Edward Grant (educator)

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Edward Grant (or Graunt ; * around 1546; † August 4, 1601 ) was a learned English schoolboy and author of Latin poetry. He was the principal of Westminster School and the first biographer of the English educator Roger Ascham .

Life

Edward Grant received his scholarly education at Westminster School and enrolled on February 22, 1564 as a scholarship holder of St John's College (Cambridge) , where he completed the necessary theological and philological studies for the Bachelor of Arts around 1567. In February 1572 he was awarded a Bachelor of Arts degree from Oxford University on the basis of his studies in Cambridge . A month later, he obtained a Master of Arts degree from the same university after being exempted from the obligation to attend university . The English science historian Anthony Wood claims that Grant was first a member of the college of Christ Church (Oxford) or Broadgates Hall (Oxford) and then Exeter College , but the university registers do not list him as a student for any of these colleges.

In 1572, Grant was appointed principal of Westminster School, after having served as assistant principal at the school for two years. Here he brought up many students who later held an important position in the state and in the church. He was a thorough knowledge of the Greek language in particular, but also of the Latin language. He wrote a Graecae Linguae Spicilegium (London 1575), which he dedicated to Lord Burghley . Since the work was only written for scholars, however, his vice-principal William Camden later made an excerpt under the title Institutio graecae grammatices compendiaria, in usum regiae Scholae Westmonasteriensis (1597). This excerpt was distributed in multiple editions and for a long time was the most popular Greek grammar in English higher education institutions.

In May 1577 Grant was elected prebender or canon at the collegiate church at Westminster in place of Doctor Thomas Watts . In the same year he was awarded a bachelor's degree in theology at Cambridge University , of which he was a member since December 1573. From 1580 he worked as a preacher at this university and later also earned the degree of doctor of theology . From December 1584 to the following year, he served as vicar of South Benfleet in the county of Essex , and was then in November 1586 pastor of Bintree and Foulsham in Norfolk and in 1589 canon of Ely.

On December 15, 1587, Grant wrote a Latin letter to the Queen, asking for her release from the teaching service, which he had already provided for 17 years. Finally, in February 1592, he resigned the post of principal of Westminster School, in which position he was succeeded by William Camden, and accepted the office of pastor of East Barnet , which had been made to him in November 1591. From April 1598 he was pastor of Toppesfield , Essex. He was also sub-dean of Westminster Abbey and was buried in this abbey after his death on August 4, 1601. His son Edward, who died in January 1588 at the age of only five, was also buried here; Another son, Gabriel, received his higher education at Trinity College (Cambridge) and was 1600 Master of Arts, 1612 Doctor of Theology and in the same year Canon of Westminster, which he held until 1638. Grant had other children with his wife Susan, who died in 1611, including their daughters Susanna, who married Pastor John Dix, and Sarah, who remained unmarried.

In addition to the aforementioned work on the Greek language, Grant also obtained an expanded and improved edition of the Greek dictionary by the French jurist Jean Crespin ( Lexicon graeco-latinum Joannis Crispini, opera et studio EG , London 1581), which he wrote to Robert Dudley, 1st Earl of Dedicated to Leicester . He also published an edition of the letters and poems of the well-known English philologist Roger Ascham , with whom he was close friends ( Epistolae et poemata Rogerii Aschami, accedit oratio de vita et obitu ejus ac dictionis elegantia; cum exhortatione ad adolascentulos , London 1577). Grant himself had a not insignificant disposition to Latin poetry, as his attempts, scattered in various works, show. He lamented the deaths of Bishop John Jewel and Roger Ascham in Latin verse.

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personal data
SURNAME Grant, Edward
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Graunt, Edward
BRIEF DESCRIPTION English educator and Latin poet
DATE OF BIRTH around 1546
DATE OF DEATH 4th August 1601