Thomas Percy (Bishop, 1729)

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Thomas Percy (born April 13, 1729 in Bridgnorth , England , † September 30, 1811 in Dromore ) was an English poet and Anglican bishop of Dromore (in northern Ireland ).

Life

Percy received his education from 1746 to 1753 at the University of Oxford . In 1782 Percy became Bishop of Dromore in Northern Ireland . In 1759 he married Anne Gutterridge who died in 1806.

Percy was friends with James Boswell , Samuel Johnson , Joseph Warton, and Thomas Warton .

During his time as pastor of Easton Maudit , Percy came across a manuscript collection of the Middle Ages, later named Percy Folio MS , in a friend's house in 1756 , which had been recorded around 1650 after oral lectures in Lancashire and Cheshire . Since it was used in the house to fan the fireplace, parts were already missing. Binding the manuscript resulted in additional sections being lost. Among the 191 preserved texts were medieval Arthurian romance , poems from the 16th and 17th centuries and street songs , as well as folk and knightly adventure stories and ballads about Robin Hood . Samuel Johnson and the poet William Shenstone encouraged Percy to publish the collection, which, after a first edition from 1765 ( Reliques of Ancient English Poetry, Cosisting of old heroic Ballads, Songs and other Pieces of our earlier Poets (chiefly of the Lyric Kind), togehter with some few of later date , London), was not completed until 1867/68 after many years of editing by Percy and other editors. This, however, formed the basis for FJ Childs collection The English and Scottish Popular Ballads (1882–1898).

With his lifelong collection of English ballads , Percy not only created the basis for the systematic literary scholars who came after him, but also influenced German poetry .

In 1761 Percy translated a work on the history of China from Portuguese , and in 1763 he published Five Pieces of Runic Poetry . Reliques of Ancient English Poetry followed in 1765, Northern Antiquities in 1770 , Henri Mallet's translation of the history of Denmark , and The Hermit of Warkworth in 1771 .

literature

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Uwe Böker : Reliques of Ancient English Poetry. In: Major works of English literature. Individual presentations and interpretations. Vol. 1. From the Beginnings to the End of the Victorian Age. Compiled by Henning Thies , Kindler Verlag , Munich 1995, ISBN 3-463-40271-8 , p. 443f.
  2. ^ Reliques of Ancient English Poetry . Vol. III. Henry Washbourne & Co., London 1857 . On: books.google.co.uk. Accessed November 16, 2012.
personal data
SURNAME Percy, Thomas
BRIEF DESCRIPTION English bishop of Dromore and poet
DATE OF BIRTH April 13, 1729
PLACE OF BIRTH Bridgnorth
DATE OF DEATH September 30, 1811
Place of death Dromore