Thomas James (Librarian)

Thomas James (painting attributed to Gilbert Jackson )

Thomas James (* 1572 in Newport (Isle of Wight) , † August 1629 in Oxford ) was a British librarian , translator and clergyman of the Church of England .

Life

Origin and education

Little is known about Thomas James' family background. According to James' statements, his parents were expelled from England under Queen Maria I. James' older sister Mary married Thomas Fleming, who was later appointed Lord Chief Justice of England and Wales and who in 1586 placed his then thirteen-year-old brother-in-law at Winchester College . At this boarding school, James completed his schooling and was admitted to study at the New College of the University of Oxford on June 30, 1591 , but only on probation according to the access restrictions at the time. About seven months later, the regular matriculation took place and in the summer of the following year James was already elected a member of the New College.

Librarian activity

Even before graduating with a master's degree in February 1599, James had published a number of translations, including by Antonio Brucioli and Guillaume du Vair . In his 1599 new edition of Richard Aungerville's Philobiblon , which he dedicated to Thomas Bodley , James shows his interest in bibliography by adding a list of the mentioned manuscripts to the work. In the same year Bodley wrote to James asking him for the post of director of the newly formed Bodleian Library .

Over the next two years, James worked on a catalog of all the manuscripts in the Oxford and Cambridge libraries, and on the reorganization and transcription of the University of Oxford's statutes. Although James intended to marry, contrary to Bodley's drafted works constitution, he was appointed Bodley's Librarian on April 13, 1602 and received a raise. However, this had little effect, since James had to give up his membership in New College with his marriage in October 1602 and thus again lost part of his income.

James' polemical writings against the Roman Catholic Church resulted in King James I , whose wife converted to Catholicism shortly after their marriage, temporarily ceasing his sponsorship and James Bodley warned him to moderate. Nevertheless, Bodley worked hard to ensure that James became chaplain under Richard Bancroft and later his successor George Abbot in the years that followed.

With some like-minded people, James began on July 1, 1610, to work on a research project on the history of the Church of England , which had to be terminated prematurely two years later because the Bodleian Library lacked the necessary funds. Possibly in the course of further financial bottlenecks, Thomas James drafted a kind of deposit copy rule in the autumn of the same year , which was contractually sealed on December 12, 1610 with the Worshipful Company of Stationers and Newspaper Makers on the one hand and the University of Oxford on the other. When new premises for the Bodleian Library were built between 1613 and 1619, Thomas James, along with Sir Henry Savile, had the right to select the authors and content that should be represented on the frescoes.

In 1620 Thomas James resigned from his position as Bodley's Librarian for health reasons and increasingly occupied himself with the collation of manuscripts of the church fathers , whose intentional falsification by Catholic scholars he wanted to prove. Not least for this purpose, James probably also placed his nephew Richard as a librarian with Sir Robert Bruce Cotton , who ultimately also granted his uncle access to his extensive private library. However, a project that James presented in Oxford in 1626, and according to which a commission of scholars should deal with the original form of the texts, met with little approval from the English bishops. One of the few supporters was James Ussher , then Bishop of Meath , to whom James wrote a letter complaining about the failure of his project.

Thomas James died in August 1629 and was buried in the chapel of New College, of which he had been a member until 1602.

Fonts (selection)

Many of James' writings are accessible to academic institutions via the Early English Books Online (EEBO) platform .

Translations and reprints

• Antonio Brucioli: A commentary upon the Canticle of Canticles. (Original title: Annotationi sopra i proverbii di Salamo. ). London: Field 1598.
• Guillaume du Vair: The moral philosophy of the Stoicks. Written in French, and englished for the benefit of them which are ignorant of that tongue (Original title: La philosophie morale des Stoiques ). London: Thomas Man 1598.
• John Wyclif , Thomas James (Ed.): Tvvo short treatises, against the orders of the begging friars, compiled by that famous doctour of the Church, and preacher of Gods word John Wickliffe, sometime fellow of Merton, and master of Ballioll Coll. Oxford: Joseph Barnes 1608.
• John Wyclif: A treatise of the corruption of Scripture, councels, and fathers, by the prelats [sic!] , Pastors, and pillars of the Church of Rome, for maintenance of popery and irreligion. London: Mathew Lownes 1611.
• John Wyclif: The Iesuits downefall. Oxford 1612.

Catalogs

• Ecloga Oxonio-Cantabrigiensis . London: Geor. Bishop & Io. Norton 1600 ( digitized version ).
• Catalogus librorum bibliothecæ publicæ quam vir ornatissimus Thomas Bodleius eques auratus in Academia Oxoniensi nuper instituit. Oxford: Joseph Barnes 1605.

Monographs

• Bellum papale, sive Concordia discors Sixti V. et Clementis VIII. Circa Hieronymianam editionem. London: Bishop, Newberie and Barker 1600 ( digitized ).
• The humble supplication of Thomas James student in divinitie and keeper of the publike librarie at Oxford, for reformation of the ancient Fathers Workes, depraved by Papists sundrie wayes. London: John Windet s. a.
• Bellum Gregorianum siue Corruptionis Romanæ in operibus D. Gregorii M. Oxford: Joseph Barnes 1610.
• An explanation or enlarging of the ten articles in the supplication. Oxford: John Lichfield and William Turner 1625.
• Vindiciae Gregorianae sive restitutus innumeris paene locis Gregorius M. Geneva: P. et J. Chouet 1625 ( digitized ).
• Index generalis librorum prohibitorum à pontificiis. Oxford: William Turner 1627.

Individual evidence

1. ↑ ^{a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p} R. Julian Roberts: James, Thomas . In: Henry Colin Gray Matthew, Brian Howard Harrison (Eds.): The Oxford Dictionary of National Biography . tape 29 : Hutchins - Jennens. Oxford University Press, Oxford 23 September 2004, doi : 10.1093 / ref: odnb / 14619 .
2. ↑ ^{a b c d e f} Gordon Goodwin: James, Thomas (1573? -1629) . In: Stephen Leslie (Ed.): Dictionary of National Biography . tape 29 : Inglish - John. Smith, Elder & Co., London 1892, p. 222-223 (English, wikisource.org ).
3. ↑ Nick Havely: Dante's British Public. Readers and Texts, from the Fourteenth Century to the Present . Oxford University Press, Oxford 2014, pp. 98 ( google.at ).
4. ↑ About. In: Early English Books Online. EEBO, accessed on June 6, 2020 (English).