidden other decrees that did not work for his argument.71 It also emphasised the fact that Becket was acting outside of the king’s rule. A further inclusion of a letter from Alexander III to Becket, chastising him for ceasing to say Mass because of his ‘transgressions’ is shown as nothing more than a rouse designed for the king’s ears.72 Foxe explains it as an attempt to placate the king whilst, in secret, other letters were sent to Becket assuring him that the king could do nothing as another letter, sent to the Archbishop of York to confirm Becket’s dismissal, could not be handed over without the pope’s agreement. Much of the new material is designed to clarify points already made. Foxe adds a letter sent to Becket to Henry II in which the archbishop argued his case against the king. It is a long letter, and Foxe, it would appear, believed that it was useful to include in full so that the issues could be spelt out to his readers. He begins by announcing that Becket wrote the letter ‘to prove that Bishops and priestes ought not to come under the court & controlement of temporall power’.73 Foxe coheres this claim with a list of 11 historical instances when bishops and priest should be shown to have come under the temporal court. Another letter is added, this time from Empress Matilda to Becket, accusing the latter of rebellion whilst simultaneously offering her services as a mediator. In another new element, Foxe claimed that after Becket had tried excommunicating bishops who would not side with him, he accused various laymen and clerks to the point in which ‘almost all the

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court was accursed eyther by name, or as partakers’.74 This was again a response to Stapleton’s attack on Foxe, particularly the claim that the king had unfairly argued that he should be appraised first of any excommunication of his servants. Foxe, here, shows why Henry was right to include that decree as, without it, a wayward bishop could misuse excommunication for his own political purposes. Whilst the rest of the sequence is little different from what Foxe had provided in the first edition, the end does include a longer consideration of whether Becket should be considered a saint and martyr or a traitor. Unlike the first edition, Foxe also tackles the merits of miracle stories, probably in response, once again, to Stapleton’s criticisms. Helen Parish emphasises how Foxe described the miracles as ridiculous, monstrous, blasphemous, and shameful.75 In the first edition, Foxe had only referred directly to one claimed-miracle, the supposed power of Becket’s blood. Now Foxe added paragraphs that were meant to ‘trye and examine these his miracles’ but particularly to show that the miracles were most likely false or at most ‘wrought not by God, but by a co[n]tary spirit: of who[m] Christ our Lord geueth vs warnyng in hys Gospell, saying whose co[m]ming shalbe w[ith] lyenges signes & wounders to deceaue’ and that such a miracle ‘is but fained & forged of idle mo[n]kes & religious belyes for t[he] exaltatio[n] of their churches, & profit of their powches’.76 The concession by Foxe that some of  Becket’s miracles could not simply be refuted as feigned is defended in terms of his apocalyptic sense of the past. Miracles they might be, but feigned ones caused by evil spirits. Other miracles Foxe argued away as absurdities. Apparitional appearances and the curing of diseases and ailments were, for example, called absurd and vain. Even the fact that there were many claimed miracles is proof to Foxe that these were creations meant only to amplify Becket as a feigned saint, after the fact, rather than proof of his favour by God. Foxe is keen to defend himself on these points, and in doing so, he references a book belonging to William Stevenson that contained ‘all’ 270 miracles ascribed to Becket. Foxe, therefore, deals with Stapleton’s attack by arguing that he had reviewed all the miracles ascribed to Becket (he, therefore, could claim to write from a position of authority) and that what he had found did not convince him that the miracles were anything other than feigning creations of monks or signs of Satan at work designed to ‘deceaue the simple soules of Christes church’. In the fourth edition of the Acts and Monuments, Foxe took the rare step of adding even more material. This he took from the Regum Angliæ of Gervase of Canterbury. This addition is slightly odd, as Foxe had seemingly rejected Gervase as a source for Becket in the 1570 edition, instead favouring Gervase only for stories on church disputes during the subsequent reign of King Richard. In the fourth edition, Foxe appears to have changed his mind. Whilst the Regum Angliæ offered an eyewitness account of Becket,

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it tended to offer a viewpoint in full agreement with the hagiographies, but less detailed.77 The detail that Foxe adds is another miracle story. Gervase told of how Becket had supposedly appeared to ‘a certayne priest, named Thomas’ and had declared to him that he had so brought to passe, that all the names of the Monks of the Church of Canterbury, with the names of the priestes and Clerkes, & with the families belonging to that city and church of Cant. were written in the booke of lyfe.78 The claim, once again, is viewed by Foxe as absurd as it claimed favour on one specific group without the need for remission of sins. What it shows is that even a decade later, Foxe was still keen to refute the criticisms that Stapleton had levelled at him.

Conclusions Starting with the controversy between Lanfranc and Thomas during the reign of William I and ending with the accession of Henry II and the rebellious nature of Thomas Becket, Foxe traced the history of the eleventh and early twelfth centuries through three interdependent lenses. First, the corruption of the papacy; second, contentions in the realm of England; and third, rivalries between the papacy and empire. Competition over who held authority is, therefore, the key to understanding the narrative that Foxe expressed in these parts of his book. Although he did summarise each monarch’s reign and did include material that fell outside this core story, showing that the papacy sought authority over secular princes and revealing the slow build up of controversy this caused, the presentation focused on Becket and enabled Foxe to prove his interpretations of prophecy to be correct. Under Foxe’s revised schema, this was the end of the second age and it was beginning to crumble as Satan loosened its bindings. A succession of popes, beginning with Silvester II and later Gregory VII, heard the whisperings of Satan, leading them to corrupt the purposes of the papacy so that Satan and the Antichrist could be released two centuries later. Much of that story would be told after the Becket affair. The loss of authority by King John and Henry III in England, and the unfair treatment of Frederick II in Germany would become Foxe’s next subject of interest. In this first part, though, Foxe expressed the Norman Conquest as a rupture that coincided with Satan gaining influence of successive popes. He did so through a small selection of sources, many of which he had also used to describe the Anglo-Saxons. For the most part, these were English chronicles and annals assigned to John Brompton, Robert Fabyan, William of Malmesbury, Henry of Huntingdon, Ranulf Higden, and Roger of Hoveden. Foxe also used the anonymously written Eulogium and inserted references from

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the works of John Bale and Matthias Flacius. Foxe also inserted the occasional piece of material from other sources, including hagiographies. Entire narratives from the first edition of the Acts and Monuments—especially the narratives on Gregory VII, Lanfranc, Anselm, and Thomas Becket—were repurposed wholesale. These were occasionally enhanced or slightly rearranged, but were otherwise left largely intact. In large part, Foxe used the chronicles and annals as his core material. One or two chronicles formed the basis for an account with others used to supplement with incidental detail. The hagiographies were used cautiously. Their purposes were only to provide primary source material such as correspondences and lists of laws. Foxe also used them to form a characterisation of bishops such as Anselm and Becket, but all references to miracles and veneration are ignored or used only as a means of dismissal. In terms of methodology, Foxe both compiled primary source material en-masse and intertwined chronicle accounts into his own words. In both cases, he coloured those materials with a picture of an enthralled England, imperial authority being undermined by papal claims, and the foreign as equal to a claim of novelty and corruption. Whilst Foxe admitted that what had been before in England was not perfect, he saw in the Norman Conquest the removal of England’s ‘natural’ governance (including religious governance) with a foreign one, overly influenced by the pope. Often, he asked his reader to consider this picture as a possible omen of what could happen if Elizabeth and her ministers failed to protect evangelical religious reforms and what might happen if Elizabeth failed to provide a safe heir. The treatment (or lack of) of Gervase of Canterbury in the account of Thomas Becket reminds us that Foxe sought harmony between his sources and would favour those that best told a similar story. Thus Fabyan and John Brompton were closely aligned as were Henry of Huntingdon and William of Malmesbury. All but one of these (Fabyan) were local and near-contemporary authorities. The most telling element to be drawn from the first part of Book 4, however, is the way that Foxe understood cause and effect in the action of the Canterbury and York archbishops. Lanfranc, Anselm, Thurstan, and Becket were described similarly to one another. Each was described using similar words, and each placed in a continuum in which their characteristics and actions were compared to what Foxe believed was correct and wrong. Foxe argues over how each contention was an argument between custom, tradition, and ‘original’ truth, and the attempt to override these with novelties.

Notes 1. A&M (1570), 232 (217). 2. This is an argument that I first made in Matthew Phillpott, “Anglo-Norman and Plantagenet Kingship in John Foxe’s Acts and Monuments,” TAMO, 2009, www. johnfoxe.org/index.php?realm=more&gototype=&type=essay&book=essay16.

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3. A&M (1570), 237. 4. Compare A&M (1570), 238 with Polydore Vergil, Anglica Historia: A Hypertext Critical Edition, trans. Dana F. Sutton (Basel, 1555), 295, www.philological. bham.ac.uk/polverg/; Brompton, bk. 6, chap. 25 and Fabyan, bk. 6, chap. 212. 5. Jonathan Wright, “Marian Exiles and the Legitimacy of Flight from Persecution,” The Journal of Ecclesiastical History 52, no. 2 (2001): 220–43, https:// doi.org/10.1017/S0022046901005929. Reference at 226. 6. Ibid. 7. First printed as Christopher Hill, “The Norman Yoke,” in Democracy and the Labour Movement: Essays in Honor of Dona Torr, ed. John Saville (London: Lawrence & Wishart, 1954), 11–67, and reprinted in Christopher Hill, “The Norman Yoke,” in Puritanism and Revolution: Studies in Interpretation of the English Revolution of the 17th Century, ed. Christopher Hill (London: Secker & Warburg, 1958), 46–111. 8. A&M (1570), 237. 9. Bernard McGinn, Antichrist: Two Thousand Years of the Human Fascination With Evil (New York: Columbia University Press, 2000), 200–1. 10. Ibid., 203. 11. Christopher Toenjes, Islam, the Turks and the Making of the English Reformation: The History of the Ottoman Empire in John Foxe’s Acts and Monuments (Frankfurt am Main; New York: Peter Lang, 2016), 147–8. 12. The sequence on Frederick Barbarossa is almost an exact copy from the 1563 edition. Foxe does add additional examples of letters sent by Cardinal Benno for his new sequence on Gregory VII, which, in 1563, Foxe had directed his readers to find by themselves. 13. These sources are (1) the New Chronicles of Robert Fabyan (2) the Chronicon attributed to John Brompton (3) William of Malmesbury Gesta Regum Anglorum (4) William of Malmesbury Gesta Pontificum Anglorum (5) Henry of Huntingdon Historia Anglorum (6) the Annales of Roger of Hoveden (6) the annals of Lambert of Hersfeld (7) the Eulogium. 14. A&M (1570), 237. 15. Fabyan, 240. 16. Compare A&M (1570), 237 to Brompton, col. 961. 17. Compare A&M (1570), 237 to Fabyan, 240. 18. A&M (1570), 237. 19. Ibid., 251. 20. Although Foxe used Fabyan, bk. 7, chap. 220 and Brompton, col. 967–8, he also names the Cardinals as Peter and Paul. These names do not occur in either source and was most likely obtained from Hoveden, vol. 1, 122–3. 21. Compare A&M (1570), 238 to Fabyan, 241 and Brompton, col. 967–8. 22. Compare A&M (1570), 237 to Brompton, col. 961. 23. Brompton, cols. 963–5. 24. See Thomas S. Freeman, “John Foxe: A Biography,” TAMO, 2004, www.johnfoxe. org/index.php?realm=more&gototype=&type=essay&book=essay1. 25. Montague Rhodes James, A Descriptive Catalogue of the Manuscripts in the Library of Corpus Christi College, Cambridge, 2 vols (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1909), vol. 1, 183–4, 406 confirms that a similar list can be found in CCCC MS 177 no. 41, a composite manuscript containing miscellaneous documents, and in CCCC MS 96, the copy of John Brompton’s Chronicon. 26. Thomas Fuller, The Church-History of Britain; From the Birth of Jesus Christ, Untill the Year M.DC.XLVIII (London, 1655), 166–7. 27. Guillaume le Talleur, Les Cronicques de Normendie (Rouen, 1487), fo. 52r-v. 28. See Raphael Holinshed, The Laste Volume of the Chronicles of England, Scotlande, and Irelande, With Their Descriptions: Conteyning the Chronicles of

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29. 30. 31.

32. 33. 34. 35. 36. 37. 38.

39. 40. 41. 42. 43. 44.

45. 46. 47. 48.

49. 50. 51. 52.

From William the Conqueror to Henry II Englande From William Conquerour Vntill This Present Tyme (London, 1577), vol. 3, 293–4 and John Stow, The Chronicles of England, From Brute Unto This Present Yeare . . . 1580 (London, 1580), 153–4. A&M (1570), 237. For example, compare A&M (1570), 436 (415) on the recovery of Windsor Castle with Flores, vol. 2, 482. There are nine references to ‘Italian’ in the sequence on papal exactions in England during the reign of Henry III, A&M (1570), 378–88 (365, blank, 366, blank, 382, blank, 368, blank, 369, blank, 370). See, as an example, A&M (1570), 383 (blank) compared to Matthew Paris, CM, vol. 4, 419; the letter from England to the pope at the Council of Lyons in A&M (1570), 384 (368) with Matthew Paris, CM, vol. 4, 443; a second letter sent to the pope in A&M (1570), 387 (blank) with Matthew Paris, CM, vol. 4, 595. A&M (1570), 250–1. Ibid., 261. Ibid., 273–4. Ibid., 252. Malmesbury, GR, bk. 4, chap. 1. Higden, vol. 7, chap. 5 and Fabyan, 248. Foxe cites Matthew Paris. In this instance, this is probably Matthew Paris, HA, vol. 1, 50. The reference might alternatively derive from John Bale, The First Two Partes of The Actes or Unchast Examples of the Englysh Votaryes (London, 1551), fo. 49, although Foxe does include some Latin which is not in Bale’s work, but is in the Historia Anglorum. It is not from the Chronica Majora. Compare A&M (1570), 252 to Higden, bk. 7, chap. 5, 319–29 or Eulogium, vol. 3, 46–7. Compare Higden, bk. 7, 320–2 with Bale, The First Two Partes of The Actes or Unchast Examples of the Englysh Votaryes, bk. 2, fo. 50. The letters are taken from Martin of Opava, which can be found in Johann Heroldt, ed., Mariani Scoti Chronica . . . Adiecimus Martini Poloni Archiepiscopi Consentini, Eiusdem Argumenti Historiam (Basel, 1559), 443–51. A&M (1570), 261. Ibid., 273. See Fabyan, 273; Higden, vol. 8, 8–9, 16–19, Huntingdon, 756–7; Hoveden, vol. 1, 189–213; Brompton, col. 1036; and Trivet, 66. Foxe also refers to a change in hand in the chronicle of Henry of Huntingdon, taken from CCCC MS 280, fo. 195v. From Bale, Catalogus, 177. Compare A&M (1570), 274 with Fabyan, bk. 7, chap. 236, 273. Helen L. Parish, Monks, Miracles, and Magic: Reformation Representations of the Medieval Church (London: Routledge, 2005), 102. A&M (1570), 238. Frank Barlow, The English Church, 1000–1066: A History of the Later Anglo-Saxon Church, 2nd ed. (London: Longman, 1979), 234–6, has shown that there is evidence that Lanfranc based his claim on Anglo-Saxon rules that developed after the era of Augustine and Gregory I. A&M (1570), 240. Ibid. Ibid., 267. Compare A&M (1570), 267 with Malmesbury, GP, 107–12, 114–15 and Walter Fröhlich, ed., The Letters of Saint Anselm of Canterbury, 3 vols (Kalamazoo, MI: Cistercian Publications, 1990), vol. 2, 156–8, 163, 170–1 as cited by Thomas S. Freeman, “‘St Peter Did Not Do Thus’: Papal History in the Acts and

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53. 54. 55. 56. 57. 58. 59. 60. 61. 62. 63.

64. 65. 66. 67. 68.

69. 70. 71. 72. 73. 74. 75.

76. 77. 78.

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Monuments,” TAMO, 2004, www.johnfoxe.org/index.php?realm=more&gotot ype=&type=essay&book=essay17. This is CCCC MS 135 as described in Fröhlich, The Letters of Saint Anselm of Canterbury, 5–65. A&M (1570), 254. Ibid. Ibid., 255. Compare to CCCC MS 135 as found in Fröhlich, The Letters of Saint Anselm of Canterbury, 156–8, 162, 170–1. Foxe also supported this evidence from Malmesbury, GP, 85–91, 100–55. A&M (1570), 255. Ibid., 256–8. Ibid., 262. Compare A&M (1570), 270 with Malmesbury, GP, 402–3; 444–7, Hoveden, vol. 1, 171, Hemingford, vol. 1, 42–3, and Higden, vol. 7, 446–56. A&M (1570), 270. Ibid., 265. Thomas Stapleton, A Counterblast to M. Hornes Vayne Blaste Against M. Fekenham : Wherein Is Set Forthe: A Ful Reply to M. Hornes Answer, and to Euery Part Therof Made, Against the Declaration of My L. Abbat of Westminster, M. Fekenham, Touching, the Othe of the Supremacy. By Perusing Vvhereof Shall Appeare, Besides the Holy Scriptures, as It Vvere a Chronicle of the Continual Practise of Christes Churche in Al Ages and Countries, Fro[m] the Time of Constantin the Great, Vntil Our Daies: Prouing the Popes and Bishops Supremacy in Ecclesiastical Causes: And Disprouing the Prince Supremacy in the Same Causes (Louvain: Apud Ioannem Foulerum. An. 1567. Cum priuil., 1567), fo. 78r. Stapleton, fo. 78r. Compare A&M (1570), 283 with Stapleton, fo. 78r. Stapleton, fo. 78r. Ibid. A&M (1570), 279. See Vergil, Anglica Historia, bk. 13, chap. 3. Foxe would seem to have obtained this information from one of two surviving manuscripts at Lambeth Palace that contained a life of Becket compiled by a monk of Canterbury, who claimed to be an eyewitness to the murder (although the prologue is the same as another version which might suggest that this is not true). This manuscript contains details such as the name of Becket’s mother (Rose) and the claim that she came from Normandy. See James C. Robertson, Materials for the History of Thomas Becket, Archbishop of Canterbury, 4 vols (London: Longman, Trübner, 1879), xiii. A&M (1570), 279. Ibid., 280. Stapleton, A Counterblast to M. Hornes Vayne Blaste Against M. Fekenham, fo. 78r. A&M (1570), 291. Ibid. Ibid., 301. Parish, Monks, Miracles, and Magic: Reformation Representations of the Medieval Church, 102. Helen Parish also notes that Matthew Parker provided a less polemical account of Thomas Becket in his De Antiquitate Britannicae Ecclesiae. A&M (1570), 304. See Chris Given-Wilson, Chronicles: The Writing of History in Medieval England (London; New York: Hambledon and London, 2004), 126. Compare A&M (1583), 226 (211) to Gervase, vol. 1, 171, 229.

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Works Cited Manuscripts CCCC MS 280 Henry of Huntingdon

Printed Bale, John. The First Two Partes of the Actes or Unchast Examples of the Englysh Votaryes. London, 1551. ——— Scriptorum illustriū maioris Brytannię . . . catalogus . . . usque ad annū hunc Domini 1557 . . . IX centurias continens, etc.: (Scriptorum illustrium . . . posterior pars, quinque continens centurias ultimas). Basel, 1557. Barlow, Frank. The English Church, 1000–1066: A History of the Later AngloSaxon Church. 2nd ed. London: Longman, 1979. Brompton, John. “Chronicon Johannis Bromton Abbatis Iornalensis.” In Historiæ Anglicanæ scriptores X : Simeon Monachus Dunelmensis. Johannes Prior Hagustaldensis. Ricardus Prior Hagustaldensis. Ailredus Abbas Rievallensis. Radulphus de Diceto Londoniensis. Johannes Brompton Jornallensis. Gervasius Monachus Dorobornensis. Thomas Stubbs Dominicanus. Guilielmus Thorn Cantuariensis. Henricus Knighton Leicestrensis. Ex vetustis manusciptis, nunc primùm in lucem editi; Adjectis variis lectionibus, glossario, indicéque copioso., edited by Roger Twysden, 725–1284. London, 1652. Fabyan, Robert. The New Chronicles of England and France, in Two Parts; Named . . . the Concordance of Histories, edited by Henry Ellis. London, 1811. Foxe, John. “Acts and Monuments.” TAMO, 1570. www.johnfoxe.org. ——— “Acts and Monuments.” TAMO, 1583. www.johnfoxe.org. Freeman,Thomas S.“John Foxe:A Biography.”TAMO,2004.www.johnfoxe.org/index. php?realm=more&gototype=&type=essay&book=essay1. ——— “‘St Peter Did Not Do Thus’: Papal History in the Acts and Monuments.” TAMO, 2004. www.johnfoxe.org/index.php?realm=more&gototype=&type= essay&book=essay17. Fröhlich, Walter, ed. The Letters of Saint Anselm of Canterbury. 3 Vols. Kalamazoo, MI: Cistercian Publications, 1990. Fuller, Thomas. The Church-History of Britain; From the Birth of Jesus Christ, Untill the Year M.DC.XLVIII. London, 1655. Given-Wilson, Chris. Chronicles: The Writing of History in Medieval England. London and New York: Hambledon and London, 2004. Guillaume le Talleur. Les Cronicques de Normendie. Rouen, 1487. Haydon, Frank S., ed. Eulogium historiarum sive temporis: Chronicon ab orbe condito usque ad annum Domini M.CCC.LXVI., a monacho quodam Malmesburiensi exaratum; accedunt continuationes duae, quarum una ad annum M.CCCC. XIII., altera ad annum M.CCCC.XC. perducta est. London: Longman, Brown, Green, Longmans & Roberts, 1858. Henry of Huntingdon. The History of the English People, 1000–1154, translated by Diana E. Greenway. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1996. Heroldt, Johann, ed. Mariani Scoti Chronica . . . Adiecimus Martini Poloni Archiepiscopi Consentini, Eiusdem Argumenti Historiam. Basel, 1559. Higden, Ranulph. Polychronicon Ranulphi Higden, Monachi Cestrensis: Together With the English Translations of John Trevisa and of an Unknown Writer of the Fifteenth Century, edited by Joseph R. Lumby and Churchill Babington, translated by John Trevisa. London: Longmans, 1865. Hill, Christopher. “The Norman Yoke.” In Democracy and the Labour Movement: Essays in Honor of Dona Torr, edited by John Saville, 11–67. London: Lawrence & Wishart, 1954.

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——— “The Norman Yoke.” In Puritanism and Revolution: Studies in Interpretation of the English Revolution of the 17th Century, edited by Christopher Hill, 46–111. London: Secker & Warburg, 1958. Holinshed, Raphael. The Laste Volume of the Chronicles of England, Scotlande, and Irelande, With Their Descriptions: Conteyning the Chronicles of Englande From William Conquerour Vntill This Present Tyme. London, 1577. James, Montague Rhodes. A Descriptive Catalogue of the Manuscripts in the Library of Corpus Christi College, Cambridge. 2 Vols. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1909. McGinn, Bernard. Antichrist: Two Thousand Years of the Human Fascination With Evil. New York: Columbia University Press, 2000. Paris, Matthew. Matthai Parisiensis, monachi Sancti Albani: Historia Anglorum, sive, ut vulgo dicitur, Historia minor, edited by Frederic Madden. London: Longmans, Green, Reader & Dyer, 1866. Parish, Helen L. Monks, Miracles, and Magic: Reformation Representations of the Medieval Church. London: Routledge, 2005. Phillpott, Matthew. “Anglo-Norman and Plantagenet Kingship in John Foxe’s Acts and Monuments.” TAMO, 2009. www.johnfoxe.org/index.php?realm=more&g ototype=&type=essay&book=essay16. Robertson, James C. Materials for the History of Thomas Becket, Archbishop of Canterbury. 4 Vols. London: Longman, Trübner, 1879. Roger of Hoveden. Chronica Magistri Rogeri de Houedene, edited by William Stubbs. London: Longmans, Green, Reader & Dyer, 1868. Stapleton, Thomas. A Counterblast to M. Hornes Vayne Blaste Against M. Fekenham: Wherein Is Set Forthe: A Ful Reply to M. Hornes Answer, and to Euery Part Therof Made, Against the Declaration of My L. Abbat of Westminster, M. Fekenham, Touching, the Othe of the Supremacy. By Perusing Vvhereof Shall Appeare, Besides the Holy Scriptures, as It Vvere a Chronicle of the Continual Practise of Christes Churche in Al Ages and Countries, Fro[m] the Time of Constantin the Great, Vntil Our Daies: Prouing the Popes and Bishops Supremacy in Ecclesiastical Causes: And Disprouing the Prince Supremacy in the Same Causes. Louvain: Apud Ioannem Foulerum. An. 1567. Cum priuil., 1567. Stow, John. The Chronicles of England, From Brute Unto This Present Yeare . . . 1580. London, 1580. Stubbs, William, ed. The Historical Works of Gervase of Canterbury. 2 Vols. London: Longman, 1880. Toenjes, Christopher. Islam, the Turks and the Making of the English Reformation: The History of the Ottoman Empire in John Foxe’s Acts and Monuments. Frankfurt am Main and New York: Peter Lang, 2016. Trivet, Nicholas. Annales Sex Regum Angliae, edited by Thomas Hog. London, 1845. Vergil, Polydore. Anglica Historia: A Hypertext Critical Edition, translated by Dana F. Sutton. Basel, 1555. www.philological.bham.ac.uk/polverg/. Walter of Hemingford. Chronicon Domini Walteri de Hemingburgh, Vulgo Hemingford Nuncupati . . . de Gestis Regum Angliæ, edited by Hans C. Hamilton. 2 Vols. London, 1848. William of Malmesbury. William of Malmesbury’s Chronicle of the Kings of England From the Earliest Period to the Reign of King Stephen, edited by John A. Giles. London, 1847. Wright, Jonathan. “Marian Exiles and the Legitimacy of Flight From Persecution.” The Journal of Ecclesiastical History 52, no. 2 (2001): 220–43. https://doi.org/ 10.1017/S0022046901005929.

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At some point in August 1569, Sir William Cecil received a letter from the Archbishop of Canterbury asking if he could borrow ‘for a week or two, your book of Matthew Paris’s story’.1 Cecil agreed, as did other owners of other manuscript copies, such as Henry FitzAlan, Sir Henry Sidney, Edward Aglionby, and John Stow. By the end of that year, Parker had achieved the near impossible. He had in his possession all the known copies of Matthew Paris’ thirteenth-century Chronica Majora. Turn back nine years and we find that the Magdeburg Centuriators had singled out Matthew Paris’ chronicle when they requested from Parker materials pertinent to English history.2 John Bale had also promised the archbishop that there was evidence in the Chronica Majora that revealed in ‘lyuely colours’ the ‘excercrable procedynges’ of the pope.3 Once he had all the known copies, Parker and his household examined variations, made annotations on the manuscripts, and conflated the differences between versions so that they could publish a composite edition in the markets of London.4 That edition was released in 1571, one year after Foxe had published the second edition of his Acts and Monuments. In the preface, Parker emphasised his purpose as one concerned with the problem of history. The problem was not just how history had been told in the past, but in the authorities upon which it was based. He considered the history told by Ranulf Higden and Polydore Vergil (amongst others) as a poor foundation upon which a correct past should be founded. He believed that Matthew Paris, whilst imperfect, told more elements of truth. Additionally, the Chronica Majora had been all but forgotten in the sixteenth century. Few scholars had seen a copy, let alone used it. By publishing the chronicle, complete with appropriately leading annotations, Parker offered scholars raw material upon which a new, revised history could be compiled. The Chronica Majora was, however, only one component of Parker’s endeavour. There were other chronicles of near equal importance which, taken together, were intended as an alternative source base for late medieval history. The first of these was the Flores Historiarum, which Parker published in 1567 and 1570.5 Whilst the Chronica Majora contained history from 1066 through to around 1273, the Flores Historiarum took that history up to 1307. In 1574,

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Parker added to the set by publishing a version of Thomas Walsingham’s Historia Brevis (more often also called the Chronica Majora).6 This chronicle has a complex tradition, with multiple versions, but was essentially a continuation of Matthew Paris which brought the account up to 1422. What we have here is an alternative corpus of English history, all drawn from the abbey at St Alban’s and all intended, by Parker, to make a revised claim about the past. The revision Parker had in mind was based on opinion and bias. Richard Vaughan has described Matthew Paris as a ‘bigot’ and his views of both the State and the papacy as one of ingrained ‘resentment and prejudice’ based purely on parochial concerns.7 Matthew Paris could be quite vocal, as Vaughan argues when listing some of the words he used to describe the papacy: ‘extortion’, ‘avarice’, ‘simony’, ‘rapine’, ‘gluttony’, ‘licentiousness’, ‘temporal ambition’.8 It was no wonder then that John Bale had called Matthew Paris a skilled and wise historian who ‘painted’ the ‘avarice, fraud, lies, deceit, pomp, shamelessness, tyranny, and blasphemy’ of the pope for all to see.9 The Flores Historiarum, meanwhile, contained less of Matthew’s avarice, but enough to be worthwhile.10 The Historia Brevis was an independently written chronicle. Thomas Walsingham had spent 46 years writing it, borrowing almost nothing from other histories and, just like his predecessor, saw the world through the lens of his own monastery and viewed the papacy with disdain. This was an opinion fuelled, in James Clark’s words, ‘by traditional English resentment of papal provisions and contemporary Benedictine suspicions of the promotion of (mostly mendicant) papal chaplains’.11 The limited and inward-looking colouring of these histories, parochial as they were in original intent, could be and were transformed by Protestants to indicate papal tyranny. To make that case, Parker lent John Foxe two copies of Matthew Paris— one containing the history up to 1188 (CCCC MS 26) and the other between 1189 and 1253 (CCCC MS 16). Parker also supplied Foxe with a copy of the Historia Brevis (probably Arundel MS 7). These would prove crucial to the telling of Plantagenet history in the latter half of Book 4 of the Acts and Monuments. The story of Henry III and the first three Edwards had received only a short tease in the first edition. Foxe had mainly focused on the story of Cardinal Otto, Peter Rubeus and other papal officials coming to England to exact taxes and laud over English customs and authorities. These sequences Foxe retained but he also added considerably more to the second edition, arguing that England had been ‘made tributary to the pope and the Romishe church’. He further emphasised his opinion that ‘the insatiable auarice and gredines of the Romains did oppresse and wring the commons and all estates and degrees of the realm’.12 In the second edition, these sequences were to become some of the most important parts of the pre-Lollard history. It was here where Foxe told of an oppressed and dystopian England, drained of finances by a greedy papacy and weakened politically by enforced obedience to Rome. Foxe does not hold back. He calls it a period of ‘slauery, captiuity, & penurye’. The king ‘neither

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durste nor might remedy their exclamations by himselfe’.13 The failure of King John to control his baronage had led to the subjugation of the king’s power. Henry III was restrained by ‘the insatiable rauening of these gredye wolues’. England suffered because the barons looked to their own and because of the manipulations of Rome. This led to war and chaos. There was a moral here that Foxe made clear: those men of power who rebelled against their king would lead the realm to ruin and subjugation. The threat of rebellion for Elizabeth was as great as it was for King John and Henry III. The risk of papal autocracy ever-present. In the early years of Henry’s reign, Foxe uses the Chronica Majora to tell this story, recounting multiple accounts of papal extortion and greed. As events moved into the 1250s, Foxe, still using Matthew Paris but now supported by other sources such as Nicholas Trivet’s Annales and the Flores Historiarum, increasingly sought to show the building of political tension that would lead to baronial rebellion in less than a decade. The story of Edward I through to Edward III extends the use of Parker’s St Albans corpus with an increasing reliance on Thomas Walsingham, as well as Robert Avesbury and Walter of Guisborough. The St Albans corpus was, therefore, not the only lesser-known sources that Foxe used, but taken together these texts provided a variety of biases and opinions and the occasional unique factual detail that aided a Protestant reading of the past. These Foxe would claim as ‘truths’ buried within the chaff of other opinions, biases, and facts that did not suit his reading of history. Of course, such a selective reading of the source material led to circular reasoning. Foxe and Parker found exactly what they wanted to find in their sources, using biases to feed their own. The rest was ignored, denied, or claimed as outright lies or distortions. Granting authority to these lesser-known sources was equally important. The words of Robert Fabyan, Ranulf Higden, and Polydore Vergil were well known and easily accessible. Material extracted from these could be easily verified and understanding contested. Lesser-known authorities, especially an important one such as Matthew Paris, needed verification and justification. In the case of the Chronica Majora, this was achieved through the inclusion of citations. Foxe provided citations from time to time to manuscripts and printed books, but he rarely did so in a systematic manner, but he does for Matthew Paris. The reason would appear to be one of providing authority. Foxe knew that Parker was in the process of publishing a version of the Chronica Majora, and he was keen to prove that he had consulted the original to avoid any accusation of error or purposeful alteration that might be found in the published version. The combination of sources and the interpretation of them were also fed through Foxe’s prophetical schema. As described in Chapter 1, Foxe labelled Boniface VIII (1294–1303) and Clement V (1305–1314) as the two popes who completed the process of corruption that would lead to the unleashing of Satan in the fourteenth-century. They built upon attempts in the tenth

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and eleventh centuries by Silvester II and Gregory VII to reign supreme over the Church and over secular powers, and, under Innocent III, to bring forth monastic orders to alter doctrine in the twelfth century. Together, Boniface and Clement completed the process by corrupting faith itself and enthralling all worldly powers to their own. The era in which the Plantagenet family ruled in England was, therefore, one of turbulence, into which Foxe interpreted the chief cause at every point to come from Rome. Whereas the first half of Book 4 had told a story of internal division in the Church that occasionally crossed over into the secular sphere, the latter half described a fully realised dystopian past in which the papacy interfered at all levels of government, in multiple countries, and via a variety of underhanded means. When Foxe completed his narrative of Henry II, he tied it directly into this framework, continuously promoting the idea that all the problems of the realm resulted from papal interference. Thomas Becket was not just a traitor, but one given licence by Pope Alexander III to betray his king. In Germany, the same crime is committed against Emperor Frederick Barbarossa. Foxe makes similar claims for King John, Henry III, and Edward I. Foxe used lesser-known sources to show and claim that the papacy of this era was corrupting the Church and secular powers, and forcing its claimed superiority over both. The second half of Book 4 is structurally like the ending of Book 1 in the first edition of the Acts and Monuments, but much more detailed and much longer. In the first edition, Foxe had written about Frederick Barbarossa, then the Waldensians, and then Thomas Becket. He now switched these into a new, more chronologically correct and useful order. The sequence on Barbarossa now provided a segue into the narrative on Thomas Becket, and the Waldensians followed thereafter. Helen Parish identifies this re-sequencing as important. It offered Foxe the opportunity to place the Becket sequence directly after a woodcut showing Barbarossa supplicating to the pope, thus presenting to the reader a suggested link between the two narratives regarding papal attempts to intimidate and control monarchs.14 As shown in Figure 7.1, after finishing with Henry II and the Waldensian sequence, Foxe offers an altered sequence on King Richard, which emphasises examples of everyday contentions within the English Church, a narrative on the king’s crusade, and a series of conspiracies between the clergy, nobles, and papacy. The next narrative sequence is a reprint of the King John story, as first told in the 1563 edition. This Foxe leaves largely intact. He then expands his narrative of Henry III from 5,606 words to over 135,000 words. Figure 7.1 is slightly misleading in this respect. One-third of the sequence is a lengthy story of Frederick II’s conflict with the papacy (44,988 words). Foxe also inserts an epitaph to Innocent III and a table listing the great diversity of monastic orders (1,910 words), Hildegard’s prophecy regarding the corruption of the Church (2,379 words), a literary and anti-clerical tract called Jack Upland (4,847 words), a sequence on Gregory IX’s variance with the citizens of Rome (6,091 words), and a story of how the papacy encouraged and

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The Waldensians

4051

King Richard King John

24982 12985

Henry III and Frederick II

135823

Edward I Edward II

47973 12732

Edward III

31360

List of archbishops of Canterbury 2811

Figure 7.1 Length of narrative sequences in the Acts and Monuments, 1570, Book 4, Richard I–Edward III (counted by the number of words)

manipulated the French army to eliminate Catharism in Languedoc (7,645 words). In total, half of the sequence is not about Henry III at all. Book 4 ends with sequences on each of the three Edwards, detailing military affairs, the rise of anti-clericalism, and the continued interference of the papacy.

The Use of Sources There is a wealth of materials in these sequences, ranging from literary tracts to letters, official records, and verbatim copies of continental polemical texts. Foxe does not only cover the history of English and foreign kings and bishops but also includes stories of war, everyday contentions, heresies, biographies of learned men, and, above all, evidence of papal corruption and worldly desire. Parker was vital as a provider of old manuscripts, as a supplier of evidence pertinent to a Protestant argument, and as benefactor and head of a scholarly network that linked Foxe to nobles, clergy, and scholars across England and the continent. Foxe, of course, had his own contacts and his own collection of historical texts. These he used. Nonetheless, the connection to Parker became vital in this half of Book 4. Without it, Foxe would not have achieved the rich and colossal compilation of materials that weaved a story of failure and near destruction. As a first example, the sequence on King John was inserted without much change into the second edition, but the change that was made leads us directly to Parker’s household. In his A Counterblast to M. Hornes vayne blast (1567), Thomas Stapleton had specifically attacked Foxe’s claim in the first edition that most chroniclers claim that King John had been poisoned by a monk. Stapleton declares this a ‘manifest lie’, listing and describing all the accounts that disproved the claim.15 He was not alone. Two years earlier,

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Thomas Harding, in his A Confutation of a Booke Intituled an Apologie of the Church of England, had done the same.16 We know that Foxe was sensitive to criticism. In this instance, and with Parker’s help, he added evidence as a rebuttal to their accusations. In the sequence, the change is minor. Foxe adds proof from Walter of Guisborough who claimed that the monks had poisoned John with a dish of poisoned pears. In Book 6, as part of a sequence on the Proud primacy of Popes, Foxe offers a much more complex defence, taken from the researchers of Parker’s household. Foxe repeats his claim that ‘in the end’ John was ‘poysoned by a subiect of the Popes owne Religion, a Monke of Swynshed’.17 Thomas Freeman has looked at this sequence in detail, counting 14 sources including Caxton’s Cronycles, which Stapleton had mistaken as Foxe’s original source of the poisoning story. Foxe had really used the Eulogium, despite his own references suggesting otherwise.18 Other sources used and cited are Thomas Gray’s Scalachronicon, a French chronicle ‘in Meter’, Ranulf Higden’s Polychronicon, Thomas Rudborne’s Epitome Historis Majoris, Richard Rede’s Novo Chronico, the chronicle of Walter of Guisborough, John Major’s De Gestis Scotorum, the Brut, and a variety of anonymous manuscripts, which Foxe describes as ‘without name’ and written in either English or Latin. These all came from Parker. The revision of the sequence on Richard I provides a second example. The reworking of the sequence was not necessary to offer a different characterisation of the king or other key players, nor was it undertaken to significantly extend a claim to papal interference. The reason was driven by sources provided by Parker. In the first edition, Foxe had mostly followed the story told in John Bale’s The Actes or Unchast Examples of the Englysh Votaryes, adding some additional detail from available manuscripts such as the Flores Historiarum, Polychronicon, and the Annales of Roger of Hoveden. These were now replaced with material taken out of Parker’s copy of the Regum Angliæ by Gervase of Canterbury (CCCC MS 438) and the previously mentioned Chronica Majora of Matthew Paris (CCCC MS 16). The Chronica Majora was used to provide stories of English political conspiracies on a wide scale, especially the story of William de Longchamp. The Regum Angliæ, meanwhile, was most usefully used to expand the narrative of the crusade, especially the military chronology and the strained relations between Richard and the French King. It also provided stories of local disputes in England. As a source, Gervase posed difficulties for Foxe. In general, it was not particularly supportive to a Protestant revision of history by commonly offering support to Roman supremacy and doctrine, but it did contain examples of the local complaint, that emphasised political disputes between bishops.19 This was more useful. The Gervase material provided a variety of stories that revealed contentions between the monks of St Augustine’s and several archbishops of Canterbury from Theobald (c. 1090–1161) to Baldwin (c. 1125– 1190). A good portion of this sequence focuses on what historians call the Hackington dispute. This obscure quarrel between Baldwin and the monks

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of Christ Church Canterbury was an attempt to divert funds and property from the monastery to build a new collegiate church at Hackington. We are told that the monks were to blame for the dispute and that this is just ‘one example amongst a thousand others’ where they protected their own at the expense of the greater good. The reading that Foxe provides is not quite what his source contained. Gervase had argued the reverse.20 The archbishop was the one causing the dispute. He was attempting to take authority away from Christ Church and into his own hands and for his own gain. Foxe overturned the reading Gervase had given in favour of his own. It was more useful to claim that the disturbance was the fault of monks than it was to blame the archbishop. In telling such a story and giving it his own twist, Foxe ensured that his reader connected the dots by referring to his earlier narrative on controversies between York and Canterbury at the time of Lanfranc. Foxe argued that ‘where such dissension dwelleth, there dwelleth not the spirite of Christe’.21 Gervase provides a link in a chain which reached back to the beginning of Book 4 and which would continue to the reign of Henry VIII. This link enabled Foxe to connect the contentions within the Church that had featured heavily in the first part of Book 4 with the expanding horror of a church attempting to overrule secular authorities and place them under their submission. Furthermore, whilst Foxe does generally cite material accurately from the Regum Angliæ (even if he twists the words sometimes), he was not above imagining what might have happened within the silences as well. When Gervase described the quarrel between Sylvester, the Abbot of St Augustine’s and Theobald, Archbishop of Canterbury, Foxe inserted in his translation and transcription the claim that Silvester making a great bagge of money, went to Rome, where he obtained of the Pope, for money (for what ca[n] not money do at Rome?) letters that  the Archb[ishop] should consecrate the abbat, in his own church of S. Austen, and also not exact of him any profession of canonicall subiection.22 Gervase does not mention payment. Foxe, therefore, used the silence in the chronicle to claim that money most likely transferred even though there was no actual reference. He saw a possibility that money had exchanged hands, based on his understanding of papal practices, and made it a fact. This is not the only time that he does this. When using Matthew Paris’ Chronica Majora to describe the reign of Henry III, Foxe repeatedly uses the same trick. The best example can be found in a sequence called the ‘intolerable oppression of the Realme of England’.23 It relies on a method of duplication of stories already told, the removal of contextual and chronological indicators to make a point, and the use of silence in the source material to claim that money was taken when the source makes no mention of it. Foxe argues,

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During all this kynges tyme, the Realme was neuer lightly without some of the Popes liegers withal violence exacting and extorting continuall prouisions contributions, and summes of money to be leaued out of Celles, Abbayes, Priores, fruites of benefices, and Bishoprikes, and also lay mens purses, to the miserable empouerishing both of the Clergie, & temporaltie.24 The sequence offers a powerful message to Foxe’s readers, making the argument that the papacy had become greedy and corrupt and that Henry III, because of baronial rebellion during the reign of his father, was not able to do much about it. Foxe collated dispersed references to papal exactions and activities over a 50-year period from the pages of Matthew Paris and knitted them together into a cohesive list. Ryan Netzley, Mark Breitenberg, and James Truman have all described the martyrological elements of Foxe’s text as purposefully repetitive to harmonise original martyrs with modern ones, and thus claiming their similarities (and training new martyrs-to-be how to act).25 In this sequence, Foxe does the same, but with money. This was possible because Matthew Paris had himself obsessed over taxation. Richard Vaughan has described how any money requested by Rome, for any purpose, was repeatedly described as an extortion.26 Thus some of the claims Foxe makes about taxation do accurately reflect the words in the Chronica Majora. On one occasion Cardinal Otto is said to have assembled the Benedictine monks together giving them ‘strait orders’ and requiring money from them. Both Foxe and Matthew Paris provide that information.27 In another example, Otto ‘extorted from them [the Bishops] a great quantitie of gold and siluer’, as Foxe told it. Matthew Paris similarly wrote that the legate demanded money from the assembled bishops.28 Foxe repeated the claim that Peter Rubeus had extorted money by underhand means and had plotted to gain more money through the promise of a crusade. He also reported that Martin had arrived in England with blank papers signed by the pope’s seal so that he could write to whoever and for whatever purpose he liked.29 In other cases, Foxe included money when the Chronica Majora remained silent on the matter. For example, when Matthew Paris referred to the king asking Cardinal Otto to stay rather than return to Rome, he makes no reference to payment. Nevertheless, Foxe inserts that story and adds that Otto stayed but ‘not without some English money, ye may be sure’.30 It seems that wherever papal agents had the opportunity to claim monies from English authorities, then this is argued as likely to have occurred, even if the source makes no such reference. This provides an impression that more money was taken from England during these years then the evidence supports, whilst never once actually making a false claim. The use of repetition in the sequence emphasises these claims. One of the best examples is an argument that ‘Italians & straungers receauyng of yearely rentes out of England’, came to a total of 60,000 marks per year, more than

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the government received in the same period. This claim appeared once on page 383, twice on the subsequent page in both text and marginalia, and again on page 386. Foxe similarly repeated some of the collections that Cardinal Otto and other papal agents made. The story of Otto and Peter Rubeus was newly formed for this sequence, but it also appeared in the same form as it had been written in the first edition, as part of the general narrative of Henry III’s reign. In making such repetition in the text, Foxe is not entirely deceptive. He makes it clear in the narrative the date of these events, but by insinuation and repetition, he creates an image in the reader’s mind that more money was regularly and increasingly demanded of England. Besides all of this, Foxe used the Chronica Majora to accuse the papacy of avarice, domination, and disrespect in the treatment of secular governments. Embedded in the main sequence on Henry III, Foxe recites how when Cardinal Otto first came to England, he was met with a great honour: At receauing of which Legate, great preparuance was made, many rich and precious giftes in scarlet, in plate, in iewels, in money & palfreys were geuen him. Whom the kyng also him selfe went as far as the Sea side to receaue, bowing downe his head in low course to the Cardinals knees.31 The Bishop of Winchester also offered the Cardinal 50 oxen and 8 vessels of wine. Foxe shows that such respect did not go two ways. Otto subsequently bestowed benefices to whomever he wanted whether they were ‘meete, or vnmeete’ for the post. To achieve his aims, Otto used Bulls that enabled him to transfer benefices to foreign bishops—Foxe specifically states ‘from Italy and other places’—which, Foxe adds, was against the ‘auncient libertie and right of the true patrons therof’.32 Otto was not alone. Some years later the papal agent Mumelius brought 24 ‘Romanes’ to England to be beneficed.33 In 1244, another papal envoy, Martinus could suspend prelates in England from giving benefices unless Italians were first selected for the posts.34 Such activities did not go ahead without opposition. Part-way through the sequence, Foxe recites a letter sent by the nobles of England to the pope in which they complained that the realm was ‘oppressed’ from heavy taxation and over-reliance (and preference) granted to Italians bishops, which resulted also in money from those benefices leaving the realm. In telling these stories Foxe does not present his reader with the full story. It is true that there is nothing here that cannot be found in the Chronica Majora. Foxe is accurately extracting his material. However, Foxe also leaves out the occasional inconvenient truth. Returning, as an example, to the story of Cardinal Otto being welcomed to England with great respect and gifts, it is notable that Matthew Paris also wrote that Otto ‘did not accept of all the presents offered him’ and had received them with ‘a benign countenance’.35 On another occasion, Foxe extracts a passage from the Chronica Majora telling how Edmund, Archbishop of Canterbury worked on behalf of the

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pope to extract money from the English Church. What Foxe fails to mention is that Edmund was a reluctant pawn. Matthew Paris had written how Edmund had initially resisted the pope’s demands.36 Although Matthew Paris did write vehemently against taxation by papal agents, he equally complained of secular taxation.37 During 1243, Matthew Paris noted that the citizens of London ‘were aggrieved by a very heavy impost called a tallage’ that enforced their payment of money to the king for foreign wars.38 On another occasion, in 1247, he tells how the king filled the saddlebags of his brothers’ horses with ‘such a weight of money that he was obliged to increase the number of his horses’, and his other brother he gave the castle of Hertford with ‘a large sum of money’. His reason was to appear destitute himself so that he could ‘plunder or beg his own food’ from the poor of his own country.39 These, and many like stories, angered Matthew Paris and drew out his derogatory language of equal stature to that he made against the papacy. Foxe included nothing of these in his book. Yet again then, it is the expectation of an occurrence that is read into the meaning of the text, not just its actual meaning or words. Repeatedly, Foxe reads between the lines, inserting what he expected to exist there and considers the silences between letters and words as an opportunity to re-insert what he thought had been left unwritten and forgotten. Sources proving the poisoning of John, tales of contention from Gervase, and ‘intolerable oppression of the Realme of England’ are just a few examples of how Foxe made use of Parker’s manuscript collection. There are many others. One such example can be found in Foxe’s description of heretical groups and the difficulty he had in providing a useful account. In the second edition of the Acts and Monuments, Foxe retains his original sequence on the Albigensian Crusade intact, but also adds a new sequence that told in more detail the events that led to the destruction of the Cathars. Foxe attempts to understand whether the Cathars were proto-protestants or heretics. There was actually a wide range of differences in doctrine, but the sources that Foxe had available were vague regarding the tenants of their faith and often what Foxe did find did not support a correlation between the Cathars and sixteenthcentury Protestantism. Foxe wanted to believe that the Cathars held beliefs analogous to his own, but he could not prove it. The Cathars were not alone in lacking proof that supported Protestant allegiance; the Lollards too proved difficult.40 The sources that did exist explained heretical doctrines from the bias of conformity to the Roman Church. In frustration, Foxe admitted that Cathar faith ‘can not be wel gathered by the old popishe histories’.41 Having failed then to uncover the necessary evidence to turn his belief of analogous faith into proof of it, Foxe instead focused on where his sources were stronger. Using the Chronica Majora, Foxe sought to show that the papacy had put undue pressure on the French to persecute the Cathars.42 Foxe sought to also show, through Parker’s manuscripts, that papal agents tricked and lied to force the Cathars into a surrender.

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Sources and Evidence for the Three Edwards The expansion of the pre-Lollard text into the latter thirteenth century and to the moment of Satan’s unbinding completed the story that Foxe had begun by telling the story of an enthralled England under King John and Henry III. Again, Parker’s manuscripts were vital. The sequence on Edward I begins with the putting down of rebellion in Wales, but the longer part of the sequence is reserved for his war with Scotland. Foxe also provides lengthy sequences on contentions between Philip IV of France (1268–1314) and Pope Boniface VIII (ruled 1294–1303) and more examples of problems within the English Church. Foxe reminds his readers that these occurrences are proof of the servitude of England in the thirteenth century. He explains, The churche of Rome began dayly more and more to ryse up and swell so high in pride and worldlye dominion: that no king almost in his own country could doo any thing, but as pleased the pope: who both had and ruled all, in all countries, but chiefly here in Englande.43 The initial narrative on the Welsh and Scottish wars are political and secular. Foxe focuses most of his attention on what he calls the ‘false vntroth’ of the Scottish and French kings, and the rise and death of William Wallace (d. 1305). He even offers an apology, admitting that these stories appertayne not greatly to the purpose of our story ecclesiasticall: yet so much by the waye I thought briefly to touch, whereby the better it might be vnderstanded by these premises, that which foloweth in the sequele hereof.44 It is no surprise that the sequel is an argument that the pope exacerbated tensions and caused further warfare for his own profit. The Scots ask Boniface VIII to intervene. His response is one-sided: in Foxe’s words, Boniface immediately sendeth downe hys precept to the king, to this effect, t[hat] he should hereafter surcease to disquiet or molest the Scots, for that thei were a people exempt and properly pertaining to his chappell.45 The claim of exemption by the pope was particularly troubling. What gave the pope the right to place another country under his protection and therefore interfere in the natural disputes between realms? The English believed that they had a rightful claim to Scotland. The Scottish disagreed. The pope should have had no prerogative on the matter. Indeed, if not for his onesided interference, peace might have been pursued, Foxe tells his readers. Instead, the Scots fought on for another year causing more deaths, more suffering, and more problems. Foxe makes a claim that the pope was listening to falsified reports when he tells of how Edward I responded to the pope

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and argued that he should not ‘geue light eare to the sinister suggestions of false reporters, and imaginers of mischief’.46 On the same page, Foxe tells how Edward asked the pope to check his facts, suggesting a variety of old records and histories that proved England’s claim to Scotland. These sources, Edward is stated as claiming, ‘geue manifest euidence’ of the kings ‘title of superioritie, euer continued and preseued hitherto’. Foxe then adds his own check for his own readers by providing an almost word-for-word narrative of England’s claim to Scotland from Nicholas Trivet’s Annales.47 All of this is to no avail. Foxe tells how the papacy had no problem ignoring such facts if it meant furthering their own ambitions. The next pope, Clement V (ruled 1305–1314), annuls the oath to Edward previously made by Robert Bruce (1274–1329), proving once again that the Roman Church no longer cared for truth or recognised princely authority. As an epilogue to this affair and prologue to the lengthier war between Philip and Boniface, Foxe tells how the pope also disregarded French authority by attempting to ‘excite’ Edward to war against the French King and ‘promising him great ayde therunto’. Foxe confuses his sources here. He cites Robert de Avesbury but uses the Historia Brevis of Thomas Walsingham (he does this several times, as noticed by Elizabeth Evenden and Thomas Freeman).48 From that source, Foxe tells how Edward refused because he did not trust ‘the popes false vnstable affection toward him’. The dispute between Philip of France and Pope Boniface also addresses the king’s attempt to control the clergy and Knights Templar in his country. Foxe uses a combination of his usual sources: the catalogues of John Bale and Matthias Flacius, Nicholas Trivet’s Annales, and Walsingham’s chronicle.49 Foxe next returns to English affairs by providing an example of the pope setting up the candidate for Canterbury and ignoring the king’s own choice. This selection was John Peckham (c.1230–1292), whom Foxe implied had been enlisted by the papacy to enact papal policies in England rather than offering loyalty to the king. One example that Foxe gives tells how Peckham directed a papal bull to England that decreed no church nor ecclesiastical person should yield tributes to a secular prince. Foxe denounces the decree as against ‘the commanded ordina[n]ce of God, and the Apostolicall canon of S. peter, and all other examples of holye scripture’, printing it in full—but only in Latin so that the less learned reader would not be confused by its content or influenced by its claims.50 The bull caused immediate problems in England. When Edward I attempted to raise taxes by Parliament the clergy refused to pay because of it. The purpose, Foxe suggests, was not only to over-rule the secular monarch but also to have a ‘weight against him’. By this stage of the narrative, the story had become more militaristic in tone, with Foxe showing how the papacy stirred up controversy and variance between sovereign kingdoms on a regular basis. The secularisation of the narrative and the move away from strictly ecclesiastical affairs were, however, relevant. Foxe saw the wars leading to and including the Hundred Years’ War as evidence of the papacy’s increased interference.

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By the time Foxe reached Edward III’s reign, most of the material is taken from a combination of Thomas Walsingham, Nicholas Trivet, Matthew of Westminster, and the anonymous Chronicon Angliæ, all manuscripts that Parker had shared with Foxe. It is in this way that Foxe partook in Parker’s alternative corpus of English history. He used sources that were lesser known, and less available, to show that the traditional corpus failed to record history properly. The truth could be found within a wider and inclusive use of all English historical chronicles, not just in a select few that the Roman Church had used to strengthen its hold on the realm. Parker provided the manuscripts and some of the analysis and arguments, Foxe provided the rest, transforming the raw materials into a cohesive history of an antichristian Church, including the enthrallment of secular authorities. Taken together these sequences on papal interference between England and Scotland, in France, and in England itself, demonstrate the problem of a papacy taken over by antichristian desires and needs. Foxe complains that the papacy ‘put downe princes, excommunicated kings, such as did not take their confirmation at his hand’.51 This was not just an English problem, but a worldwide problem. It was also a problem that met with resistance. Foxe goes to some lengths in Book 4 to show that papal demands were not just accepted without comment. They knew that something had gone wrong. This was not what the Church was meant to be about. The sequences on King John, Henry III, and Edward I had shown how they each tried to resist papal demands and taxation. The sequence of Edward III does the same. Foxe transcribes various correspondences in which the king can be seen to attempt, but fail, to alleviate papal enthrallment of England. Parker’s influence is felt strongly. Foxe relied mainly on the chronicle of Thomas Walsingham (borrowed from Parker); he also inserted material from William Rashanger’s continuation of the Flores Historiarum (also from Parker), Bales Catalogus, and the chronicles of Platina and Walter of Guisborough. Foxe relied, in addition, on Nicholas Trivet’s Annales (which Foxe might have inherited from Bale and then passed to Parker). Trivet was used as a counterweight to Walsingham, providing alternative authority for stories such as on Boniface IX, the story of Cardinal William Testa, and a Council held at Carlyle in 1307. As in other parts of Foxe’s history, however, not all of the sources were assembled from Parker. Many of the sources that were obtained from elsewhere continued the story of resistance to papal and church tyranny. For example, resistance could also be found in medieval literature. Nestled between the prophecy of Hildegard (reprinted from the first edition) and the sequence on the Albigensian crusade, is a complete transcription of a literary and subversive tract called Jack Upland. Foxe claimed the work as belonging to Geoffrey Chaucer. It was actually of Lollard origin, most likely written in the early fifteenth century. The attribution to Chaucer was not, however, a mistake first made by Foxe, if indeed it can be called a mistake.52 The attribution was first made during the final years of Henry VIII when

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evangelical scholars sought a means to publish evidence of anti-fraternal and Lollard literature. Henry had banned such publications under his Act of Six Articles, but a claim to authorship by Chaucer circumvented such rules and had the added benefit of providing greater authority and popularity for the work. It was also not an unprecedented claim, Chaucer had long been associated with Lollardy.53 The inclusion of Jack Upland in the Acts and Monuments was partly one of opportunity. Its printer, John Day, had the rights to its publication.54 This was an opportunity to use those rights. More than that, though, Jack Upland had a practical purpose. It not only provided more evidence that the practices of friars had become corrupted, but it acted as a proxy for popular knowledge and anger against the monasteries. It was one thing for scholars and clergymen to write against the monks, distant as they were from the ordinary populace. It was another thing entirely for a celebrated and popular writer such as Chaucer to make such statements. The writings (and claimed writings) of Chaucer also offered evidence for remnants of the true church in late medieval England. Holly Crocker has called Chaucer’s role in the Acts and Monuments as one that attempted to reveal the persistence of truth.55 Chaucer’s writings are therefore an archetype in a similar vein as the use of martyrs in the Roman period and kings and princes of later periods. The persona of Chaucer is one that is outside of ordinary time. In the Acts and Monuments, his writings are examined as part of the anti-fraternal polemic in the thirteenth century and again reappears in the fifteenth century but are not found in his own time. Crocker calls this an ‘expressive affinity’, meaning that Foxe used and understood Chaucer’s writings as dislocated from a specific moment in time. Instead, Chaucer is expressive of an idea of popular resistance to clerical abuse of authority that exists at all moments of time. It is another example of Foxe’s sense of the past as a cycle that repeats. Another sign of the true faith’s survival and resistance could be found in Foxe’s use of Robert Grosseteste (1175–1253). Grosseteste had been an English philosopher and theologian (educated and teaching at Oxford) and had later held the position of Bishop of Lincoln. Foxe promoted Grosseteste because of his links to Wycliffe and the Lollards, who had celebrated him as a predecessor of their own religious opinions (as detailed in Bale’s manuscript Fasciculi Zizaniorum).56 There was danger in this reading, however. The claim that the Lollards had made rested on a misinterpretation of Grosseteste’s core arguments about the abuse of the pope’s pastoral office. Grosseteste was not antipapal. He was concerned with practical issues such as what happened to those who were incapable of carrying out duties for one reason or another. Grosseteste’s Aphorisms (statements), supplied to the Council of Lyons, support this position. Foxe and the Lollards before him, however, misread them, believing that Grosseteste had accused the papacy of being the Antichrist. What he claimed was nothing more than a danger of Antichrist’s influence if the papacy ignored the problems that he had outlined. Foxe

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prints the Aphorisms as evidence of the papal Antichrist, viewing the statements through Lollard eyes and not by how they were originally intended. Foxe supported this reading of Grosseteste with an apocryphal story that once again demonstrated the supernatural hand of God in human history. It is a tale of Pope Innocent IV (1243–1254), taken from a combination of Foxe’s key sources: Matthew Paris’ Chronica Majora, Matthew of Westminster’s Flores Historiarum, Nicholas Trivet’s Annales, and John Bale’s Catalogus.57 The story tells of a vision that the pope had one night. He slept, and in his dreams was struck on his left side by a staff wielded by Grosseteste himself. Innocent awakes and discovers that he is injured on his left side: ‘Oh (sayth he) how sore is my side, & how egerly it vexeth me, as being run through w[ith] a spear’.58 Foxe understood this story as the enactment of prophecy and a sign of God’s retribution. Grosseteste had offered the papacy one last chance to reform. Innocent had ignored the opportunity and therefore suffers retribution. One year after Grosseteste died (in 1253), Innocent IV also died, which Foxe took as further proof of divine intervention. God’s involvement in history also resurfaces in the characterisation of Edward I. He is described as pious. When his father, Henry III had died, Edward had ‘wept and lamented’ his passing as a ‘louing and natural child’ would.59 The result is God’s protection. On the same page, Foxe narrates a story of how Edward barely escaped accidental death but that ‘the present hand and might prouidence of the liuyng God’ had saved him. In another example, Foxe tells of a time when Edward uncharacteristically acted in anger against another man. It occurred when the king was out hawking, and he observed that one of his gentlemen was acting negligently on the other side of the river. In anger, Edward ‘leaped strait into t[he] floode’ with the intention of taking ‘the death of his man’. As a response, God sent Edward a warning; a near-death experience. The king almost drowns in the river. These providential stories mirror those Foxe had written in his Anglo-Saxon history for Edwin of Northumbria who also escaped death because of his Christian actions but faced possible punishment whenever he risked deviating. It also mirrors Foxe’s characterisation of Constantine the Great, who won victory over the Roman Empire by displaying the Christian banner in battle. Providence can be found enacted for a variety of individuals in the Acts and Monuments. Queen Mary was perhaps the most famous.60 As queen, she committed every mistake possible—marrying foreigners, listening to poor advisors, rejecting reform, burning the true faithful—and as a result, ‘the Lord did work agaynst her’.61 Foxe did not, however, claim divine acceptance and rejection for all monarchs. He was selective, choosing those who appeared to highlight godly or ungodly attitudes—thus those who were of most interest to his narrative—and sidelining those who offered less of interest. Indeed, such direct colouring of the story along these lines does not happen again until Foxe narrates the failure and death of Richard III in the

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fifth book as the result of God’s retribution on a king who failed to defend the faith. Up until this point in Book 4, Foxe had generally spun a narrative in which the English king had attempted to defend the kingdom from the unfair demands of the papacy only to be betrayed by a fractious and rebellious nobility or a self-interested clergy. Similar arguments were made for other realms, other monarchs, and other nobles as well. Much of this narrative is turned upside down when Foxe came to the reign of Edward II. This is a king that Foxe describes wholly in the negative, claiming him of ‘euill disposition much deformed’ and ‘vnstedfast of worde, and light to disclose secretes of great counsaile’.62 Foxe even declares the king ‘tyrannous’— although he takes these words from his source the Historia Brevis—and argues that through the king’s reliance on foreign council enabled Satan to sow ‘discord’ and stir up trouble.63 Foxe supplies his reader with an immediate example in the form of Piers Gaveston (c.1284–1312). This man had been exiled during the reign of Edward I for ‘his naughtie and wicked familiaritie with his sonne Edward, and for his seducyng of him with sinister counsaile’.64 Although Edward II had promised at his coronation not to ally himself again with Gaveston, this was not a promise that he kept. Gaveston, once again, became Edward’s sole trusted advisor. This was considered a problem by the English nobles who, themselves, lost their counsel with the king and considered Gaveston also as dangerous and treacherous. In time, as Foxe narrates, the nobles managed to force the king to send him into exile. However, when Edward could not rely on him anymore, he sought out other advisors, also at odds with the kingdom. One such example is Hugh Despenser the Elder and Hugh Despenser the Younger, a father and son who were widely accused of hindering good governance and, like Gaveston, only interested in their own greed and power. As before, Foxe refers to the calamity in terms of supernatural intervention: ‘Sathan the autor and sower of all discord, stirred vp his instruments [. . .] which ceased not in carping and deprauing the nobles, to inflame the kings hatred and grudge agaynst them’.65 Although the actions were those of men, they could also be called puppets: their strings pulled by Satan and God. More accurately though, this is another example of biblical archetype and an example of understanding time as a circular pattern in which types of person repeat and types of events reoccur. Once again, this pattern of history offered warnings, lessons, and reminders for the present, particularly for the nobility and royalty of Foxe’s own day. At every turn, Foxe noted the danger to royal succession, the threat to English  liberties, and what failure in maintaining religious freedom (as in English supremacy of their own church) would do to the realm. In the latter half of Book 4, Foxe once again offers a stern warning to the nobility that rebellion only increases the danger of interference and control from abroad (and especially from Rome).

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This was equally true for the latter half of the sequence on Henry III. Foxe had referred to a story taken out of the chronicle of Walter of Guisborough and supported by evidence in the Flores Historiarum, in which the dying Viscount of Meluns confessed the French plans to invade, using the rebellious English barons as a distraction.66 Adding a few lines extra from the Chronia Majora, Foxe also explained that the papal legate, Guala Bicchieri, used the situation as an excuse to heavily tax the rebellious clerics once the rebellion had ended. The moral was straightforward. Rebellion gave the opportunity to enemies to attack and pillage. The later baronial rebellions under Simon de Montfort, sixth Earl of Leicester (1208–1265) included summaries of the battles, negotiations, and peace agreements, and again offered a warning of the destabilisation and harm that rebellion caused. Foxe most likely had in mind the events of 1567 when he wrote these passages. At that time, there was a widespread fear of rebellion involving Mary Queen of Scots. Foxe found many lessons of use in the story of Henry III’s baronial conflicts that could be used to demonstrate to any noble the danger of rebellion. He also found another opportunity to warn Queen Elizabeth of the dangers that foreign marriage risked. When Foxe recites the story of Henry III marrying Eleanor, daughter of the Count of Provence, Foxe reiterated his stance that such a marriage risked exposing the realm to an influx of foreigners.67 The continual use of history for these two specific purposes—a warning against foreign marriage and a warning against rebellion—reflect the concerns of the early Elizabethan state. It is no accident that Foxe read into these accounts a lesson for his own times. Whilst, strictly speaking, these were not issues relevant to an ecclesiastical history, Foxe provided these parallels for political purposes, but did also attempt to weave them into the wider and core issue of papal interference. He did so through the claim that where ‘mutuall concorde lacketh’ and where foreign power is given an opening (such as through foreign marriage), then this became an opportunity for the Antichrist to further assert itself.68 Whether it was baronial conflict during the reigns of King John and Henry III, or Anglo-Saxon kings feuding with one another, the only winner was the Roman antichristian church, which used the disruption as an opportunity to gain more strength in England than it would have otherwise achieved.

Jews in Foxe’s History This chapter has offered a tour of the variety of subjects that Foxe inserted into the latter half of Book 4. Much of it connects to the interests and motivations of Matthew Parker, via the borrowing or supply of documents, and most connect to the larger story of the papal decline into darkness. It has looked at heretics, now reformed as proto-protestants (or at least Foxe attempted, sometimes weakly, to make that claim). It has looked at papal attacks on secular monarchs and emperors. It has looked at anti-clerical writings and seen the hand of providence in Foxe’s sense of the past. What

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has not been touched upon is the role that Jewish history had to play in Foxe’s overarching schema. Jews are often absent from the variety of stories in the Acts and Monuments, but they do come to the forefront in short bursts from time to time and do have a role to play in Foxe’s understanding and expression of ecclesiastical history.69 Foxe, on the whole, considered England’s Jewish population in terms of his overarching prophetic schema, asking existential questions concerning their continued existence, their possible role in the last days, and the correct ‘handling’ of Jews by Christians to conform to God’s plans in his own day. Sharon Achinstein offers the most detailed study of the Jew in Foxe’s work and concludes that despite Foxe’s approach to them in his prophetic schema he generally offered no coherent treatment.70 On the one hand, Foxe updated the medieval narrative and bias in Jewish accounts that he found in the old chronicles to reflect contemporary concerns. For example, he largely ignored claims of magic. On the other hand, and on many occasions, Foxe’s intentions were dismissive and more focused on his primary mission to discredit the Roman Catholic Church. On more than one occasion, Foxe exclaimed that God had abandoned the Jew as his chosen people and that the same had now happened to Roman Catholicism. For Foxe, the Jew has become an anachronism, who continued to exist through a combination of their ignorance of the truth and because of an unwarranted obedience to a failed faith. Thus Foxe reduces the Jew to little more than a polemical point regarding blind superstition. For example, nestled between the claims by Robert Grosseteste that reform was needed in the Church and a list of papal extortions of England by Pope Alexander IV in the 1250s and 1260s, Foxe inserted a series of brief accounts of Jewish activities in the thirteenth century. These would seem to have been strategically placed in the text to make a polemical point regarding the superstitions of the Roman Church. For example, Achinstein argues that the tale of a Jew who fell into a privy in Tewkesbury on a Sabbath day is a direct parallel to the story told next on the Archbishop of York Walter Gray, who died from too much fasting.71 Achinstein suggests that Foxe interpreted these events as blind superstition. Indeed, on most occasions when Foxe decided to tackle the Jews, he emphasised the superstitious nature of their beliefs, their impurity as a people, and the medieval association of the Jew with excrement. The Jews and Catholics are described as similar in their fervent ceremonialism and superstitious nature. This interpretation by Foxe is what Achinstein calls an ‘irrational obedience to the letter of the law’ in which Foxe claimed the Jew and Catholic as excessive and misguided. Soon after telling the story of Tewkesbury and Walter Gray, Foxe discusses various instances of blood libel to make the same point.72 Foxe also narrates basic historical facts to show the Jews as both greedy and disruptive to the good working of kingdoms. For example, Foxe summarises how the Jews were banned from France in 1255 and

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how Henry III charged the Jews 8,000 marks unless they voluntarily left the realm. He also told how Jews in Northampton conspired to burn the city at Lent and how the Jewish uprising at Richard I’s coronation was a threat to Christian, social, and political order. The Jews again reappear amongst a short list of events occurring in 1276, during the reign of Edward I.73 Foxe narrates that seven Jews were executed for money clipping and that the Jewish community was ultimately banished from England in 1291. This Achinstein categories as the Jew used as a social and political threat, endangering the vital elements of modern state formation such as the regulation and control of currency and the suppression of rebellions. Essentially, Foxe sacrifices the unique history of the Jew in favour of a polemical attack on blind superstition aimed squarely at the Roman Church. However, he also uses the Jew to further his arguments around exempla. As Achinstein argues the Jews offered themes on ‘civil obedience, national community, and international reform, and its fears about difference and identity’.74 For Achinstein, Foxe’s Jew is often incoherent, partly depending on the source material that he relied on and their medieval bias, and partly so that Foxe could score additional points against the Roman Church.

Conclusions Most of the second half of book 4 focused on the claimed servitude of England under a papal yoke. Foxe additionally expanded accounts of papal and imperial rivalry as a parallel, but also stories regarding anti-clericalism, some material on heretical groups (the true faithful), and a marginal but significant extension into later medieval Jewish history. Foxe built upon John Bale’s original conception of ecclesiastical history as the tale of ‘two churches’: one, the Church of the papal Antichrist including the corruption of monks, the controversies of bishops, and the worldly desires of the pope himself, and, second, of those princes who resisted papal authority, heretical groups whose faith was that of the true church, and those scholars who had dared to write against papal policies and declared them the work of the devil. Key to this was the materials supplied to Foxe by Parker’s household. Foxe had followed Matthew Paris’ Chronica Majora for the reign of Henry III from his coronation (and before) up to the year 1260 where the chronicle ended. It was also used in the account of King John, but this was set by the first edition and was, as Freeman argued, possibly written by John Bale, rather than Foxe himself. For the three Edward’s and the increase in political tensions caused by the Barons war and the Hundred Years’ War, Foxe followed, amongst other sources, the variant versions of Thomas Walsingham’s chronicle: the Historia Brevis, the Chronicon Angliæ, and the De Gestis Mirabilibus Regis Edwardii tertii attributed to Robert de Avesbury. Foxe’s use of these St Albans chronicles in the second edition emerged out of a prominent ‘propaganda’ campaign by Matthew Parker to replace

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the traditional corpus of English histories such as Ranulf Higden’s Polychronicon and Polydore Virgil’s Anglica Historia, with a semi-forgotten (Parker would say suppressed) and more aggressive tradition made up of the Flores Historiarum, Chronica Majora, and Historia Brevis. Together these texts offered a history that covered roughly the same chronological and geographical space, but one that angrily denounced papal intrusions on local issues.75 There can be no doubt that this was part of a concerted effort to provide a Protestant colour to history through its sources. Parker had sought not only to replace one tradition with another but also to amend that tradition so that it revealed more clearly the opinion of history that reformers accepted. The editions of these St Alban’s chronicles that Parker published, and the use Foxe made of the original manuscripts, was an attempt to convey the source material unblemished from any perceived corruptions. This meant that material was selected based on an understanding of the past as preconfigured by God and upon the idea that historical occurrence represented things that were correct or wrong depending on how they fitted the doctrines of reformed religion. From this point, Foxe moved into the territory of martyrdom once again, re-telling the story of Scriptural prophecy and introducing John Wycliffe and the Lollards. This, for Foxe, was the starting point for Reformation and the moment when the battle between good and evil became, once again, more violent. Book 4 was always leading towards that story, telling of increasing corruption and failure across Christendom caused by the interference, worldly focus, and greed of the Roman Church.

Notes 1. The manuscript is Paris Bibliotheque Nationale (B.N.) Latin MS 6048. This is a mixed text containing both the Chronica Majora and the Historia Anglorum of Matthew Paris. 2. See Ronald E. Diener, “The Magdeburg Centuries: A Bibliothecal and Historiographical Analysis” (Th.D. diss., Harvard University, 1978), Norman L. Jones, “Matthew Parker, John Bale, and the Magdeburg Centuriators,” The Sixteenth Century Journal 12, no. 3 (1981): 35–49, https://doi.org/10.2307/2539785, Timothy Graham and Andrew G. Watson, The Recovery of the Past in Early Elizabethan England: Documents by John Bale and John Joscelyn From the Circle of Matthew Parker (Cambridge: Cambridge Bibliographical Society, 1998). 3. Graham and Watson, The Recovery of the Past in Early Elizabethan England: Documents by John Bale and John Joscelyn From the Circle of Matthew Parker, 29–30. 4. This is Matthew Parker, ed., Matthæi Paris Monachi Albanensis, Angli, Historia Maior, a Guilielmo Conquæstore, Ad Ultimum Annum Henrici Tertii (London, 1571). 5. Matthew Parker, ed., Elegans, illustris, et facilis rerum, præsertim Britannicarum, et aliarum obiter, notatu dignarum, a mundi exordio ad annum Domini. 1307. narratio: quam Matthæus VVestmonasteriensis monachus, eius author, vir in vtraque literatura eruditus, Flores historiarum scripsit (London, 1567), and Matthew Parker, ed., Matthæus VVestmonasteriensis, florilegus dictus, præcipue de

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6. 7. 8. 9. 10. 11. 12. 13. 14. 15.

16. 17. 18. 19. 20. 21. 22. 23. 24. 25.

26. 27. 28.

From Richard Lionheart to Edward III rebus Britannicis ab exordio mundi vsque ad annum domini. 1307 (London, 1570). Matthew Parker, ed., Historia breuis Thom15 VValsingham, ab Edwardo primo, ad Henricum quintum (London, 1574). Richard Vaughan, Matthew Paris, Reissued with supplementary bibliography (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1958), 141. Ibid., 141. Bale, Catalogus, 315: ‘In quibus quorundam Romanorum pontificum auaritias, faraudes, mendacia, dolos, pompas, impudentias, tyrannides, blasphemies, & artes pessimas ita depinxit, ut nullus unqua[m] Apelles melius’. See Henry R. Luard, Flores Historiarum per Matthaeum Westmonasteriensem collecti, 3 vols (London: H.M.S.O, 1890), vol. 1, x–xii. David Preest and James G. Clark, eds., The Chronica Maiora of Thomas Walsingham (1377–1422) (Woodbridge: Boydell Press, 2005), 14. A&M (1570), 354 (345). Ibid. Helen L. Parish, Monks, Miracles, and Magic: Reformation Representations of the Medieval Church (London: Routledge, 2005), 102. Thomas Stapleton, A Counterblast to M. Hornes Vayne Blaste Against M. Fekenham: Wherein Is Set Forthe: A Ful Reply to M. Hornes Answer, and to Euery Part Therof Made, Against the Declaration of My L. Abbat of Westminster, M. Fekenham, Touching, the Othe of the Supremacy. By Perusing Vvhereof Shall Appeare, Besides the Holy Scriptures, as It Vvere a Chronicle of the Continual Practise of Christes Churche in Al Ages and Countries, Fro[m] the Time of Constantin the Great, Vntil Our Daies: Prouing the Popes and Bishops Supremacy in Ecclesiastical Causes: And Disprouing the Prince Supremacy in the Same Causes (Louvain: Apud Ioannem Foulerum. An. 1567. Cum priuil., 1567), fo. 312r–313r. Thomas Harding, A Confutation of a Booke Intituled an Apologie of the Church of England (Louvain, 1565), fo. 184r-v. A&M (1570), 950 (blank). Thomas S. Freeman, “John Bale’s Book of Martyrs?: The Account of King John in Acts and Monuments,” Reformation 3, no. 1 (1 January 1998): 175–223, https:// doi.org/10.1179/ref_1998_3_1_008. Reference at 182 (fn 11), & 206–8. See William Stubbs, ed., The Historical Works of Gervase of Canterbury, 2 vols (London: Longman, 1880), vol. 1. Compare A&M (1570), 317–24 (317, blanks, 311-313) with Gervase, vol. 1, 332–92. A&M (1570), 324 (313). Ibid. Covering A&M (1570), 380–8 (366, blank, 382, blank, 368, blank, 369, blank, 370). A&M (1570), 380–1 (366, blank). As discussed in Chapter 4. Ryan Netzley, “The End of Reading: The Practice and Possibility of Reading Foxe’s ‘Actes and Monuments’,” ELH 73, no. 1 (2006): 187– 214; Mark Breitenberg, “The Flesh Made Word: Foxe’s ‘Acts and Monuments’,” Renaissance and Reformation 13, no. 4 (1989): 381–407; James C. W. Truman, “John Foxe and the Desires of Reformation Martyrology,” ELH 70, no. 1 (2003): 35–66. Vaughan, Matthew Paris, 140–1. A&M (1570), 381 (blank). Taken from Matthew Paris, CM, vol. 3, 499–16, 424, 610–12. A&M (1570), 382. Taken from Matthew Paris, CM, vol. 4, 9–15.

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29. Blank charters gave the bearer carte blanche and was considered in the period to be a weapon of tyranny. See Caroline M. Barron, “The Tyranny of Richard II,” Historical Research 41, no. 103 (1968): 1–18, https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1468-2281. 1968.tb01435.x. 30. Compare A&M (1570), 381 (blank) with Matthew Paris, CM, vol. 3, 473. 31. A&M (1570), 381 (blank). 32. Compare A&M (1570), 381 (blank) with Matthew Paris, CM, vol. 3, 499–516. 33. Compare A&M (1570), 382 with Matthew Paris, CM, vol. 4, 101–2, 414–5. 34. Compare A&M (1570), 383 (blank) with Matthew Paris, CM, vol. 4, 284–379. 35. Matthew Paris, CM, vol. 3, 412–3. 36. Compare A&M (1570), 381–2 (blank, 382) with Matthew Paris, CM, vol. 4, 14. 37. Vaughan, Matthew Paris, 140–1. 38. Matthew Paris, CM, vol. 4, 242. 39. Ibid., 650. 40. See, as an example, Susan Royal, “Reforming Household Piety: John Foxe and the Lollard Conventicle Tradition,” Studies in Church History 50 (2014): 188– 98, https://doi.org/10.1017/S0424208400001716. 41. A&M (1570), 350 (341). 42. See Nicholas Vincent, “England and the Albigensian Crusade,” in England and Europe in the Reign of Henry III (1216–1272), ed. Björn K. U. Weiler and Ifor Rowlands (Aldershot, England; Burlington, VT: Ashgate, 2002), 67–85, and A&M (1570), 361 TAMO Commentary. 43. A&M (1570), 458 (437). 44. Ibid., 447 (426). 45. Ibid. 46. Ibid., 448 (427). 47. Compare A&M (1570), 448 (427) with Trivet, 379–94. Much of this material is also in Walsingham, Guisborough, and the Flores Historiarum, but Foxe follows the wording of Nicholas Trivet closely, proving that this is his source here. 48. A&M (1570), 449 (428). See Elizabeth Evenden and Thomas S. Freeman, Religion and the Book in Early Modern England: The Making of John Foxe’s ‘Book of Martyrs’ (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2011), 155–6. 49. Compare Foxe, A&M (1570), 450–8 (429-437) to Bale, Catalogus, 331–2, Trivet, 378–9, Flacius, CTV (1556), 1018–21 or (1562), 577, Walsingham, vol. 1, 100–4. 50. Compare A&M (1570), 459 (438) with Hemingford, vol. 2, 66–7. 51. A&M (1570), 450 (429). 52. P. L. Heyworth, “The Earliest Black-Letter Editions of ‘Jack Upland’,” Huntington Library Quarterly 30, no. 4 (1967): 307–14, https://doi.org/10.2307/3816956. 53. See Kenneth B. McFarlane, Lancastrian Kings and Lollard Knights, ed. Gerald L. Harris (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1972), 183–5. 54. See Ezra Kempton Maxfield, “Chaucer and Religious Reform,” PMLA 39, no. 1 (1924): 64–74, https://doi.org/10.2307/457281. 55. Holly A. Crocker, “John Foxe’s Chaucer: Affecting Form in Post-Historicist Criticism,” New Medieval Literatures 15 (1 January 2013): 149–82, https://doi. org/10.1484/J.NML.5.103453. 56. See R. W. Southern, “Grosseteste, Robert (c. 1170–1253), Scientist, Theologian, and Bishop of Lincoln,” ODNB, 2004, https://doi.org/10.1093/ref:odnb/11665, and Daniel A. P. Callus, Robert Grosseteste: Scholar and Bishop. Essays in Commemoration of the Seventh Centenary of His Death (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1955). 57. Compare A&M (1570), 430–1 (409-410) with Bale, Catalogus, 288, Matthew Paris, CM, vol. 5, 471–2, Flores, vol. 2, 404, and Trivet, 244.

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58. A&M (1570), 431 (410). 59. Ibid., 446 (425). 60. See as an example David Loades, “Foxe and Queen Mary: Stephen Gardiner: Edmund Bonner,” TAMO, 2004, www.johnfoxe.org/index.php?realm=more&g ototype=&type=essay&book=essay19. 61. A&M (1570), 2338 (2298). 62. Ibid., 480 (459). 63. Compare A&M (1570), 483 (462) to Walsingham, vol. 1, 119–26. 64. Compare A&M (1570), 480 (459) to Walsingham, vol. 1, 126, 129–35. 65. A&M (1570), 483 (462). 66. Compare A&M (1570), 341 (334) to Flores, vol. 2, 163 and Guisborough, 158– 9. It might also derive from Hemingford, vol. 1, 258–9. 67. A&M (1570), 433 (412). 68. Ibid. 69. For context Erin E. Kelly, “Jewish History, Catholic Argument: Thomas Lodge’s “Workes of Josephus” as a Catholic Text,” The Sixteenth Century Journal 34, no. 4 (2003): 993–1010, https://doi.org/10.2307/20061642. 70. Sharon Achinstein, “John Foxe and the Jews,” Renaissance Quarterly 54, no. 1 (2001): 86–120, https://doi.org/10.2307/1262221. 71. Achinstein. 72. A&M (1570), 431 (410). 73. Ibid., 446 (425). 74. Achinstein, “John Foxe and the Jews,” 116. 75. Matthew Phillpott, “The Compilation of a Sixteenth-Century Ecclesiastical History: The Use of Matthew Paris in John Foxe’s Acts and Monuments,” The Medieval Chronicle 7 (2011): 205–22. Reference at 208–9.

Works Cited Printed Achinstein, Sharon. “John Foxe and the Jews.” Renaissance Quarterly 54, no. 1 (2001): 86–120. https://doi.org/10.2307/1262221. Bale, John. Scriptorum illustriū maioris Brytannię . . . catalogus . . . usque ad annū hunc Domini 1557 . . . IX centurias continens, etc.: (Scriptorum illustrium . . . posterior pars, quinque continens centurias ultimas). Basel, 1557. Barron, Caroline M. “The Tyranny of Richard II.” Historical Research 41, no. 103 (1968): 1–18. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1468-2281.1968.tb01435.x. Breitenberg, Mark. “The Flesh Made Word: Foxe’s ‘Acts and Monuments’.” Renaissance and Reformation 13, no. 4 (1989): 381–407. Callus, Daniel A. P. Robert Grosseteste: Scholar and Bishop. Essays in Commemoration of the Seventh Centenary of His Death. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1955. Crocker, Holly A. “John Foxe’s Chaucer: Affecting Form in Post-Historicist Criticism.” New Medieval Literatures 15 (1 January 2013): 149–82. https://doi.org/10.1484/J. NML.5.103453. Diener, Ronald E. “The Magdeburg Centuries: A Bibliothecal and Historiographical Analysis.” ThD diss., Harvard University, 1978. Evenden, Elizabeth, and Thomas S. Freeman. Religion and the Book in Early Modern England: The Making of John Foxe’s ‘Book of Martyrs’. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2011.

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Flacius Illyricus, Matthias. Catalogus Testium Veritatis, Qui Ante Nostram Aetatem Pontifice Romano Ejusque Erroribus Reclamarnt, Jam Denuo . . . Emendatiori et Auctior Editus. Strasbourg, 1562. https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=PWVeAAAAcAAJ. ——— Catalogus Testium Veritatis, Qui Ante Nostram Aetatem Reclamarunt Papae: Opus Varia Rerum, Hoc Praesertim Tempore Scitu Dignißimarum, Cognitione Refertum, [. . .]. Basel, 1556. www2.uni-mannheim.de/mateo/camenahist/autoren/ flacius_hist.html. Foxe, John. “Acts and Monuments.” TAMO, 1570. www.johnfoxe.org. Freeman, Thomas S. “John Bale’s Book of Martyrs?: The Account of King John in Acts and Monuments.” Reformation 3, no. 1 (1 January 1998): 175–223. https:// doi.org/10.1179/ref_1998_3_1_008. Graham, Timothy, and Andrew G. Watson. The Recovery of the Past in Early Elizabethan England: Documents by John Bale and John Joscelyn From the Circle of Matthew Parker. Cambridge: Cambridge Bibliographical Society, 1998. Harding, Thomas. A Confutation of a Booke Intituled an Apologie of the Church of England. Louvain, 1565. Heyworth, P. L. “The Earliest Black-Letter Editions of ‘Jack Upland’.” Huntington Library Quarterly 30, no. 4 (1967): 307–14. https://doi.org/10.2307/3816956. Jones, Norman L. “Matthew Parker, John Bale, and the Magdeburg Centuriators.” The Sixteenth Century Journal 12, no. 3 (1981): 35–49. https://doi.org/10.2307/2539785. Kelly, Erin E. “Jewish History, Catholic Argument: Thomas Lodge’s ‘Workes of Josephus’ as a Catholic Text.” The Sixteenth Century Journal 34, no. 4 (2003): 993–1010. https://doi.org/10.2307/20061642. Loades, David. “Foxe and Queen Mary: Stephen Gardiner: Edmund Bonner.” TAMO, 2004. www.johnfoxe.org/index.php?realm=more&gototype=&type=essay&book= essay19. Luard, Henry R. Flores Historiarum per Matthaeum Westmonasteriensem collecti. 3 Vols. London: H.M.S.O., 1890. Maxfield, Ezra Kempton. “Chaucer and Religious Reform.” PMLA 39, no. 1 (1924): 64–74. https://doi.org/10.2307/457281. McFarlane, Kenneth B. Lancastrian Kings and Lollard Knights, edited by Gerald L. Harris. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1972. Netzley, Ryan. “The End of Reading: The Practice and Possibility of Reading Foxe’s ‘Actes and Monuments’.” ELH 73, no. 1 (2006): 187–214. Paris, Matthew. Matthæi Parisiensis, Monachi Sancti Albani, Chronica Majora, edited by Henry R. Luard. 7 Vols. London: Rolls Series, 1872. Parish, Helen L. Monks, Miracles, and Magic: Reformation Representations of the Medieval Church. London: Routledge, 2005. Parker, Matthew, ed. Elegans, illustris, et facilis rerum, præsertim Britannicarum, et aliarum obiter, notatu dignarum, a mundi exordio ad annum Domini. 1307. narratio: quam Matthæus VVestmonasteriensis monachus, eius author, vir in vtraque literatura eruditus, Flores historiarum scripsit. London, 1567. ———, ed. Historia breuis Thom15 VValsingham, ab Edwardo primo, ad Henricum quintum. London, 1574. ———, ed. Matthæi Paris Monachi Albanensis, Angli, Historia Maior, a Guilielmo Conquæstore, Ad Ultimum Annum Henrici Tertii. London, 1571. ———, ed. Matthæus VVestmonasteriensis, florilegus dictus, præcipue de rebus Britannicis ab exordio mundi vsque ad annum domini. 1307. London, 1570.

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Phillpott, Matthew. “The Compilation of a Sixteenth-Century Ecclesiastical History: The Use of Matthew Paris in John Foxe’s Acts and Monuments.” The Medieval Chronicle 7 (2011): 205–22. Preest, David, and James G. Clark, eds. The Chronica Maiora of Thomas Walsingham (1377–1422). Woodbridge: Boydell Press, 2005. Riley, Henry T. Thomae Walsingham, Quondam Monachi S. Albani, Historia Anglicana. 2 Vols. London: Longman, Green, Longman, Roberts & Green, 1863. Rothwell, Harry, ed. The Chronicle of Walter of Guisborough: Previously Edited as the Chronicle of Walter of Hemingford or Hemingburgh. London: Offices of the Society, 1957. Royal, Susan. “Reforming Household Piety: John Foxe and the Lollard Conventicle Tradition.” Studies in Church History 50 (2014): 188–98. https://doi.org/10.1017/ S0424208400001716. Southern, R. W. “Grosseteste, Robert (c. 1170–1253), Scientist, Theologian, and Bishop of Lincoln.” ODNB (2004). https://doi.org/10.1093/ref:odnb/11665. Stapleton, Thomas. A Counterblast to M. Hornes Vayne Blaste Against M. Fekenham: Wherein Is Set Forthe: A Ful Reply to M. Hornes Answer, and to Euery Part Therof Made, Against the Declaration of My L. Abbat of Westminster, M. Fekenham, Touching, the Othe of the Supremacy. By Perusing Vvhereof Shall Appeare, Besides the Holy Scriptures, as It Vvere a Chronicle of the Continual Practise of Christes Churche in Al Ages and Countries, Fro[m] the Time of Constantin the Great, Vntil Our Daies: Prouing the Popes and Bishops Supremacy in Ecclesiastical Causes: And Disprouing the Prince Supremacy in the Same Causes. Louvain: Apud Ioannem Foulerum. An. 1567. Cum priuil., 1567. Stubbs, William, ed. The Historical Works of Gervase of Canterbury. 2 Vols. London: Longman, 1880. Trivet, Nicholas. Annales Sex Regum Angliae, edited by Thomas Hog. London, 1845. Truman, James C. W. “John Foxe and the Desires of Reformation Martyrology.” ELH 70, no. 1 (2003): 35–66. Vaughan, Richard. Matthew Paris. Reissued With Supplementary Bibliography. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1958. Vincent, Nicholas. “England and the Albigensian Crusade.” In England and Europe in the Reign of Henry III (1216–1272), edited by Björn K. U. Weiler and Ifor Rowlands, 67–85. Aldershot, UK and Burlington, VT: Ashgate, 2002. Walter of Hemingford. Chronicon Domini Walteri de Hemingburgh, Vulgo Hemingford Nuncupati . . . de Gestis Regum Angliæ, edited by Hans C. Hamilton. 2 Vols. London, 1848.

8

Our History Is the Truth

Our history is the truth. That is what John Foxe, John Bale, Matthew Parker, and other Protestant writers in England truly believed. They wished to obliviate previous interpretations of the past and replace them with their own reading, which to them better addressed the concerns of the present and more fully supported their specific world order. To do so, these clerical scholars revisited England’s manuscript heritage with the purpose of reappraisal. They no longer trusted the veracity of old chronicles and annals uncritically, and therefore asked questions of them that had not generally been asked before. Who were the authors? What were their biases? Do their accounts of events correspond to other near-contemporary sources or do they differ in minutia and detail? Are conflicts between sources over detail a purposeful misrepresentation or simple error? Whose writings had not properly transmitted to the present and why? Were they suppressed? What is the truth? What is a lie? To achieve their aims, John Foxe and his colleagues brought forth underused texts or near-lost chronicles. Matthew Parker sought out the manuscripts that had once populated monastic scriptorium and were now housed in private collections or misused as scrap paper. His household analysed and annotated them, identifying what might be useful and what should be disregarded. John Bale catalogued past writers, identified their writings, and assessed their qualities. Lawrence Nowell and William Lambarde sought out clarification on ancient laws and sought to reignite study in the Anglo-Saxons by returning to the sources. Foxe, meanwhile, sought to popularise their discoveries and to bring his own considerable scholarly talent to the table. He sought to show to the ordinary populace, the gentry, and the Queen that history had been misrepresented, that what they thought the past told them was not the true story. Foxe claimed that a new story was needed, but one that sought not to reinvent but to return to its origins, to seek truth and purity in the distant past, and to reveal the corruption of time as the result of Antichrist and Satan. In this book, the analysis of this attempted (and largely successful) historical revision has focused on the first two editions of John Foxe’s Acts and Monuments from the point-of-view of its medieval and classical history,

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rather than from the contemporary portions of the work. It has identified the sources that Foxe used (where possible), where he obtained those sources and how he used them. It has looked at methodology and protocols, attempting an understanding of how Foxe compiled his history. It has addressed the question of underlying assumptions which gave the history its character. The result hopefully clarifies the purpose that Foxe saw in writing a history. It was not only meant to contextualise the memorial of Protestant martyrs in the other half of the Acts and Monuments but also to reveal truths of its own, to provide examples that supported the Elizabethan religious settlement and encourage further reform. It was also meant as a correction and a revelation that Christian religion had been subverted over a long period of time and that history, newly interpreted, should show a different story. This study has clarified some of these issues, focusing on the nature of this history as part historical revision, part hagiography, and part polemical exegesis.

A Collaborative Project What emerges helps to support recent research on the Acts and Monuments. In the 1560s and 1570s, Foxe was the mouthpiece of a concerted and collaborative effort to win over the hearts and minds of England to a reformed religion and to educate and inspire a new collective understanding of its past. As such, the Acts and Monuments was never Foxe’s task alone. It was a collaborative effort, involving scholars, clergymen, translators, printers, patrons, and illustrators. It was state-sponsored by the senior clergy, such as Edmund Grindal (Bishop of London), and Matthew Parker (Archbishop of Canterbury), and by England’s Chief Secretary Sir William Cecil. The martyrological stories were supplied to Foxe in various states of completion, first in exile by Edmund Grindal and his team in Strasbourg, and via those who wrote martyrologies on the continent such as Heinrich Pantaleon (1522–1595), Adriaan van Haemstede (1525–1562), Ludwig Rabus (1523–1592), and Jean Crespin (c.1520–1572). John Bale also supplied Foxe with an account on Anne Askew, and other clergymen, too, compiled short pamphlets in the early 1560s to promote the last words and thoughts of individual martyrs. In these instances, Foxe acted more as editor and compiler than the author, although he did also check findings and add more information from other sources, including interviews with witnesses. After the success of the first edition, Foxe also found that England’s populace sent him unsolicited information and corrections.1 Finally, Foxe also worked closely with Henry Bull (d. 1577) to corroborate and gather more information about the martyrs that he had already described.2 The effort of writing a revised story of the English and Christian past, especially one that was purposely intended as partisan and disruptive against the old traditions, required just as much collaboration. Elizabeth Evenden has, for example, already identified a much closer collaboration between Foxe and his printer, John Day, than is ordinary.3 Foxe probably gained

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easier access to printed materials with Day’s help but was also able to print the literary and anti-clerical tract, Jack Upland, because Day owned the monopoly on that work. Evenden and Thomas S. Freeman have also identified a connection to Laurence Humphrey, president of Magdalen College, who conscripted some of his students to proofread and copy-edit the text.4 For the first edition of the Acts and Monuments, John Bale was a crucial partner, although it is unknown whether he had any kind of direct involvement with the work. At the very least, Bale had been the inspiration behind Foxe’s first commentary, the Commentarii. Foxe and Bale also worked together in Basel on Bale’s updated Catalogus and on Foxe’s second commentary, the Rerum. If Freeman is correct, and the evidence is compelling, then Bale also supplied Foxe with a draft (possibly near completed) of his intended third part of The Actes or Unchast Examples of the Englysh Votaryes and, most likely, a variety of scattered notes.5 It is quite possible that everything in Book 1 of the 1563 edition from the sequence on King John onwards derives directly from Bale’s provision. There is evidence, also, that Bale corresponded with Matthias Flacius and the Centuriators, provisioning them with evidence from England. A letter dated 2 March 1559 from Johann Wigand to Bale shows, for example, that the Centuriators had at least asked Bale for assistance.6 Foxe would almost certainly have become part of that connection—if somewhat at a distance—whilst they saw the drafts of Flacius’ works through Oporinus’ print house. For the second edition of the Acts and Monuments, Matthew Parker essentially takes over the role of Bale. Parker, of course, had his own connections to the Magdeburg Centuriators, and it is not impossible, therefore, that it was his idea to convert the Acts and Monuments into an ecclesiastical history, as a copy of their efforts. At the very least, Parker was aware of the polemical worth of England having its own ecclesiastical history, which could signify and emphasise local issues, interests, and examples, and which could be read in the vernacular language. Parker’s network was huge, bringing Foxe into a circle of scholars that included William Lambarde, John Stow, John Joscelyn, and John Twyne (amongst others). Meanwhile, the archbishops’ gathering together of England’s lost and hidden manuscript heritage provisioned Foxe with an unprecedented opportunity to be the first to reassess England’s textual history in its near totality, making his Acts and Monuments more than a straightforward partisan revision of history, but a history that reappraised the actual foundation of historical knowledge. The collaboration with Parker’s household, therefore, transformed the history of 1563, which was heavily reliant on other contemporary writers, to the history of 1570, that was innovative and pioneering, considering some chronicles as suppressed, such as Matthew Paris’ Chronica Majora, Old English monuments as hidden or falsely erased, and other medieval chronicles as untrustworthy repositories of history. The collaborative process involved in compiling the Acts and Monuments, alongside the fact that within it are large sequences of writing where Foxe

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is required more as an editor of pre-written materials than as an author, has led some scholars to enhance or alter the description of his role. John N. King, for instance, has suggested the term ‘author-compiler’ for Foxe, because his text is equal part verbatim and summarised documentation, as it is his own words.7 Thomas Betteridge too sees Foxe more as a compiler of materials than an author, noting how in the first edition Foxe is described as ‘gatherer’ on the title page and at the start of Book 1.8 Jesse Lander and Devorah Greenberg, meanwhile, have argued for a reflexive use of the word ‘Foxe’, in quotation marks, to mean not only Foxe himself but also his collaborators and those who made editorial interventions in subsequent editions.9 Greenberg and Patrick Collinson have also called for the reception and re-appropriation of the text by readers to be included in this multifaceted ‘Foxe’.10 Whilst there are certainly uses to applying such a term as ‘Foxe’ to better understand and assess the complexities of the Acts and Monuments, it must also be understood that the problem is not unique to Foxe’s work. The Magdeburg Centuries are larger and more complex, and they too were compiled through a collaborative effort. Ronald E. Diener has examined the ‘collegium’ (as it became called) that involved Matthias Flacius and Casper von Nidbruck (1525–1593) as initiators, and Johann Wigand (1523–1587) and Mattæus Judex (1528–1564) as principal organisers.11 The number of scholars, transcribers, translators, and officials involved in the project was huge and multinational in scope. On a scale more like the Acts and Monuments and again in England, the history that became known as Holinshed’s Chronicles, was also a collaborative venture. The first edition of 1577 was largely the work of one man, Raphael Holinshed (c.1525–1580), but the second edition, worked on after Holinshed’s premature death and published in 1587, involved a loosely connected collaborative team, including the antiquarian, John Stow. Annabel Patterson calls this a ‘syndicate’, containing freelance antiquarians, lesser clergymen, members of Parliament, minor poets, publishers, and booksellers.12 Collaboration as a method for writing large histories was, therefore, not unique, or unknown. It was a necessary and useful means for gathering together materials and compiling them into a meaningful order. Therefore, if ‘Foxe’ is necessary or useful for understanding the variety of aspects involved in analysing the Acts and Monuments, then the comparison to these other large histories and their process of compilation would be equally as useful. More to the point, the pre-Lollard history that Foxe compiled was not created by him alone, it was a process involving many other people, almost all of whom were engaged on the very same idea of understanding history as needing re-telling and appropriation by the Elizabethan State. This study has shown this, especially in demonstrating the importance of John Bale and Matthew Parker to the creation of Foxe’s history. What it has also examined are the protocols and methodologies that were employed to assess the manuscript material that Foxe received.

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The Protocols of Ecclesiastical History With the help of Bale, Parker, Joscelyn, Lambarde, and others, Foxe shifted through England’s manuscript heritage, assessing their contents according to a paradigm that considered the past in terms of right and wrong; individuals were judged by their tenants of faith, events described as God’s will or corruption caused by Satan or antichristian evil. To make sense of it all, Foxe employed the genre of ecclesiastical history, aligning his story of the past to the protocols outlined by Eusebius in the fourth century and declaring similarity of his work to that of the Magdeburg Centuriators in Germany. By closely examining what Foxe wrote and how he structured the pre-Lollard history, it becomes clearer how important these protocols are to the history that Foxe ended up producing. In Chapter 1, the protocols of ecclesiastical history were outlined as (1) a focus on ecclesiastical affairs at the expense of secular affairs, (2) a framework based on the succession of rulers, (3) an emphasis on distant history, (4) inclusion of verbatim and summarised documentation to provide proof and evidence, and (5) an avoidance of invented speeches. In addition, another protocol emerged soon after Eusebius, which is a textual lineage in which one ecclesiastical history led into another to form a cumulative series of texts. The first edition, with its piecemeal, case study, approach to historical events did not conform very well to these protocols. Foxe did mention Eusebius in the prefaces and even compared himself to him, but the structure of ecclesiastical history is more an afterthought than an actual framework. The second edition is a different matter entirely. For the first protocol, Foxe emphasised on a variety of occasions that his focus was to remain on ecclesiastical affairs, admitting (and apologising) that from time to time it was necessary to edge against that boundary. Such examples include the story of Offa, where Foxe states that there are ‘many notable deedes’, which he could recite but as they do not pertain to ecclesiastical history, ‘I omit here to recite’. Nonetheless, he does summarise some of them.13 When telling the story of contentions in the Church during the reign of Henry III, Foxe mentions, If I had so much leasure to prosecute them, as I finde them in stories remaining: might sufficiently induce vs to understand what small peace and agrement was then ioyned with the doctrine and religion in those dayes, during the state and raygne of Antechrist.14 He makes this statement as an excuse not to include secular matters, whilst highlighting that corruption had by this point in time affected more than the Church state. Foxe admits that he could enhance his telling with foreign histories, which are not ecclesiastical in focus, but that ‘for breuity I do purposely contract and omit’. In such cases as these, Foxe tended to begin or end with a pause, re-state that he did not deal in ‘profane’ or ‘secular’ history, and then move on to a new subject.

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Such boundary crossing was nonetheless inevitable. R. A. Markus once noted that soon after Eusebius had limited the focus to ecclesiastical affairs the Church and State had become more closely intertwined: one could not be explained without reference to the other.15 Even where Foxe does not see a line, one is regularly crossed by discussing the Church in terms of the State. Whilst a focus specifically on religious affairs, rather than political set the Acts and Monuments out as different from many other histories, it was also the most difficult of Eusebius’ protocols to follow without deviation. Foxe did well in this regard and is not alone in attempting to follow the protocol; Philip Melanchthon, Matthias Flacius, and the Centuriators all followed the same path. Only John Sleiden had doubts, arguing, ‘In the history of religion [. . .] I would not omit what concerned the civil government because [. . .] they are interwoven with the other’.16 Foxe was also careful to follow the second protocol, demanding a framework based on the succession of rulers. Although the larger structure of the Acts and Monuments is claimed on a basis of one book per 300-year period, within this is a structure of sequences, many of which follow the line of succession of the English monarchy, others which follow the succession of Popes, and others, the succession of Holy Roman Emperors. Foxe also followed the protocol that required an emphasis on distant history and the tendency for ecclesiastical historians to re-state Eusebius’ own narrative as a prologue to their own. Foxe brought his history back to the Roman era, relying heavily on the narrative first provided by Eusebius— although often through the lens of the Magdeburg Centuries—he also kept the contemporary history and martyrology. His reasoning is that his own time was again a period of persecution and an essential element of understanding God’s plan for humanity. Foxe certainly believed that his work was a continuation and cumulation of Eusebius’ original work. Invented speeches were still common in secular histories, but Foxe avoided them. Instead, he relied on the ‘voices’ found in his source materials, including letters, reports, and oral testimonies, which are scattered throughout each sequence. Described by Mozley as a ‘colossal storehouse of material’, the inclusion of documentation, much of which had been supplied by Parker, found by Foxe, or offered as oral testimony by contemporary witnesses is what makes the Acts and Monuments such a large and complex document.17 Foxe’s respect for these protocols was enhanced also by his understanding of the past as interpreted through Scriptural prophecy. Foxe largely confined the telling and explanation of this prophetic framework to short sequences, scattered throughout the Acts and Monuments (specifically at the beginning of Book 1, then near its end, at the start of Book 5 and at the start of Book 6). He does not attempt to furnish each story with a remark about prophecy. Indeed, the word ‘Satan’ only appears 23 times and the word ‘Antichrist’ 37 times in Books 1 through 4. Foxe, therefore, hardly refers to either entity or to the greater schema whilst describing Anglo-Saxon, AngloNorman, and early Plantagenet history.

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Instead, the prophetic basis for history is best understood as Foxe’s guiding principle and overarching interpretative framework, and less one that needed explicit description in the historical narratives. Warren Wooden once argued that Foxe understood ‘history as a reflection of the metaphysical struggle between the forces of good and evil, with earthly combatants presented as exemplars of one principal or the other’.18 This is a good description of how the interpretation of prophecy influenced the way that Foxe understood the past and how he assessed his sources.

A Sense of the Past In this study, the individual as exemplar has been identified multiple times in Foxe’s work and is key to understanding his sense of the past. In Chapter 1, the ideas of Peter Burke were highlighted as one means of assessing that sense, addressing three key factors or protocols: anachronism or an understanding of critical analysis, an awareness of evidence, and an interest in causation.19 Of course, in examining Foxe’s work under these criterions, there is a risk of anachronistically judging Foxe, claiming some of his working methods as regressive or progressive, instead of understanding them on his terms. However, making the assessment can also tease out what is already explicit in Foxe’s methodology and is therefore worthwhile undertaking. The past, for Foxe, is explicitly one of judgement. He assesses individuals in terms of how they conform or deviate from the Protestant idea of true faith. This is demonstrated on multiple occasions throughout Foxe’s preLollard history. Constantine the Great is an archetype of perfect kingship, Augustine, Lanfranc, Anselm, Thurstan, and Becket are examples of contentious archbishops, greedy in their abuse of power and failing their own king in favour of the false supremacy of an antichristian papacy. King John defends the true faith but fails because of the rebellion of his barons. Frederick Barbarossa and Frederick II, similarly, try to defend the proper order of church rule, but both are defeated. Pope Silvester II and Gregory VII give power to Antichrist, and so forth. Foxe’s use of hagiography and archetypes to judge individuals makes his history one of direct comparison between the past and present. In doing so, Foxe largely undermines any prospect of explaining or understanding the past as intrinsically different than the present. His use of history as an example further creates a sense of familiarity and similarity. Foxe’s attempt to stress the dangers of rebellion to the nobility of his own day can be found in the telling of rebellion by King John’s nobility which resulted in England’s nearoccupation by the papacy, and the subsequent sequences on the Barons War during the reign of Henry III. Concerns about Queen Elizabeth failing to marry, or worse, entering a dangerous foreign marriage are highlighted in the sequence of Henry III entering into a foreign marriage which led to an influx of ‘foreigners’. It can also be found in the stories of various Anglo-Saxon kings who abdicated to become monks and in the story of Edward the Confessor

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failing to produce an heir, leading to the disaster of Norman Conquest. Time and the events that occur are, for Foxe, repetitive and comparable. History is precedence, but it is not in any way viewed as progressive or evolving. The use of old law codes provides one more example that illustrates Foxe’s sense of the past as judgement on conformity and faith, rather than something that changes, alters, and evolves. When William Lambarde had investigated the old Anglo-Saxon law codes for his Archaionomia, he did so with a clear understanding that law altered and evolved, and worked based on precedence built up piece by piece over time. He understood, at least in this limited sense, what Burke calls anachronism. When Foxe came to use those same laws, and examine Lambarde’s work, he fails to provide the same understanding of context. Instead, Foxe used the law codes in a simple manner; he used them to reveal the occasional deviation from contemporary Roman laws, claiming that some rules were anti-Roman and better aligned with Protestant faith and that any legal ruling regarding religion in that period proved that secular princes once did have the right to order legal restraints on the English Church. For Foxe, the difference was not caused by historical change, but by a corruption of religious observance and authority. The second protocol outlined by Burke is an awareness of evidence. Burke suggests that there is an ‘active’ and ‘passive’ aspect.20 Active in terms of scholars creating forgeries and inventing myths on purpose to tell a history, and passive in judging the capacity of past authors to write something that is meant to be reliable and where those authors are aware of their own biases and purposes. Foxe is certainly aware of the danger of forgery and mythologizing. He is careful not to claim too strongly any argument where the evidence is too weak. Foxe judged the story of King Lucius and the original conversion of the Romano-British with scepticism despite the potential for those stories to win him a polemical victory. Foxe realised that the evidence was inadequate. He was equally as sceptical about King Arthur and was careful not to proclaim with any certainty that heretical groups such as the Waldensians and Albigensians held a proto-protestant faith. Foxe suggested. He gave an opinion. He stretched credibility. He did not, however, fabricate beyond what the evidence allowed. What Foxe did do, however, was seek coherence between as many sources as possible, to claim probability of truth, and, where he wished to discredit, to use variant sources to weaken certainty. The poisoning of King John is a good example. In the 1563 edition of the Acts and Monuments, Foxe claimed, Kyng Iohn was come to Swinested Abbey, not farre from Lincolne, he rested there two dayes, where as most writers testifie [tha]t he was most trayterously poisoned, by a Monke of that Abbey, of the sect of Sisteanes, or sainct Bernardes brethren called Simon of Swinsted.21 In this edition, the claim is largely unsubstantiated. Foxe misleads with the statement that ‘most writers’ supported it as he only cites one, William Caxton’s

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Chronicles of England. The claim was stronger in early Protestant literature by men such as William Tyndale, Simon Fish, and Robert Barnes, than it was in medieval chronicles. Indeed, this sequence of text might have originated with Bale originally; this is, after all, the portion of Book 1 possibly taken from a draft of the third part of The Actes or Unchast Examples of the Englysh Votaryes.22 Nonetheless, Foxe appears to have supported it, seeing in the story not only a conspiracy to kill a king who had stood up to the pope but also to claim regicide by traitorous monks. In 1565, Thomas Stapleton declared Foxe’s statement as of low credit and as a ‘manifest lie’, offering in his A Counterblast to M. Hornes vayne blast, counter evidence: Polydore Vergil claimed that John had died of ‘sorrowe and hevines of harte’, Randolph Niger that he died of ‘surfeting in the night’, Roger of Hoveden that he died of ‘a bluddie flixe’, and Matthew Paris a ‘hevines of minde’.23 When Foxe complained in the prefaces to the 1570 edition of the Acts and Monuments that there were many who ‘carpe and find fault’ and sting like ‘waspes & buszyng drones’, as a response to the first edition, he in part had this passage in mind.24 In the second edition, Foxe made his claim more robustly by adding evidence from the chronicle of Walter of Guisborough that also claimed that John had been poisoned. Foxe also admitted, Many opinions are among the chronicles of the death of King John. Some of them doe write that he dyed of sorrow and heauines of heart, as Polidorus: some of surfeiting in the night, as Radulphus Niger: some of a bloudy flixe, as Rog. Hoveden: some of a burning ague, some of a cold sweat, some of eating appels, some of eating peares, some plummes.25 The list is rather familiar, and purposefully so. The repetition of Stapleton’s argument helped to block any further protest. This was, however, only the beginning of Foxe’s response. As described in Chapter 7, Foxe inserted at the end of Book 6 more evidence, citing three anonymous chronicles, including one in French, one by Thomas Gray, and another manuscript which began ‘Adam pater generis humani’, a French chronicle entitled Scalachronicon, Ranulf Higden’s Polychronicon, the Eulogium, Thomas Rudbourne’s Epitome Historis Majoris, a copy of the Brut, a manuscript beginning ‘Richard Rede in novo Chronico ad tempora Henry 6’, and several others. These all appear to have come from Matthew Parker, suggesting that Foxe had sought help to bolster the original assertion.26 In this example, Foxe sought proof through what is often now called standards of coherence.27 He believed, as some philosophers now argue, that a weak statement can be reported as accurate and true, by finding supporting statements from other sources that cohered. In the pre-Lollard history, such use of coherence is prevalent. Whilst assembling his account of Anglo-Saxon England, Foxe found in Robert Fabyan’s New Chronicles a

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tale of King Æthelstan slicing a stone with his sword at York before battle. Foxe was dubious, so he checked the source that Fabyan had claimed, Ranulf Higden’s Polychronicon, and then compared their statements with the Chronicon attributed to John Brompton and John Bale’s Catalogus, both of which mentioned the story. Foxe also checked William of Malmesbury’s Gesta Regum Anglorum and Henry of Huntingdon’s Historia Anglorum, both of which did not contain the tale. As a result, Foxe concluded that it was a myth, noting that even good ‘story writers’ sometimes forget ‘the office of historicians’ and instead ‘seme to play t[he] Poete’.28 The sources had failed to cohere. Foxe also uses coherence to establish facts about those who had been martyred during the reign of Mary. The martyrdom of Thomas Tomkins, for instance, first appears in Foxe’s second Latin commentary, the Rerum. Foxe initially relied on the materials gathered by Edmund Grindal’s team, but there were gaps in the story. For the first edition of the Acts and Monuments, Foxe went to the trouble of digging up documents from Bishop Bonner’s register that gave more detail. He also obtained several oral testimonies. In the second edition, Foxe once again sought more details, obtaining local accounts this time from Tomkin’s home area of Shoreditch.29 A similar trajectory of evidence-building can be detected for Foxe’s account of Edmund Allin.30 In the first edition, Foxe was only able to obtain some basic details from the trial records at Canterbury. These were bolstered in the second edition with testimonies by men named as Richard Fletcher, John Webbe, Roger Hall, and Sir John Baker. The account of George Marsh, similarly began with basic details, this time in Foxe’s Rerum. By 1563, Foxe had gained access to Marsh’s own account of his examinations by Bishop Cotes and an eyewitness account of his death. By 1570, Foxe added more details supplied by the Earl of Derby.31 Evenden and Freeman offer a similar example regarding the story of John Purvey (c. 1354–1414), a Lollard who preached ‘heresy’ in Bristol.32 Foxe once again began with a basic account in his Commentarii and Rerum, this time derived out of the Fasciculi Zizaniorum, but by 1563, Foxe was able to add a list of articles that Purvey had recanted, and in the 1570 edition, Foxe added a further commentary on Purvey’s articles and his recantations of them. In each case, Foxe not only collected accounts from informants as well as evidence from official documentation, but he ensured that they meshed together properly. Although the purpose of finding coherence for Foxe was partly about avoiding criticisms and attacks by Roman Catholic polemists such as Thomas Stapleton and Thomas Harding, it is common enough in his book to be considered a key method that Foxe used to sift truth from falsity. Taking a similar, but different case, when describing Elizabeth’s imprisonment during the reign of Mary I, Foxe can be found to have obtained his information from many different informants so that he could show that he had been thorough and systematic in his collection of information about this difficult period in the queen’s life.33 Foxe sought coherence in all his

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accounts, contrasting evidence in any one main source, with at least one other to establish its credibility. This methodology was the solution that Foxe had for establishing the accuracy and trustworthiness of his evidence. Foxe recognised biases, he understood forgery as something to be avoided and knew that mythology was a block to establishing true facts. Foxe was also aware of biases and purposes in his sources, another element that Peter Burke noted as important to understanding an author’s sense of the past. However, Foxe was not neutral himself. As J. F. Mozley has argued, Foxe had no need to be impartial.34 Indeed, the whole purpose of the Acts and Monuments was to offer a radical reinterpretation of the past for the cause of religious Reformation. This was a history that demanded change and alteration in the present and a realignment of knowledge. It was not history, for histories sake. Such a purpose means that Foxe understood biases in his sources and in his own writing, in terms of religious opinion. He and his various colleagues held a very real belief that England’s history had been manipulated and controlled by the elite of a now defunct regime (but one that still threatened it from within and without), which led them to view histories in terms of true and false statements. This is essentially a view that regarded the past and present in terms of binary opposites: good versus evil, right versus wrong, true faith versus false faith. This is what John Bale had called the profitable corn and the unprofitable chaff when he considered what manuscripts should be saved and which should be destroyed.35 In doing so, Bale had referred specifically to monastic histories, making a distinction between those that offered knowledge that was useful (the corn) and those that should be dismissed for offering misinformation, theological inaccuracy, and Roman bias (the chaff). By examining the sources that Foxe used in his pre-Lollard history, and how he used them, it is possible to argue that Bale’s ‘chaff’ and ‘corn’ analogy is complicated by the fact that Foxe used materials that were blatantly in the ‘chaff’ category. The use, by Foxe, of the hagiographies of Osbern and Eadmer provide one excellent example. Foxe borrowed heavily from these manuscripts to tell the story of Edgar and Dunstan despite their stringent glorification of miracles and their portrayal of saintly characteristics and troupes. Similarly, the Quadrilogus contained a series of hagiographical accounts intended purely to promote the martyrdom and sainthood of Thomas Becket, yet Foxe made this his main source for dismantling the archbishop’s reputation. Foxe’s use of papal decretals, meanwhile, was an attempt to highlight variance and discord between rulings made across a millennium and a half of councils and gatherings. Both Bale and Parker had dismissed them as worthy only of disregard, but Foxe believed that he could make them useful.36 Indeed, the evidence that they supplied provides one of the more powerful methods by Foxe of comparing the ancient and modern churches. The use of hagiography and decretals worked for Foxe only because he twisted

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the meaning and carefully selected and interpreted his extracts to denounce the very same qualities that these sources had originally glorified. Medieval histories were just as suspect. Take the Opera Historia by Gervase of Canterbury. Foxe found his ‘corn’ in those portions of the text where Gervase had attempted to protect the interests of his own house from what he saw as outside aggression and threat.37 Foxe, for the most part, ignored those portions that described national events, such as the rise and fall of Thomas Becket and the failure of rule whilst Richard went on Crusade. For Gervase, these were near-contemporary events. He was an eyewitness. However, he also offered opinions that were not suitable for Foxe’s arguments. Gervase supported the papal position more often than that of the king. Even those histories that offered opinion and fact more conducive to a Protestant reading of the past were not perfect and were judged in the same way. The Chronica Majora of Matthew Paris was useful because its author tended to write voraciously against outside influences, especially the papacy. However, Matthew Paris was equally as dismissive of secular intrusion, attacking the king and his gentry whenever they interfered in monastic and church institutions. The former Foxe extracted, the latter he ignored, viewing those claims as either unimportant to an ecclesiastical history or as a misrepresentation of what had occurred. Evidence was therefore selected, appraised, and extracted based on preconceived notions of what was right and what was wrong. The writing of history, for Foxe, was based on an awareness of biases in his sources but also an awareness of his own bias. He used history to offer advice and example and to demand change. That was the purpose. Daniel Woolf has suggested that the underlying research processes common in the sixteenth century promoted this type of reading and understanding of the past. As briefly discussed in Chapter 2, scholars of this period tended to rely on the commonplace book to collect ideas and evidence together under a series of headings for later recitation and recall.38 Woolf claims that this process produced a near-unconscious expectation that the past was to be used and understood as a series of ideas, often distant from and extractable of the original context that past writers had offered. Woolf argues, To the historian and the casual compiler of commonplaces alike, the past was a convenient and nearly boundless lake, full of examples and anecdotes that were mobile and extractable from the lake’s varying depths into the boat of present usage.39 History could, therefore, be reduced to a list of various points under specific headings, often with a mind to seeking harmony and coherence or to identify disharmony amongst statements taken from potentially many sources. This is a similar argument as Mary T. Crane made regarding the use of commonplaces for mnemonic ordering and retention.40 It can, perhaps, be imagined that when Foxe read between the lines in Matthew Paris’ chronicle,

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he did so because he had already extracted a number of anecdotes under a commonplace heading where taxes had been demanded in similar cases. Foxe was interested in the claims where papal agents had demanded money but not in those cases where the secular government had done the same. He scribbled down those references of interest to him and ignored the rest. The result was a sequence nestled into the account on Henry III’s reign that listed all the instances of taxation by papal agents over a ten-year period. This was most likely a replication of the notes that he had produced under a specific commonplace heading. The intermittent sequences on papal history, interspersed between biographical entries in John Bale’s Catalogus, provides a second example. The formulation and structure of these entries have the appearance of deriving from a commonplace method.41 Foxe extracted many of these entries from the Catalogus to deploy in his own history as primary source examples, detaching them for a second time from their original context. The same is equally true for the masses of primary documentation that Foxe extracted from Matthias Flacius’ Catalogus Testium Veritatis and from the various volumes of the Magdeburg Centuries. Bale’s chaff and corn metaphor, therefore, is not just a guide to whole works, but a guide to the worth of textual statements. Through studying how Foxe extracted and analysed these statements an answer to Burke’s second protocol is apparent. Foxe was most certainly aware of biases and fabrication in evidence, but his approach was to implement his own biased opinion as a basis for understanding the truth-claim. The third protocol that Burke asks to be examined is an interest in causation.42 How did Foxe attempt to analyse and contextualise historical events? As Foxe offered his history purposefully as an alternative to the traditional story, he sought primarily to revise. More specifically, Foxe chose to dismiss much of the accumulated interpretation that contemporary or latter-day histories had offered, and instead, he sought out the origin and the first utterance of a claim, as well as seeking out coherence between them. Foxe not only repeated what these sources told him, but he assessed their worth and attempted to explain them and offer an opinion. What this amounts to, is an attempt at appropriating old ideas for a new need, specifically Reformation. Herbert Weisinger once offered a generalisation of Renaissance-era histories as attempting not so much to seek original ideas as to discover the cumulative flow of old ideas, and to analyse what new combinations have been made and under the impetus of what new needs and forces. The ideas themselves retain certain fairly constant characters; what changes as a result of new demands is the forms of recombination of old ideas.43 Once Foxe began to collaborate with Matthew Parker he was in a perfect position to assess and examine the ‘cumulative flows of old ideas’, analyse them,

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and then ‘recombine’ them, as Weisinger suggests. When Warren Wooden argued that much of what Foxe wrote is embedded in medieval traditions and is not new or original at all, he is noticing the tension involved in writing history in a time of great change.44 Truth for Foxe was a correction of mistakes in the traditional story, a rediscovery of the original utterance, and an attempt to identify the original interpretation but only as a mirror of his own beliefs. It was not meant as a new interpretation, but a return to an old one. This is what Foxe tried to offer. The sense of the past that Foxe provides in his history is one that does analyse sources, does attempt to explain them and does consider issues of truthfulness as paramount. He considers the past in terms of a simple judgement between what is right and what is wrong; in this, his history is little more than a black-and-white portrayal of complex events. The history is also meant to encourage change in his own time. As Woolf described, history was a ‘lake’ of anecdotes and examples that could be used to illuminate issues in the present. The difference that Foxe saw in the past was not one of historical change, but one of corruption of faith and its continued maintenance by a select few. Foxe’s reliance on Eusebian ecclesiastical history as the chosen genre for his work further emphasises this same point—Foxe tirelessly aligned his history with the protocols of that genre, ensuring that his work did not in itself seem in any way novel or new.

A Memory Container The history that Foxe provided Elizabethan England was intended to convey the importance of the past to understand the present and the future. It was meant to establish precedence for the Elizabethan religious settlement and, more specifically, a defence from detractors who claimed that the Protestant breakaway churches were newly created. The intention was to direct this knowledge to a variety of readers: the convert, the undecided, the stout Catholic, and so forth. Examples from the past were used to instruct devotion for the ordinary person, but also to guide the actions of gentry and monarch. It was also intended as a means of gathering together disparate materials, some of which had disappeared into private collections after the dissolution of the monasteries, some which had simply fallen from favour and others that had been forgotten entirely. These needed a layer of interpretation to make useful: to remove the chaff from the corn, as Bale had suggested. There was also a need to make the growing amount of textual arguments and evidence more accessible. Foxe once wrote that ‘the number of trifling pamphlets may grow out of reme[m]brance’ when he discussed the Marian martyrs.45 By this Foxe referred to the various publications that had proceeded the Acts and Monuments as smuggled and illicit material during the reign of Mary, and then, more recently, as a memorial at the beginning of Elizabeth’s reign. These included Henry Bull’s An Apologye (1562), which focused on John Hooper,

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Thomas Brice’s A Compendious Regester in Metre (1559), which honoured, in the form of a poem, all those Protestants who had been executed on 69 different days, Matthew Rogers The Complaint of Veritie, based on John Bradford’s writings on Hooper, and Henry Sutton’s The Examinaction, which focused on the martyrdom of John Philpot. There were other publications of a similar kind as well, written by Arthur Golding (in 1562), William Griffith (in 1561), and William Powell (in 1560) amongst others. Foxe himself even wrote one of these when he first returned from exile: the A Friendly Farewell, Which Master Doctor Ridley, Late Bishop of London Did Write Beinge Prisoner in Oxeforde (published in 1559). There was nothing less than a deluge of such texts printed in England between 1559 and 1563, of no more than 50 to 150 folio pages each in size, and taking as their focus just one or two martyrs. After publishing the first edition of his Acts and Monuments, Foxe discovered first-hand that there existed a similar deluge of historical material, discarded at the time of monastic destruction, but now re-gathered and rediscovered as potentially useful. Bale had provided a good guide to this material in his Catalogus, but Parker had discovered even more and now provided much of it to Foxe for inclusion in the Acts and Monuments. Then there were the other forms of printed material, the panegyrics, the polemics, the theological treatises, the histories, and hagiographies. From initially basing his history on intermediary works such as Bale’s catalogue, and its continental partner, Flacius’ Catalogus Testium Veritatis, Foxe found himself overwhelmed. This would appear to have been a popular complaint. Ann Blair has written of a feeling of ‘information overload’ in the sixteenth century, borne of a sudden easy availability and increase in texts because of the invention of and business capacity of printing presses.46 For someone like Foxe, the boom in printed texts was exacerbated by the need also to uncover the original utterances and therefore engage fully and properly with England’s manuscript heritage as well. The Acts and Monuments is therefore partly an answer to this complaint and concern. Foxe not only sought to write a memorial to fallen colleagues and friends and a history that re-interpreted the meaning of history as an ongoing war between the forces of good and evil but also sought to offer a guide to the accumulated textual knowledge. Foxe could have printed numerous short pamphlets, but he chose not to. His response to a complaint from a good friend, William Turner, that the first edition was too long, was responded to with a much larger and longer second edition.47 Foxe did not do this to spite Turner’s genuine concern, but because his mission was not just to promote the Protestant faith through history and memorialisation, but to offer some form of control and accessibility to those arguments and materials. Essentially, Foxe sought to compile a complete record, that drew into it all the disparate pamphlets, manuscripts, and printed works, into one, relatively easy to use compendium. There are early signs that Foxe sought harmony between texts and worried that the message would be lost because of too many texts and not enough connections between them. When he left Basel in 1559, Foxe had

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left behind a promised work to produce volume two of the Rerum, containing continental martyrs. The collection of epistles now found in The Zurich Letters includes several by Foxe from this time to the famous Swiss reformer, Heinrich Bullinger (1504–1575) asking for materials related to Lutheran and Zwinglian martyrs.48 By 1562, however, nothing more had happened with the volume as Foxe was, by then, deeply entrenched in producing the Acts and Monuments. Foxe’s Basel printer, Johannes Oporinus wrote to him to ask if he intended to finish the Rerum pars Secunda. Foxe responded in the negative, but a new solution was found instead, presumably with Foxe’s agreement. Whilst living in Basel, Foxe had made friends with Heinrich Pantaleon (1522–1595), a local physician and scholar. Pantaleon now took over the work and published it at roughly the same time that Foxe published the Acts and Monuments in England. In the preface, Pantaleon stated, ‘We hoped that this second part would be either by himself or certain other enthusiastic historians brought to light on this fixed day’.49 The suggestion that the Rerum Pars Secunda was to be printed on a ‘fixed day’, might just be a printer deadline to ensure that the book reached the Frankfurt book fair, but it might also suggest a planned publication campaign that linked the Acts and Monuments and the Rerum Pars Secunda together as a combined attack on Roman Catholicism. The evidence is uncertain but does show that Foxe had once planned not only to collate material about English martyrology but also to include all continental martyrs as well and to contain these in one series of volumes for ease of use and discoverability. Interestingly, Foxe concluded the second edition of his Acts and Monuments with a promise to embed a history of continental martyrs and history, into ‘the next booke or Section insuyng’.50 Foxe would appear to have in mind a reprint and translation of the Rerum Pars Secunda as part of his own Acts and Monuments. Foxe, therefore, appears to be working towards a complete and comprehensive history and memorial of Christianity that avoided the problem of too many disparate publications. Foxe sought not to publish multiple texts, but to draw the accumulated knowledge together into one place. What comes to mind here is the study of ‘memory’s library’ by Jennifer Summit.51 Summit has argued that the development of early modern libraries, such as those built by Matthew Parker and Robert Cotton (1570–1631), emerged in the late sixteenth century and early seventeenth century not only to preserve the past and its documents but also to select and remould it. These libraries were dedicated in material terms to the supremacy of the English monarchy and to the support of religious reform, their contents and the cataloguing systems employed designed to advertise, preserve, and expound a selected and curated set of knowledge. The library was meant to promote an argument about the past, not offer it silently. The process of recovering medieval books was, therefore, one inherently of reshaping and re-ordering. Whereas the monks that had originally housed these works had considered them as sacred monuments, these librarians and collectors considered them as containers of memory requiring interpretation

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and curation. This is familiar in what Foxe is trying to do in the Acts and Monuments. He is gathering together the accumulated ‘monuments’, displaying them in his book, and providing a service of curation to organise them as an argument and not just a provision. He included medieval manuscripts, printed texts, oral testimonies, records, and martyrological accounts, and presented them in a form that would aid and guide the reader. Parker, Cotton, and other collectors were doing the same with their libraries. Thus the description of Foxe as an ‘author-compiler’ that John N. King suggested could be complemented with another description of Foxe as ‘authorcurator’. Whilst Foxe did not create a library or archive, his purposes were similar. He wrote a large, comprehensive volume to bring all the disparate knowledge together into one, easy to access package. The Acts and Monuments are, of course, not the only example of this in the late sixteenth century. The Magdeburg Centuries equally cannot have been written without consideration of its long length. That work reached 14 volumes, each volume of which contained some 1,000 pages. The Centuriators saw their offering as a comprehensive compendium that could instruct others and, perhaps (and ironically) inspire shorter works in the future that would also promote the reformed faith. Providing such guides to what is essentially an overwhelming amount of material is a timeless problem that humans have attempted to solve through producing encyclopaedias, databases, catalogues, and numerous other forms of indexing. In each case, and particularly for authors engaged in a partisan rendition of the past, there is an implicit purpose not only to preserve knowledge for maintaining memory but also for shaping that memory into a certain form. Such acts, not only preserve but also seeks to forget and alter, to send into oblivion other memories and beliefs. This study of Foxe’s pre-Lollard history has illustrated some of the processes and purposes that made the Acts and Monuments into a container of memory that was much more than a simple memorial to those who had been martyred, but instead a guide to human history and its role in God’s ultimate plan. In doing so, Foxe often defaulted to hagiographical methods, but he was also critical of sources and evidence and was generally careful as a historian. There are errors and mistakes, but there are also abundant examples where Foxe shifted through the mass of data and came to a suitable conclusion, sometimes one that was more accurate than those that had come before. The partisanship of his history can negate some of this achievement in modern eyes, but in terms of sixteenth-century historiographical practice, Foxe offers a surprisingly nuanced appraisal of the past, albeit one specifically designed to support the Protestant world order and one that used the past primarily as an example and warning for the present. Foxe offers a refreshed and critical appraisal of the historical record within the understanding that history had been prophesied in Scripture and its unveiling—part of God’s grand plan for humanity and part of Satan’s meddling. The source base was extensive, especially because of the collaboration with Bale and Parker. Foxe relied not only on contemporary Protestant

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publications but also on those of his enemies as well. He used classical and medieval texts, much more than was commonly possible at the time, and he used the occasional scrap of official record and testimony to bolster his evidence. The catalogues of John Bale and Matthias Flacius provided a crucial starting point, but Foxe, himself, within a truly collaborative atmosphere, transformed previous Protestant arguments about history, into a fully formed reappraisal of the past. This was no small feat. Study of this pre-Lollard history in the first two editions of the Acts and Monuments emphasises the point that Foxe himself made: that this was not just a martyrology, but a story of Christian history. Foxe sought to contextualise those who had suffered; he sought to demonstrate how the Roman Church had fallen into the grip of Antichrist and failed to uphold the true faith. He sought to update the Church history begun by Eusebius, continued abroad by the Magdeburg Centuriators, but now given an English context in the Acts and Monuments. If history can be used to not only understand past actions and events for their own sake but also to make them useful and instructive for a present need, then this is exactly what Foxe provided. Elizabethan England had needed a new story to support its present. Its old one had failed. What Foxe created offered England that new understanding of itself. Arguably, the ripples continue to reverberate even now. Foxe’s book would last for generations and would only really be overturned by further religious controversy in the nineteenth century.52 There were multiple reprints, abridgements, and revisions. There was oral transmission: stories that Foxe had narrated were told at the pulpit or discussed amongst friends, scholars, or relatives. Much of what was remembered about Foxe’s book was, of course, the contemporary material: the vivid martyr stories, the reaction to Henry VIII’s break from Rome, and his subsequent ‘lapse’ in proclaiming the Act of Six Articles in the 1540s. It provoked popular remembrance of ‘Bloody Mary’ and established Elizabeth as a Protestant Queen (even if Foxe, himself, was disappointed by her lack of continued reform). However, the history as well reverberates. It appears in Shakespeare, in Holinshed, as references by many early historians. The conception of Anglo-Saxon England altered drastically from Foxe, but he offered the first popular beginning of a new study of that period. His conception of England as apart from continental Roman control became increasingly influential as the idea of a nation-state came to the forefront. Much of what we understand about the English Reformation begins with Foxe and much of England’s popular understanding of its history can be found in the echoes and traces of his Acts and Monuments. This is the legacy that John Foxe has left behind.

Notes 1. See, as an example, David Loades, “The Early Reception,” TAMO, 2004, www. johnfoxe.org/index.php?realm=more&gototype=&type=essay&book=essay7. 2. As suggested in Thomas S. Freeman,“John Foxe: A Biography,” TAMO, 2004, www. johnfoxe.org/index.php?realm=more&gototype=&type=essay&book=essay1.

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3. Elizabeth Evenden, Patents, Pictures and Patronage: John Day and the Tudor Book Trade (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2008). 4. Elizabeth Evenden and Thomas S. Freeman, Religion and the Book in Early Modern England: The Making of John Foxe’s ‘Book of Martyrs’ (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2011), 175. 5. Thomas S. Freeman, “John Bale’s Book of Martyrs?: The Account of King John in Acts and Monuments,” Reformation 3, no. 1 (1 January 1998): 175–223, https://doi.org/10.1179/ref_1998_3_1_008. 6. This letter is translated and discussed in John Wade, “John Foxe’s Latin Writings: Their Intellectual and Social Context, with Special Reference to this Period of His Exile, 1554–1559” (PhD. diss., University of Sheffield, 2008). 7. John N. King, English Reformation Literature: The Tudor Origins of the Protestant Tradition (Princeton, NJ; Guildford: Princeton University Press, 1983), 69; and John N. King, Foxe’s Book of Martyrs and Early Modern Print Culture (Cambridge; New York: Cambridge University Press, 2006), 23. 8. Thomas Betteridge, Tudor Histories of the English Reformation, 1530–83 (Aldershot: Ashgate, 1999), 186–9. 9. Jesse Lander, “Foxe’s “Book of Martyrs”: Printing and Popularising the Acts and Monuments,” in Religion and Culture in Renaissance England, ed. C. McEachem and D. Shuger (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997), 69–72; Devorah Greenberg, “‘Foxe’ as a Methodological Response to Epistemic Challenges: The Book of Martyrs Transported,” in John Foxe at Home and Abroad, ed. David Loades (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2004), 237–55. 10. Greenberg, “‘Foxe’ as a Methodological Response to Epistemic Challenges: The Book of Martyrs Transported”; Patrick Collinson, “John Foxe and National Consciousness,” in John Foxe and His World, ed. David Loades (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2002), 10–36. 11. See Ronald E. Diener, “The Magdeburg Centuries: A Bibliothecal and Historiographical Analysis” (Th.D. diss., Harvard University, 1978). 12. Annabel M. Patterson, Reading Holinshed’s Chronicles (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1994). 13. A&M (1570), 186. 14. Ibid., 433 (412). 15. Robert A. Markus, “Church History and Early Church Historians,” Studies in Church History 11 (1975): 1–17, https://doi.org/10.1017/S0424208400006252. 16. From the preface of John Sleiden, De status religionis et republicase (Strasbourg, 1555), as discussed and translated in Donald R. Kelley, “Johann Sleidan and the Origins of History as a Profession,” The Journal of Modern History 52, no. 4 (1980): 574–98. 17. James Frederic Mozley, John Foxe and His Book (London: Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge, 1940), 153. 18. Warren W. Wooden, John Foxe (Boston: Twayne, 1983), x. 19. Peter Burke, The Renaissance Sense of the Past (London: Edward Arnold, 1969), 3–4. 20. Ibid., 7. 21. A&M (1563), 123 (1140). 22. Freeman, “John Bale’s Book of Martyrs?: The Account of King John in Acts and Monuments”. 23. Thomas Stapleton, A Counterblast to M. Hornes Vayne Blaste Against M. Fekenham: Wherein Is Set Forthe: A Ful Reply to M. Hornes Answer, and to Euery Part Therof Made, Against the Declaration of My L. Abbat of Westminster, M. Fekenham, Touching, the Othe of the Supremacy. By Perusing Vvhereof Shall Appeare, Besides the Holy Scriptures, as It Vvere a Chronicle of the Continual Practise of Christes Churche in Al Ages and Countries, Fro[m] the Time

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24. 25. 26.

27. 28. 29. 30. 31. 32. 33. 34. 35.

36.

37.

38.

39. 40. 41.

Our History Is the Truth of Constantin the Great, Vntil Our Daies: Prouing the Popes and Bishops Supremacy in Ecclesiastical Causes: And Disprouing the Prince Supremacy in the Same Causes (Louvain: Apud Ioannem Foulerum. An. 1567. Cum priuil., 1567), fo. 78v. A&M (1570), 1 (blank). Ibid., 344 (335). Ibid., 950 (blank). Freeman, “John Bale’s Book of Martyrs?: The Account of King John in Acts and Monuments,” has identified a number of these manuscripts as belonging to Parker, including the text beginning ‘Adam pater generis humani’ as Trinity College Cambridge MS R. 7.13, fo. 1r–50v; the Scalachronicon as CCCC MS 133; Thomas Rudbourne’s history as CCCC MS 110; the manuscript beginning ‘Richard Rede’ as CCCC MS 311; and a copy of the Brut as CCCC MS 182. See, as an example, Ralph C. S. Walker, The Coherence Theory of Truth: Realism, Anti-Realism, Idealism (London; New York: Routledge, 1989). Compare A&M (1570), 208 with Fabyan, bk. 6, chap. 184, Higden, bk. 6, chap. 6, Brompton, col. 838, and Bale, Catalogus, 126–7. These details are taken from A&M (1570), 2205 TAMO Commentary. See A&M (1570), 1748 TAMO Commentary. Compare A&M (1563), 1187–98 (1118-1128, 1135) with (1570), 1770–84 (1731-1745). See Evenden and Freeman, Religion and the Book in Early Modern England: The Making of John Foxe’s ‘Book of Martyrs’, 41–2. John Foxe and Thomas S. Freeman, “‘As True a Subiect Being Prysoner’: John Foxe’s Notes on the Imprisonment of Princess Elizabeth, 1554–5,” The English Historical Review 117, no. 470 (2002): 104–16. Mozley, John Foxe and His Book, 156. John Leland and John Bale, The Laboryouse Iourney [and] Serche of Iohan Leylande, for Englandes Antiquitees: Geuen of Hym as a Newe Yeares Gyfte to Kynge Henry the Viij. in the. Xxxvij. Yeare of His Reygne, With Declaracyons Enlarged (London, 1549), sig. A7v-A8v. Parker made this claim in a letter that is now in John Strype, The Life and Acts of Matthew Parker, . . . Archbishop of Canterbury . . . To Which Is Added an Appendix, Containing Various . . . Records, Letters, Etc. (London, 1711), vol. 4, 529. For example, Foxe described in detail the contention over a new church in Canterbury. This was a parochial issue that had angered Gervase, mainly because of issues of authority. See A&M (1570), 317–8 and compare to Gervase, vol. 1, 332–4, 337–9, 344–9. For studies of a commonplace book that Foxe published as a student aid, see John G. Rechtien, “John Foxe’s Comprehensive Collection of Commonplaces: A Renaissance Memory System for Students and Theologians,” The Sixteenth Century Journal 9, no. 1 (1978): 82–9, https://doi.org/10.2307/3003741; V. Schulderer, “John Foxe’s Commonplace Book; James I’s Speech on the Gunpowder Plot; John Sharp’s ‘Cursus Theologicus’,” The British Museum Quarterly 7, no. 4 (1933): 122–3, https://doi.org/10.2307/4421483. Daniel Woolf, “Afterword Shadows of the Past in Early Modern England,” Huntington Library Quarterly 76, no. 4 (2013): 639–50, https://doi.org/10.1525/ hlq.2013.76.4.639. Mary T. Crane, Framing Authority: Sayings, Self, and Society in Sixteenth-Century England (Princeton, NJ; Chichester: Princeton University Press, 1993). Bale’s surviving notebooks, particularly the published John Bale, Index Britanniae Scriptorum: John Bale’s Index of British and Other Writers, ed. Reginald

Our History Is the Truth

42. 43. 44. 45. 46. 47. 48.

49.

50. 51. 52.

211

Lane Poole and Mary Bateson, 1st ed. reprinted / with new introduction & bibliog., by Caroline Brett and James P. Carley (Woodbridge: D.S. Brewer, 1990), show that Bale used the commonplace method. Burke, The Renaissance Sense of the Past, 13–18. Herbert Weisinger, “Ideas of History During the Renaissance,” Journal of the History of Ideas 6, no. 4 (1945): 415–35, https://doi.org/10.2307/2707343. Wooden, John Foxe, Preface. A&M (1563), 15 (937). Ann Blair, “Reading Strategies for Coping with Information Overload ca. 1550– 1700,” Journal of the History of Ideas 64, no. 1 (2003): 11–28, https://doi. org/10.2307/3654293. This was in a letter to Foxe from William Turner as described in Mozley, John Foxe and His Book, 137. The Zurich Letters, Comprising the Correspondence of Several English Bishops and Others, With Some of the Helvetian Reformers, During the Early Part of the Reign of Queen Elizabeth, trans. Hastings Robinson (Cambridge, 1842), 25–6, 35–6, 41–3. Heinrich Pantaleon, Martyrum historia: Hoc est, maximarum per Europam persecutionum ac sanctorum Dei martyrum, caeteraruḿque rerum insignium, in ecclesia Christi postremis & periculosis his temporibus gestarum, atque certo consilio per regna & nationes distributarum, commentarij. Pars secunda (Basel, 1563), Preface: expectauimus subinde hactenus quando tande(m) secu(n)da pars uel ab ispo, uel ab alio quodam Historiarum amatorein lucem prodicet. A&M (1570), 2336 (2296). Jennifer Summit, Memory’s Library: Medieval Books in Early Modern England (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2008). David Loades, “The Maitland Controversy,” TAMO, 2004, www.johnfoxe.org/ index.php?realm=more&gototype=&type=essay&book=essay11; Peter Nockles,“The Nineteenth Century Reception,”TAMO,2004,www.johnfoxe.org/index. php?realm=more&gototype=&type=essay&book=essay9.

Works Cited Printed Bale, John. Index Britanniae Scriptorum: John Bale’s Index of British and Other Writers, edited by Reginald Lane Poole and Mary Bateson. 1st ed. Reprinted/With New Introduction and Bibliography by Caroline Brett and James P. Carley. Woodbridge: D.S. Brewer, 1990. ——— Scriptorum illustriū maioris Brytannię . . . catalogus . . . usque ad annū hunc Domini 1557 . . . IX centurias continens, etc.: (Scriptorum illustrium . . . posterior pars, quinque continens centurias ultimas). Basel, 1557. Betteridge, Thomas. Tudor Histories of the English Reformation, 1530–83. Aldershot: Ashgate, 1999. Blair,Ann.“Reading Strategies for Coping With Information Overload ca. 1550–1700.” Journal of the History of Ideas 64, no. 1 (2003): 11–28. https://doi.org/10.2307/ 3654293. Brompton, John. “Chronicon Johannis Bromton Abbatis Iornalensis.” In Historiæ Anglicanæ scriptores X: Simeon Monachus Dunelmensis. Johannes Prior Hagustaldensis.

212

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Ricardus Prior Hagustaldensis. Ailredus Abbas Rievallensis. Radulphus de Diceto Londoniensis. Johannes Brompton Jornallensis. Gervasius Monachus Dorobornensis. Thomas Stubbs Dominicanus. Guilielmus Thorn Cantuariensis. Henricus Knighton Leicestrensis. Ex vetustis manusciptis, nunc primùm in lucem editi; Adjectis variis lectionibus, glossario, indicéque copioso., edited by Roger Twysden, 725–1284. London, 1652. Burke, Peter. The Renaissance Sense of the Past. London: Edward Arnold, 1969. Collinson, Patrick. “John Foxe and National Consciousness.” In John Foxe and His World, edited by David Loades, 10–36. Aldershot: Ashgate, 2002. Crane, Mary T. Framing Authority: Sayings, Self, and Society in Sixteenth-Century England. Princeton, NJ and Chichester: Princeton University Press, 1993. Diener, Ronald E. “The Magdeburg Centuries: A Bibliothecal and Historiographical Analysis.” ThD diss., Harvard University, 1978. Evenden, Elizabeth. Patents, Pictures and Patronage: John Day and the Tudor Book Trade. Aldershot: Ashgate, 2008. Evenden, Elizabeth, and Thomas S. Freeman. Religion and the Book in Early Modern England: The Making of John Foxe’s ‘Book of Martyrs’. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2011. Fabyan, Robert. The New Chronicles of England and France, in Two Parts; Named . . . the Concordance of Histories, edited by Henry Ellis. London, 1811. Foxe, John. “Acts and Monuments.” TAMO, 1563. www.johnfoxe.org. ——— “Acts and Monuments.” TAMO, 1570. www.johnfoxe.org. Freeman, Thomas S. “‘As True a Subiect Being Prysoner’: John Foxe’s Notes on the Imprisonment of Princess Elizabeth, 1554–5.” The English Historical Review 117, no. 470 (2002): 104–16. ——— “John Bale’s Book of Martyrs?: The Account of King John in Acts and Monuments.” Reformation 3, no. 1 (1 January 1998): 175–223. https://doi.org/10.1179/ ref_1998_3_1_008. ——— “John Foxe: A Biography.” TAMO, 2004. www.johnfoxe.org/index.php?rea lm=more&gototype=&type=essay&book=essay1. Greenberg, Devorah. “‘Foxe’ as a Methodological Response to Epistemic Challenges: The Book of Martyrs Transported.” In John Foxe at Home and Abroad, edited by David Loades, 237–55. Aldershot: Ashgate, 2004. Higden, Ranulph. Polychronicon Ranulphi Higden, Monachi Cestrensis: Together With the English Translations of John Trevisa and of an Unknown Writer of the Fifteenth Century, edited by Joseph R. Lumby and Churchill Babington, translated by John Trevisa. London: Longmans, 1865. Kelley, Donald R. “Johann Sleidan and the Origins of History as a Profession.” The Journal of Modern History 52, no. 4 (1980): 574–98. King, John N. English Reformation Literature: The Tudor Origins of the Protestant Tradition. Princeton, NJ and Guildford: Princeton University Press, 1983. ——— Foxe’s Book of Martyrs and Early Modern Print Culture. Cambridge and New York: Cambridge University Press, 2006. Lander, Jesse. “Foxe’s ‘Book of Martyrs’: Printing and Popularising the Acts and Monuments.” In Religion and Culture in Renaissance England, edited by C. McEachem and D. Shuger, 69–72. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997. Leland, John, and John Bale. The Laboryouse Iourney [and] Serche of Iohan Leylande, for Englandes Antiquitees: Geuen of Hym as a Newe Yeares Gyfte to Kynge

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213

Henry the Viij. in the. Xxxvij. Yeare of His Reygne, With Declaracyons Enlarged. London, 1549. Loades, David. “The Early Reception.” TAMO, 2004. www.johnfoxe.org/index.php? realm=more&gototype=&type=essay&book=essay7. ——— “The Maitland Controversy.” TAMO, 2004. www.johnfoxe.org/index.php?r ealm=more&gototype=&type=essay&book=essay11. Markus, Robert A. “Church History and Early Church Historians.” Studies in Church History 11 (1975): 1–17. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0424208400006252. Mozley, James Frederic. John Foxe and His Book. London: Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge, 1940. Nockles, Peter. “The Nineteenth Century Reception.” TAMO (2004). www.johnfoxe. org/index.php?realm=more&gototype=&type=essay&book=essay9. Pantaleon, Heinrich. Martyrum historia: Hoc est, maximarum per Europam persecutionum ac sanctorum Dei martyrum, caeteraruḿque rerum insignium, in ecclesia Christi postremis & periculosis his temporibus gestarum, atque certo consilio per regna & nationes distributarum, commentarij. Pars secunda. Basel, 1563. Patterson, Annabel M. Reading Holinshed’s Chronicles. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1994. Rechtien, John G. “John Foxe’s Comprehensive Collection of Commonplaces: A Renaissance Memory System for Students and Theologians.” The Sixteenth Century Journal 9, no. 1 (1978): 82–9. https://doi.org/10.2307/3003741. Robinson, Hastings, The Zurich Letters, Comprising the Correspondence of Several English Bishops and Others, With Some of the Helvetian Reformers, During the Early Part of the Reign of Queen Elizabeth, translated by Hastings Robinson. Cambridge, 1842. Schulderer, V. “John Foxe’s Commonplace Book; James I’s Speech on the Gunpowder Plot; John Sharp’s ‘Cursus Theologicus’.” The British Museum Quarterly 7, no. 4 (1933): 122–3. https://doi.org/10.2307/4421483. Stapleton, Thomas. A Counterblast to M. Hornes Vayne Blaste Against M. Fekenham: Wherein Is Set Forthe: A Ful Reply to M. Hornes Answer, and to Euery Part Therof Made, Against the Declaration of My L. Abbat of Westminster, M. Fekenham, Touching, the Othe of the Supremacy. By Perusing Vvhereof Shall Appeare, Besides the Holy Scriptures, as It Vvere a Chronicle of the Continual Practise of Christes Churche in Al Ages and Countries, Fro[m] the Time of Constantin the Great, Vntil Our Daies: Prouing the Popes and Bishops Supremacy in Ecclesiastical Causes: And Disprouing the Prince Supremacy in the Same Causes. Louvain: Apud Ioannem Foulerum. An. 1567. Cum priuil., 1567. Strype, John. The Life and Acts of Matthew Parker, . . . Archbishop of Canterbury . . . To Which Is Added an Appendix, Containing Various . . . Records, Letters, Etc. London, 1711. Stubbs, William, ed. The Historical Works of Gervase of Canterbury. 2 Vols. London: Longman, 1880. Summit, Jennifer. Memory’s Library: Medieval Books in Early Modern England. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2008. Wade, John. “John Foxe’s Latin Writings: Their Intellectual and Social Context, With Special Reference to This Period of His Exile, 1554–1559.” PhD diss., University of Sheffield, 2008.

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Walker, Ralph C. S. The Coherence Theory of Truth: Realism, Anti-Realism, Idealism. London and New York: Routledge, 1989. Weisinger, Herbert. “Ideas of History During the Renaissance.” Journal of the History of Ideas 6, no. 4 (1945): 415–35. https://doi.org/10.2307/2707343. Wooden, Warren W. John Foxe. Boston: Twayne, 1983. Woolf, Daniel. “Afterword Shadows of the Past in Early Modern England.” Huntington Library Quarterly 76, no. 4 (2013): 639–50. https://doi.org/10.1525/hlq. 2013.76.4.639.

Appendix A Bibliography of Sources That Foxe Consulted for His Pre-Lollard History

This is a list of all the printed and manuscript copies that have been identified as used for the compilation of A&M (1563), bk. 1 and A&M (1570), bks. 1–4 in this study. In addition, the version used to make the comparison to the Acts and Monuments has also been listed where used. Where possible, links to online copies have also been provided. The sources used specifically and only for the account of King John are not referenced below but can be found in Thomas S. Freeman. “John Bale’s Book of Martyrs?: The Account of King John in Acts and Monuments.” Reformation 3, no. 1 (1 January 1998): 175–223, https://doi. org/10.1179/ref_1998_3_1_008.

Printed Breviat chronicle (9 editions between 1551–61) [1570, bk. 2] •

A Breuyat Chronicle. London, 1556. STC 9972 (EEBO).

The Geneva Bible [1570, bk. 1] •

Berry, Lloyd E. The Geneva Bible: A Facsimile of the 1560 Edition: The Bible of the Protestant Reformation. Peabody, MA: Hendrickson Publishers, 2007.

Bale, John, Image of Bothe Churches After reulacion of saynt Iohan the euangelyst (Antwerp, 1545–1550) [1563, bk. 1; 1570, bk. 1] •

Antwerp, 1570. STC 1301 (EEBO).

Bale, John, The First Two Partes of the Actes or Unchast Examples of the Englysh Votaryes, Gathered Out of Theyr Owne Legends and Chronycles (London, 1551, 1560)

216 Appendix: A Bibliography of Sources [1563, bk. 1; 1570, bk. 2–4] •

London, 1551. STC 1273.5 (EEBO).

Bale, John, Scriptorum illustrium maioris Brytannie . . . Catalogus (Basel, 1557/9) [1563, bk. 1; 1570, bk. 2–4] •

Basel, 1557. STC 1296 (EEBO).

Bale, John, Acta Romanorum Pontificum (Basel, 1558/9) [1563, bk. 1; 1570, bk. 2–4] • •

Basel, 1559. (Google Books), https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=_ D9SAAAAcAAJ. Bale, John. The Pageant of Popes, Contayninge the Lyves of All the Bishops of Rome, From the Beginninge of Them to the Yeare of Grace 1555, translated by John Studley. London, 1574. STC 1304 (EEBO).

Bertrand, Pierre, Libellus de iurisdictione ecclesiastica (Paris, 1495) [1570, bk. 4] Burchard von Ursberg, Chronicum absolutissimum a Nino Assyriorum rege usque ad tempora Frederici II Imp. (Basel, 1569) [1570, bk. 4] Cisner, Nicholas, De Frederico II. Imperatore Oratio (Basel, 1565) [1570, bk. 4] •

Basel, 1565. (Google Books), https://books.google.co.uk/books?id= SRlPAAAAcAAJ.

Fabyan, Robert, The New Chronicles of England and France (London, 1559) [1570, bk. 2–4] •

Fabyan, Robert. The New Chronicles of England and France, in Two Parts; Named . . . the Concordance of Histories, edited by Henry Ellis. London, 1811.

Flacius, Matthias, Catalogus Testium Veritatis (Basel, 1556 or Strasbourg, 1562) [1563, bk. 1; 1570, 1, 3–4] • •

Basel, 1556, www2.uni-mannheim.de/mateo/camenahist/autoren/flacius_hist.html. Strasbourg, 1562. (Google Books), https://books.google.co.uk/books? id=PWVeAAAAcAAJ.

Appendix: A Bibliography of Sources

217

Flacius, Matthias, Magdeburg Centuries vols. 1–4 [1570, bk. 1–2] •

Flacius, Matthias, Johann Wigand, and Mattheus Judix, Ecclesiastica historia, integram ecclesiae Christi ideam quantum ad locum, propagationem, persecutionem, tranquillit., doctrin., haereses, ceremonias, gubunationem, schismata, synodos, personas, miracula, martyria, religiones extra ecclesiam: singulari diligentia et fide ex vetustissimis et optimis historicis, patribus et aliis scriptoribus congesta per aliquot studiosos et pios viros in urbe Magdeburgica, 14 vols. Basel, 1559. www.mgh-bibliothek. de/digilib/quellen.htm.

Gratius, Ortwin, Fasciculus Rerum Expetendarum ac Fugiendarum (Cologne, 1535) [1563, bk. 1; 1570, bk. 4] •

Cologne, 1535. (Google Books), https://books.google.co.uk/books? id=qL1EAAAAcAAJ.

Jewel, John, Apologia ecclesiæ anglicanæ (London, 1562) •

Jewel, John. The Apology of the Church of England, translated by Anne Bacon. London, 1888. (Gutenberg Online), www.gutenberg.org/ ebooks/17678.

Krantz, Albert, Metropolis sive Historia ed ecclesiis sub Carolo Magno in Saxonia (Basel, 1548) [1570, bk. 4] •

There is no modern edition available.

Lambarde, William, Archaionomia, siue de priscis anglorum legibus libri (London, 1568) [1570, bk. 2–3] •

London, 1568. STC 15142 (EEBO).

Lambert of Hersfeld, Annales (possibly Tübingen, 1525) [1563, bk. 1; 1570, bk. 4] •

Lambert of Hersfeld, Lamberti Hersfeldensis Annales, Ex Recens., edited by Ludwig F. Hesse. Hanover: Monumenta Germaniae historica (MGH), 1843.

Lazius, W., Abdiæ Babyloniæ episcopi et apostolorum discipuli de historia certaminis apostolici libri decem (Basel, 1552)

218 Appendix: A Bibliography of Sources [1570, bk. 1] •

Paris, 1560. (Google Books), https://books.google.be/books?vid=GEN T900000036133.

Moulin, Charles du, Commentarius in Edictum Henrici Secundi (Lyon, 1552) [1570, bk. 1] •

Lyons, 1552. (Google Books), https://books.google.co.uk/books?id= 4d9nRAuhIjQC.

Nauclerus, Johannes, Memorabilium omnis aetatis et omnium gentium chronici commentarii (Tübingen, 1516) [1563, bk. 1; 1570, bk. 4] •

Tübingen, 1516. (British Library) Ref. BLL01002610601.

Parker, Matthew, De Antiquitæ Britanniæ (London, 1572) [1570, bk. 2–4] •

London, 1572. STC 19292 (EEBO).

Platina, Bartolomeo, Liber de vita Christi ac pontificum omnium (Venice, eds. 1479–1562). [1563, bk. 1; 1570, bk. 1, 4] •

Cologne, 1562. (Google Books), https://books.google.co.uk/books? id=WkxnAAAAcAAJ.

Stella, Giovanni, Vitae ducentorum et triginta summarum pontificutatum beato petro apostolo ad Julium secundum modernum pontificem (Basel, 1507) [1570, bk. 4] •

Basel, 1507. (Google Books), https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=6 HVeAAAAcAAJ.

Stow, John, A Summary of English Chronicles (London, 1565) [1570, bk. 2] •

London, 1565. STC 23319 (EEBO).

Vergil, Polydore, Anglica Historia (Basel, 1534, 1546, or 1555) [1570, bk. 2–4]

Appendix: A Bibliography of Sources •

219

Vergil, Polydore. Anglica Historia: A Hypertext Critical Edition, translated by Dana F. Sutton. Basel, 1555. www.philological.bham.ac.uk/ polverg/.

Vigne, Pier della, Epistolarum Petride Vineis, ed. Simon Schard (Basel, 1566) [1570, bk. 4] •

Basel, 1566. (Google Books), https://books.google.co.uk/books?id= Sq1qwgUzcS8C.

Voragaine, Jacobus da, The Golden Legend/Legenda Aurea [1570, bk. 2] The Legenda Aurea was printed in more editions than the Bible before 1500, and it was one of the first books printed by William Caxton in the English language (in 1483). There were nine editions by 1527 and more followed. •

da Voragine, Jacobus. The Golden Legend: Readings on the Saints, translated by William G. Ryan (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1993).

Manuscript Alfred of Rievaulx—CCCC MS 59.56 [1570, bk. 3] • •

Aelfred of Rievaulx, The Hsitorical Works, edited and translated by Jane P. Freland and Marsha L. Dutton. Kalamazoo, 2005. CCCC MS 59 (Parker Library, Cambridge and Parker on the Web).

Anglo-Saxon Chronicle—MS Cotton Tib. B iv [1570, bk. 3] Foxe only uses a small fragment from the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, which was most likely supplied to him from Parker’s household. •

The Saxon Chronicle with an English Translation and Notes .  .  . To Which Are Added Chronological, Topographical, and Glossarial Indices, a Short Grammar of the Anglo-Saxon Language, Etc. by J. Ingram. Anglo-Saxon and Eng. L.P., translated by James Ingram. London: Longman, 1823.

Asser’s Life of Alfred—Cotton MS Otho A xii or CCCC MS 100 [1570, bk. 3]

220 Appendix: A Bibliography of Sources •

Ælfredi Regis Res Gestæ, edited by Matthew Parker. London, 1574. STC 863 (EEBO).

Crowland Chronicle [1570, bk. 3] •

Borrowed from the Lord of Arundel, via Parker’s patronage. This chronicle was only used sparingly.

Eadmer, vita S. Dunstane—CCCC MS 371 | Osbern’s Life of St Dunstan—BL Arundel MS 16 [1570, bk. 3] •

Memorials of Saint Dunstan, Archbishop of Canterbury ‘(Vita Sancti Dunstani), edited by William Stubbs. London: Rolls Series, 1874.

Elias of Evesham, Quadrilogus de vita sancti Tomae Cantuariensis matryris super libertate ecclesiastica (Paris, 1495)—Cotton Faustina B VIII & printed 1495 ed. [1563, bk. 1; 1570, bk. 4] • •

Paris, 1495. (Google Books), https://books.google.co.uk/books? id=s9dNAAAAcAAJ. Robertson, James C. Materials for the history of Thomas Becket, Archbishop of Canterbury, 4 vols. London: Longman, Trübner, 1879.

English parchment leaves—CCCC MS 404.5 [1570, bk. 4] •

CCCC MS 404.5 (Parker Library, Cambridge and Parker on the Web).

Eulogium—CCCC MS 101 [partial MSS] [1563, bk. 1; 1570, bk. 4] •

Eulogium historiarum sive temporis: Chronicon ab orbe condito usque ad annum Domini M.CCC.LXVI., a monacho quodam Malmesburiensi exaratum; accedunt continuationes duae, quarum una ad annum M.CCCC.XIII., altera ad annum M.CCCC.XC. perducta est., edited by Frank S. Haydon. London: Longman, Brown, Green, Longmans & Roberts, 1858.

Gervase of Canterbury, Opera Historia—CCCC MS 438 [1570, bk. 4] •

Gervase of Canterbury. The Historical Works of Gervase of Canterbury, 2 vols, edited by William Stubbs. London: Longman, 1880.

Appendix: A Bibliography of Sources •

221

CCCC MS 152 (Parker Library, Cambridge and Parker on the Web).

Henry of Huntingdon, Historia Anglorum—possibly CCCC MS 280 [1563, bk. 1; 1570, bk. 2–4] •

Henry of Huntingdon, The History of the English People, 1000–1154, translated by Diana E. Greenway. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1996.

Ioan Paris—possibly CCCC MS 60 [1570, bk. 3] Fragment from Matthew Parker’s collection. John Brompton [Iornalensis] Chronicon—CCCC MS 96 [1563, bk. 1; 1570, bk. 2–4] •

•

Brompton, John. “Chronicon Johannis Bromton Abbatis Iornalensis.” In Historiæ Anglicanæ scriptores X: Simeon Monachus Dunelmensis. Johannes Prior Hagustaldensis. Ricardus Prior Hagustaldensis. Ailredus Abbas Rievallensis. Radulphus de Diceto Londoniensis. Johannes Brompton Jornallensis. Gervasius Monachus Dorobornensis. Thomas Stubbs Dominicanus. Guilielmus Thorn Cantuariensis. Henricus Knighton Leicestrensis. Ex vetustis manusciptis, nunc primùm in lucem editi; Adjectis variis lectionibus, glossario, indicéque copioso., edited by Roger Twysden. 725–1284. London, 1652. (archive.org): https://archive.org/ details/historiaeanglica00twys. CCCC MS 96 (Parker Library, Cambridge and Parker on the Web).

Letters of Anselm—CCCC MS 135 [1570, bk. 4] •

The Letters of Saint Anselm of Canterbury, 3 vols, edited by Walter Fröhlich. Kalamazoo, MI: Cistercian Publications, 1990.

London Great Chronicle—MS Cotton Nero C XI [1570, bk. 4] •

Thomas, H. and I. D. Thornley. The Great Chronicle of London. London, 1938.

Matthew Paris, Chronica Majora—CCCC MS 16 & 26 [1570, bk. 3–4] •

•

Paris, Matthew. Matthæi Parisiensis, Monachi Sancti Albani, Chronica Majora, 7 vols, edited by Henry R. Luard. London: Rolls Series, 1872. CCCC MS 16 & 26 (Parker Library, Cambridge and Parker on the Web).

222 Appendix: A Bibliography of Sources Matthew of Westminster [Matthew Paris], Flores Historiarum—Possibly BL Cotton Claudius E.8 [1563, bk. 1; 1570, bk. 1–4] •

•

Matthew of Westminster. Flores Historiarum per Matthaeum Westmonasteriensem collecti, 3 vols, edited by Henry R. Luard. London: H.M.S.O, 1890. British Library: BL Cotton Claudius E.8.

Nicholas Trivet, Annales—CCCC MS 152 [1570, bk. 4] • •

Trivet, Nicholas. Annales Sex Regum Angliae, edited by Thomas Hog. London, 1845. CCCC MS 152 (Parker Library, Cambridge and Parker on the Web).

Ranulf Higden, Polychronicon—Magdalen College Oxford MS 181 | ‘Scala Mundi’ [Polychronicon]—Arundel MS 5 [1563, bk. 1; 1570, bk. 2–4] •

• •

Higden, Ranulph. Polychronicon Ranulphi Higden, Monachi Cestrensis: Together with the English Translations of John Trevisa and of an Unknown Writer of the Fifteenth Century, edited by Joseph R. Lumby and Churchill Babington, translated by John Trevisa. London: Longmans, 1865. Magdalen College Oxford MS 181. British Library: Arundel MS 5.

Roger of Hoveden, Annales [Chronica]—CCCC MS 138 [1563, bk. 1; 1570, bk. 2–4] • •

Roger of Hoveden. Chronica Magistri Rogeri de Houedene, edited by William Stubbs. London: Longmans, Green, Reader, and Dyer, 1868. CCCC MS 138 (Parker Library, Cambridge and Parker on the Web).

Simeon of Durham—CCCC MS 100 or CCCC MS 139 [1570, bk. 3] •

Simeon of Durham: A History of the Kings of England, edited and translated by J. Stevenson. 1858, facsimile reprint 1987.

Thomas Walsingham, Historia Brevis [Chronica Majora]—Arundel MS 7 | Robert de Avesbury—Bodleian Library Douce MS 128 | Chronicon Angliæ—BL Harley MS 3634 [1570, bk. 4] •

[Historia Brevis] Thomae Walsingham, Quondam Monachi S. Albani, Historia Anglicana, 2 vols, edited by Henry T. Riley. London: Longman, Green, Longman, Roberts, and Green, 1863–64.

Appendix: A Bibliography of Sources • •

223

[Robert de Avesbury] Robertus de Avesbury de gestis mirabilibus Regis Edwardi Tertii, edited by Edward M. Thompson. London, 1889. [Chronicon Angliae] Chronicon Angliae, ab Anno Domini 1328 usque ad Annum 1388: Auctore Monacho Quaodam Sancti Albani, edited by Edward M. Thompson. London, 1874.

Walter of Coventry—CCCC MS 175 and Magdalen College MS 36, fo. 3r–179v [1570, bk. 4] •

•

Memoriale fratris Walteri de Coventria—The Historical Collections of Walter of Coventry, 2 vols., edited and translated by William Stubbs (London, 1873). Magdalen College Oxford MS 36.

Walter of Guisborough [Hemingford]—CCCC MS 250 or Cambridge University Library MS Dd.2.5. Foxe also had access to a partial MSS of Guisborough, Magdalen College Oxford MS 53 [1563, bk. 1; 1570, bk. 4] •

•

[Guisborough] The Chronicle of Walter of Guisborough: Previously Edited as the Chronicle of Walter of Hemingford or Hemingburgh, edited by Harry Rothwell. London: Offices of the Society, 1957. [Hemingford] Chronicon Domini Walteri de Hemingburgh, vulgo Hemingford nuncupati, ordinis sancti Augustini canonici regularis, in caenobio beatae Mariae de Gisburn, De Gestis Regum Angliae, 2 vols,, edited by Hans Claude Hamilton. London, 1848–9.

William de Amour, De Periculis novissimorum temporum—CCCC MS 103.8 [1570, bk. 4] •

First printed as William de Amour, De periculis novissimorum temporum (1632) and more recently as William of Saint-Amour, De periculis novissimorum temporum, edited and translated by G. Geltner. Paris, 2008.

William of Malmesbury—Gesta Pontificum Anglorum—Magdalen College Oxford MS 172 [1563, bk. 1; 1570, bk. 2–4] •

•

William of Malmesbury. Gesta Pontificum Anglorum = The History of the English Bishops, edited by Michael Winterbottom and Rodney M. Thomson. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 2007. Magdalen College Oxford MS 172.

Unidentified Aeneas Sylvius Piccolomini, History of Bohemia (Basel, 1489)

224 Appendix: A Bibliography of Sources [1563, bk. 1; 1570, bk. 4] Bede, Ecclesiastical History [1570, bk. 2] Only a possible source for Foxe, although there is some evidence of its occasional use. •

Bede. Historia Gentis Anglorum Ecclesiastica: Bede’s Ecclesiastical History of the English People, edited by Bertram Colgrave and Roger A.B. Mynors. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1969.

Decretals [1570, bk. 1–2, 4] Foxe used separate editions of decretals of Gregory IX, the Gratian and Justinian decretals, and ‘Decretorum par secunda’, as well as glosses by Azo of Bologna, Peter of Blois and Nicholas de Tudeschis •

Corpus Juris Canonici, 2 vols., edited by Aemilius L. Richter, 1879. (archive.org), https://archive.org/details/corpusjuriscanon01rich.

Eusebius, Ecclesiastical History | Eusebius, De Vita Constantine | Sozomen, Ecclesiastical History [1570, bk. 1] Foxe might have used a printed edition containing all three histories. Various editions were published in the sixteenth century. It is also possible that he used manuscript copies that are now unidentified. •

• •

Eusebius. The Ecclesiastical History of Eusebius Pamphilus, Bishop of Cesarea, in Palestine, translated by Christian F. Cruse, 3rd edition. Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Book House, 1856. Eusebius of Caesarea, The Life of the Blessed Emperor Constantine: In Four Books, From 306 to 337 A.D., vol. 1. London: S. Bagster, 1845. Sozomen, “Sozomenus: Church History from A.D. 323–425.” In A Select Library of Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers of the Christian Church, edited by Philip Schaff and Henry Wace, translated by Chester D. Hartranet, vol. 2, 2nd edition. 179–427. Oxford; New York, 1890.

“Historia Cariana” [1570, bk. 2–4] •

Foxe’s name for a miscellaneous history borrowed from William Carye. Unidentified.

Historia ignoti iutoris; Historia Richardi 2; Vetusto Chronico; Chronicle Vestusto Anglicum

Appendix: A Bibliography of Sources

225

[1570, bk. 3, 4] •

Unidentified manuscripts that Foxe cites.

Jerome, De Viris Illustribus [1570, bk. 1] Foxe might have used the printed edition published in 1495 by Wynken de Worde or the 1549 edition published in Frankfurt. It is also possible that he used the excerpts found in the miscellany manuscript Oxford Magdalen College MS Latin 53. •

Jerome. “Jerome—Lives of Illustrious Men.” In A Select Library of Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers of the Christian Church, edited by Henry Wace and Philip Schaff. 359–84. volume 3, 2nd edition. Oxford; New York: Parker, 1892.

Jack Upland [1570, bk. 4] Supplied by John Day •

Jack Upland: Friar Daw’s Reply by John Walsingham; and, Upland’s Rejoinder, edited by Peter Heyworth. London: Oxford University Press, 1968.

Nicephorus, Historia Ecclesiastica [1570, bk. 1] Foxe possibly used a composite publication that also included the works of Eusebius, otherwise this might be the edition published in Basel in 1535. Registers of Hereford and Bury [1570, bk. 4] Foxe mainly used these researches for the contemporary portions of his work, however, he may also have used them for the occasional detail in the 1570 edition, Book 4. Sigebert of Gembloux [1570, bk. 3] This was first printed as Sigeberti Gemblacensis coenobitae Chronicon ab anno 381 ad 1113 (Paris, 1513). The version Foxe used is unknown. •

Sigeberti Gemblacensis monachi opera omnia, Accedunt Chronicon Polonorum auctore anonymo, edited by J.P. Migne. Paris, 1854.

William of Malmesbury—Gesta Regum Anglorum [1563, bk. 1; 1570, bk. 2–4]

226 Appendix: A Bibliography of Sources •

William of Malmesbury. William of Malmesbury’s Chronicle of the Kings of England From the Earliest Period to the Reign of King Stephen, edited by John A. Giles. London, 1847.

William of Newburgh [1563, bk. 1; 1570, bk. 4] Possibly a printed edition such as Antwerp, 1567 ed. •

William of Newburgh. The Church Historians of England, volume IV, part II, edited and translated by Joseph Stevenson. London, 1861. There is also an online edition of this translation: https://source books.fordham.edu/halsall/basis/williamofnewburgh-intro.asp [Last Accessed: December 2017].

Index

Abdias 47, 103 Acworth, George 44 Æthelbert (King of Kent) 123, 124–5 Æthelstan (King of England) 199–200 Æthelwulf (King of Wessex) 119 Albigensians 80–1, 170, 175, 198; Crusade 63, 178 Alexander III (Pope) 71, 75–6, 157, 169 Alexander IV (Pope) 183 Alfred the Great (King of Wessex) 119, 127 Allin, Edmund 200 Amour, William de 45, 96 Anglo-Saxon Chronicle 45 Anselm (Archbishop of Canterbury) 148, 152–5, 197; his letters 44, 153 Antichrist 10, 12, 67, 144–5, 148–9, 179, 184, 191, 196, 197 anti-clericalism 170 Arthur (King of England, alleged) 17, 124, 133, 198 Askew, Anne 192 Asser’s Life of Alfred 45, 131 Augustine 9, 69, 96, 115–16, 123–6, 197 Avesbury, Robert de 45, 178

Matthew Parker 6, 15–16, 34, 166; his life 44, 60–1, 90–1; his manuscript collection 37, 41, 42, 46; his plays 72, 79–80; The Image of Both Churches 9, 39, 68, 98; The Laborious Journey 15, 16–17, 31, 201 Barbarossa, Frederick see Frederick I Barbarossa Barnes, Robert 63, 79, 130, 199 Batman, Stephen 16, 44 Becket, Thomas 61–3, 72–7, 81, 92, 96, 145, 151, 155–9, 169, 197, 201–2 Bede 32, 35, 116–19, 123, 133 Benno (Cardinal) 70 Bertrand, Pierre 46 Bible see Scripture Boniface VIII (Pope) 20, 176–8 Bradford, John 143, 205 Breviat chronicle 47, 121, 132 Brice, Thomas 205 Brompton, John 35, 42–3, 45, 49, 69, 73, 131, 132, 142, 145, 146–7, 150, 200 Brut 36 Bull, Henry 90, 192, 204–5 Bullinger, Heinrich 20–1, 206

Bacon, Anne 65 Bale, John 49, 73, 107–8, 130, 134, 144, 184–5, 191–4, 192–3; Acta Romanorum Pontificum 38–9; The Actes or Unchast Examples of the Englysh Votaryes 39, 76–7, 77–8, 79–80, 81, 115–16, 125–6, 132, 150, 171, 199; the Catalogus 33, 37–8, 43, 64, 69, 70, 71, 73, 76, 81, 130–1, 132, 133, 145, 150, 177, 180, 200, 203, 205, 207–8; The Examination of John Oldcastle 76, 80; the Fasciculi Zizaniorum 30, 179, 200; his letter to

Caesarius 75 Camden, William 116 Capgrave, John 43, 135 Carye, William 41, 133 Cathars see Albigensians Cattley, Stephen 31 Caxton, William 36, 42, 198–9 Cecil, Sir William 12, 44, 115, 166, 192 Ceolwulf I (King of Northumbria) 128–9 Charles the Bald 66 Chaucer, Geoffrey 178–9 Cicero, Marcus Tullius 2, 14–15, 98 Cisner, Nicholas 46

228

Index

Clement V (Pope) 20, 177 Coggeshall, Ralph of 77–8 Constantine the Great (Emperor) 10, 12, 68, 92–6, 107, 126, 197; the Donation of 105–6 Council of Trent 47 Coventry, Walter of 36, 44 Coverdale, Miles 20–1 Cranmer, Thomas 17, 144 Crespin, Jean 192 Cromwell, Thomas 15, 17, 72 Crowland Chronicle 45, 135 Davies, Richard 44 Day, John 1, 6, 12, 47, 63, 90, 179, 192–3 decretals (Corpus Juris Canonici) 47, 64, 67, 100–1, 107–8, 201–2 Dee, John 43, 133 dissolution of the monasteries see monasteries, dissolution of Dunstan (Archbishop of Canterbury) 127–8, 129, 152, 201 Durham, Simeon of 45, 135 Eadmer 44, 130, 134–5, 153 Eck, John 101 Edgar (King of England) 45, 119, 127–8, 131, 134–5, 201 Edward I (King of England) 176–7, 180–1, 184 Edward II (King of England) 181 Edward III (King of England) 178 Edward the Confessor (King of England) 142–3, 146, 197–8 Edwin (King of Northumbria) 126 Egbert (King of Wessex) 119, 128–9 Eleutherius (Pope) 123–4 Elizabeth I (Queen of England) 12, 143 Eulogium 36, 43, 149, 171 Eusebius 12, 33, 47–8, 94, 106–7; ecclesiastical history 8, 91–2, 96, 100, 103, 195–7, 204; Life of Constantine 105–6 Evesham, Elias of: Quadrilogus 40, 41–2, 73–7, 81, 155–6, 201 Fabyan, Robert 30, 36, 45–6, 49, 73, 132, 145, 146–7, 149, 151, 199–200 Fish, Simon 79, 199 Flacius, Matthias: Catalogus Testium Veritatis 31–2, 33–4, 36, 37–8, 46, 64, 70, 71–2, 81, 91, 99, 100, 132, 144–5, 177, 203, 205, 207–8; Foxe as

proofreader 60; influence on Matthew Parker 44; Magdeburg Centuries 6, 10, 48, 196, 203; working with John Bale 193–4 Formosus (Pope) 130 Foxe, John: Commentarii 6, 45, 60; dissemination of the Acts and Monuments 8–9; Eicasmi 107; exile 6, 60; his life 4–6, 60–1, 90–3, 205–6; manuscripts owned 45; prefaces in the Acts and Monuments 11–15; Rerum 6, 60; A Solemn Contestation of Diverse Popes 67; structure of the Acts and Monuments 7–8, 10, 61, 82, 90–3, 151, 159 Frederick I Barbarossa (Emperor) 71, 81, 145, 169, 197 Frederick II (Emperor) 36, 46–7, 63, 76, 80, 81–2, 151, 169, 197 Fuller, Thomas 147 Gardiner, Stephen 66–7 Gaveston, Piers 181 Gervase of Canterbury 44, 158–9, 160, 171–2, 202 Golding, Arthur 205 Gratius, Ortwin 39, 64, 71–2 Gregory I the Great (Pope) 115–16, 123–5 Gregory III (Pope) 65 Gregory VII (Pope) 10, 20, 33, 61, 69–70, 144, 145–6, 152, 197 Gregory IX (Pope) 169 Griffith, William 205 Grindal, Edmund 6, 60, 192, 200 Grosseteste, Robert 179–80, 183 Guisborough, Walter of 41, 44, 148, 168, 171, 178, 182, 199 Hackington dispute 171–2 Haemstede, Adriaan van 192 Hakluyt, Richard 46 Hall, Edward 46 Harding, Thomas 19–20, 65, 99, 170–1, 200 Harold II Godwinson (King of England) 119–21, 142–3 Henry I (King of England) 149, 150 Henry II (King of England) 74, 145, 149, 151, 156, 169 Henry III (King of England) 36–7, 49, 63, 79, 81, 148, 167–9, 172–5, 182, 183–4, 195, 197

Index Henry IV (Emperor) 70 Henry VIII (King of England) 72–3, 76, 79, 130, 153, 155, 208 Hersfeld, Lambert of 33–4, 39, 70 Higden, Ranulf: compiler of the Polychronicon 30, 32, 36, 41, 42, 78, 132, 149–50, 200; compiler of the ‘Scala Mundi’ 42–3 Hildebrand see Gregory VII Hildegard (of Bingen) 169, 178 Holinshed, Raphael 46; his Chronicles 8, 147, 194, 208 Hooper, John 205 Hosius, Stanislaus 101 Hoveden, Roger of 36, 41, 42, 73–4, 78, 132, 133, 150 Humphrey, Laurence 12, 193 Huntingdon, Henry of 35, 41, 42, 121, 132, 133, 142–3, 145, 150, 200 Ine (King of Wessex) 128 Innocent III (Pope) 20, 36, 80, 81, 169 Innocent IV (Pope) 180 Irenaeus 33 Islam 144 Jack Upland 47, 169, 178–9, 192–3 Jerome 33, 48, 66, 103 Jewel, John 44, 144; author of the Apologia 37, 64–6, 82, 108; debate with Thomas Harding 19–20, 99 Jews 182–4 Joan (Pope, alleged) 130 John I (King of England) 19, 36, 43, 61, 63, 78–80, 81, 96, 148, 168–9, 170–1, 197, 198–9 John XI (Pope) 33 John XII (Pope) 33 Joscelyn, John 34, 40, 44, 116, 135, 193 Knox, John 10 Krantz, Albert 46 Lambarde, William 45, 115, 116, 121–2, 131, 132, 134–5, 191, 193, 198 Lanfranc (Archbishop of Canterbury) 69, 151–2, 172, 197 Lansdowne 819, Foxe’s books 35, 46, 47, 66–7 Latimer, Hugh 92 Leland, John 16–17, 38, 43, 45 Lily, Peter 44 Longchamp, William de 78, 171

229

Lucius (King of Britons, alleged) 117, 119–21, 123–6, 131, 198 Luther, Martin 130, 144 Magdeburg Centuries 33, 34, 37, 49, 60, 91, 100, 102–7, 132, 166, 193, 194, 207–8; see also Flacius, Matthias Magna Carta 143 Maitland, Samuel 31 Malmesbury, William of 35, 132, 145; compiler of Gesta Pontificum Anglorum 40–1, 69, 153; compiler of Gesta Regum Anglorum 32, 42, 149, 200 Marsh, George 200 Martin, Thomas 66–7 Mary I (Queen of England) 143, 180, 208 Mary, Queen of Scots 182 Matilda (Empress) 150–1, 157–8 Melanchthon, Philipp 144, 196 Merlin 17 Meyrick, Rowland 44 monasteries, dissolution of 3, 15–16, 204 Monmouth, Geoffrey of 35, 123–4, 132–3 More, Sir Thomas 46 Moulin, Charles du 47, 100–2, 108 Nauclerus, Johannes 39 Newburgh, William of 13, 40–1, 73–4, 77 Nicephorus 47 Nicholas I (Pope) 119, 130 Nowell, Laurence 115, 191 Offa (King of Mercia) 128, 195 Oporinus, Johannes (printer) 37, 48, 60, 91, 193, 206 Osbern (of Canterbury) 44, 130, 135 Otto (Cardinal) 80, 96, 173–4 Pantaleon, Heinrich 192, 206 Paris, Joan 45 Paris, Matthew 43, 81; character 167; Chronica Majora 36–7, 44, 49, 77, 148–9, 166–8, 171, 172–5, 180, 182, 184–5, 193, 202–3; Flores Historiarum 132, 148, 166–7, 178, 180, 182; Historia Anglorum 36 Parker, Matthew: attack on the Geneva Bible 100; manuscripts 6, 15–16, 35, 40, 43, 44–5, 91, 128, 130, 131–2, 133, 134–5, 147, 166–8, 170–5,

230

Index

176–9, 184–5, 191–4; patronage 115, 193, 199, 203–4, 205; publications 116–17, 125, 147, 166–7 Peckham, John 177 Pendragon, Uther 124, 133 Petrarch, Francesco 32 Philip II (King of Spain) 143 Philip IV (King of France) 176–7 Philpot, John 205 Piccolomini, Aeneas Sylvius 39 Pighius, Albert 101 Platina, Bartolomeo 33–4, 39, 64, 70, 102, 103, 108, 178 Pole, Reginald 123 Polycarp 33, 92, 98, 103 Ponet, John 66 Powell, William 205 printing press 4 Prise, Sir John 17 Purvey, John 200 Rabus, Ludwig 192 Rashanger, William 178 Revelation see Scripture Richard I (King of England) 63, 77–8, 169, 171, 184 Richard III (King of England) 180–1 Ridley, Nicholas 92 Rievaulx, Alfred of 45 Rogers, Matthew 205 Rubeus, Peter 173–4 Satan 9, 10, 20, 69, 92–3, 126, 144, 176, 191, 196 Scripture 10, 98, 99–100, 105, 107–8 Shakespeare, William 8, 78, 208 Silvester II (Pope) 9, 10, 20, 69, 130, 144–6, 197 Sleiden, John 10, 196 Sozomen 48, 105

Stapleton, Thomas 115–19, 123, 155–6, 170–1, 199, 200 Stella, Giovanni 39 Stephen I (King of England) 149, 150–1 Stevenson, William 158 Stigandus (Archbishop of Canterbury) 147 Stow, John 15, 44, 46, 47, 121, 132, 133, 135, 147, 166, 193, 194 Sutton, Henry 205 Temple, Sir John 8 Thomas, William 73 Thurstan (Archbishop) 154–5, 197 Tomkins, Thomas 200 Trivet, Nicholas 35, 43, 44, 148, 150, 168, 177, 178 Turk see Islam Turner, William 205 Twyne, John 17, 193 Tyndale, William 9–10, 63, 79, 199 Valla, Lorenzo 106 Varagine, Jacobus da: The Golden Legend 11–12, 46–7, 132 Vergil, Polydore 17, 43, 46, 123, 132, 148, 156, 199 Vigne, Pier della 46 Waldensians 61, 71–2, 81, 169, 198 Wallace, William 176 Walsingham, Thomas: Chronicon Angliae 44, 178; Historia Brevis (Chronica Majora) 45, 167, 177–8, 181 Wendover, Roger of 36 Westminster, Matthew of see Paris, Matthew William I (King of England) 107, 121, 142–3, 146–9 William II Rufus (King of England) 149–50, 153–4