From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Nicholas Harpsfield (
1519–
1575) was an
English historian, Catholic apologist and priest.
Early life and exile
Harpsfield was educated at
Winchester College and studied canon and civil law in
New College, Oxford, receiving a BCL in 1543. In Oxford he became connected to the circle of
Thomas More, of whom he later wrote a biography, which he dedicated to
William Roper in gratitude for his patronage. With the more aggressive religious policies of the
English Reformation following the accession of
Edward VI in 1547, he left England in 1550 to pursue his studies in the
Catholic University of Louvain.
Role in the Marian Persecutions
Upon the accession of
Mary I in 1553, Harpsfield returned to England, took the degree of DCL at Oxford in 1554, and became
Archdeacon of Canterbury in the same year, serving under
Reginald Pole. He superintended hundreds of trials targeting lay Protestants in
London, which resulted in punishments and intimidation (though not any charges under the
revived Heresy Acts). He played an active role in the administration of the diocese of Canterbury, where he zealously promoted heresy trials.
Foxe's Book of Martyrs (1563 edition) identifies him as "the sorest and of leaste compassion" among the archdeacons involved in the
Marian Persecutions and holds him responsible for many deaths in the diocese.
Imprisonment and death
Harpsfield defiantly opposed the new regime of
Elizabeth I, opposing the election of
Matthew Parker and refusing to subscribe to the
Book of Common Prayer. At some point between 1559 and 1562, he was committed to
Fleet Prison, together with his brother
John Harpsfield, for his refusal to swear the
Oath of Supremacy. He remained in prison until his release on health grounds in 1574, sixteen months before his death.
Works
- The life and death of Sr Thomas Moore, knight, sometymes Lord high Chancellor of England
- The life of our Lorde Jesus Christe
- Cranmer's Recantacyons
- Treatise on the Pretended Divorce
- Dialogi sex contra summi pontificatus, monasticae vitae, sanctorum, sacrarum imaginum oppugnatores, et pseudomartyres
- Historia Anglicana ecclesiastica
References
- Thomas S. Freeman, "Harpsfield, Nicholas (1519–1575)," Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, 2004
Further reading
- R.W. Chambers, "Life and Works of Nicholas Harpsfield," in The life and death of Sr Thomas Moore, knight, sometymes Lord high Chancellor of England, written in the tyme of Queene Marie by Nicholas Harpsfield, L.D., Oxford: EETS O.S. no. 186, 1932, pp. clxxv-ccxiv.
