Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Cottesford, Thomas
COTTESFORD, THOMAS (d. 1555), protestant divine, a native of Winchester, studied first apparently at Oxford, and afterwards at Cambridge, where he took the degree of M.A. He adopted the doctrines of the reformers, and in January 1540–1 was charged before the privy council for setting forth an epistle written by Melanchthon in violation of the act of the six articles, and he was committed to the Fleet during the king's pleasure. He held the rectories of St. Peter and St. Andrew in Walpole, Norfolk, which he resigned on 31 May 1544. On 9 June following he was presented to the vicarage of Littlebury, Essex, and in 1547 was appointed preacher to the royal commissioners for visiting the dioceses of Salisbury, Exeter, Bath, Bristol, and Chichester. On 20 May 1553 he was collated to the rectory of St. Martin, Ludgate, London, and on 10 July in the same year preferred to the prebend of Apesthorpe in the church of York (Le Neve, Fasti, ed. Hardy, iii. 167). On the accession of Queen Mary he withdrew to the continent, and resided successively at Copenhagen, Geneva, and Frankfort. He died at Frankfort on 6 Dec. 1555. His principal works are: 1. ‘The Reckenynge and Declaracion of the Fayth and Belefe of Huldrike Zwingly, Bysshoppe of Züryk,’ Zurich, 1543, 8vo; [London?], 1548, 8vo; Geneva, 1555, 12mo. To the last edition of this translation from the Latin three pieces by Cottesford himself are appended, viz.: ‘An Epistle wrytten from Copynhauen in Denmarke vnto an Englyshe Marchaunt dwellyng at Wynchestre in Englande,’ ‘An Epistle vvritten to a good Lady, for the comforte of a frende of hers, wherein the Nouations erroure now reuiued by the Anabaptistes is confuted, and the synne agaynste the holy Goste playnly declared,’ and ‘The prayer of Daniel turned into metre and applied vnto our tyme.’ This metrical prayer was licensed to John Alde as a ballad in 1569 or 1570. 2. ‘Pious Prayers for every Day in the Week,’ London, temp. Edward VI, 8vo. 3. ‘Marten Micron, minister of the Dutch Church in London, his short and faithfull instruction for the edifyeng and comfort of the symple christians, which intende to receyue the holy Supper of the Lorde,’ translated from the Dutch, London [1552]. 4. A translation of John à Lasco on the discipline of the church. Cottesford was also, it is said, engaged in the compilation of the liturgy.
[Tanner's Bibl. Brit. p. 202; Newcourt's Repertorium, i. 415, ii. 394; Gough's Index to Parker Soc. Publications; Cooper's Athenæ Cantab. i. 140; Ames's Typogr. Antiq. (Herbert), 711, 1571, 1584; Wood's Athenæ Oxon. (Bliss), i. 231; Bale De Scriptoribus, ix. 63; Ritson's Bibl. Poetica, p. 174.]