London, 8vo. He practised in chancery and bankruptcy, and published ‘Reports of Cases argued and determined in the High Court of Chancery,’ London, 1817–19, 8vo. He sat on the Chancery Commission of 1824, in the report of which he concurred, but expounded a wider scheme of reform in ‘A Letter to William Courtenay, Esq., on the Subject of the Chancery Commission,’ London, 1827, 8vo.
On 2 Dec. 1831 he was appointed to a commissionership in bankruptcy, which he held until his death, on 25 April 1844. He was buried in the churchyard, Hampstead. Merivale married, on 10 July 1805, Louisa Heath, daughter of the Rev. Joseph Drury [q. v.], head-master of Harrow School, by whom he had six sons and six daughters. His eldest son was Herman Merivale, C.B. [q. v.]; his second son, Charles Merivale, dean of Ely, and historian of the Roman empire, is noticed in the Supplement to this work.
Merivale was an accurate and elegant scholar, accomplished alike in classical and romantic literature. He was Bland's principal collaborator in his ‘Collections from the Greek Anthology and from the Pastoral, Elegiac, and Dramatic Poets of Greece,’ London, 1813, 8vo. In 1814 he published ‘Orlando in Roncesvalles,’ London, 8vo, a poem in ottava rima, founded on the ‘Morgante Maggiore’ of Luigi Pulci, and in 1820 a free translation in the same metre of the first and third cantos of Fortiguerra's ‘Ricciardetto.’ A collective edition of his ‘Poems, Original and Translated,’ appeared in 1838, London, 2 vols. 8vo, which includes, besides the before-mentioned pieces, a continuation of Beattie's ‘Minstrel,’ some translations from Dante, and other miscellanea. When past middle age he learned German, and shortly before his death published felicitous translations, partly reprinted from the ‘New Monthly Magazine’ for 1840, of ‘The Minor Poems of Schiller of the Second and Third Periods,’ London, 1844, 8vo.
Merivale was a friend of Byron, who warmly praised both his translations from the Greek and his ‘Orlando in Roncesvalles’ (see English Bards and Scotch Reviewers, ‘And ye associate bards,’ &c., Moore, Life of Byron, ed. 1847, p. 225; and Hodgson, Memoir of the Rev. Francis Hodgson, ii. 80). He was a frequent contributor to the ‘Quarterly’ and other reviews and periodicals. In 1837–8 he published in the ‘Gentleman's Magazine’ some valuable letters by Walter Moyle [q. v.] He made some collections for a history of Devonshire. Some of his letters to his friend the Rev. Joseph Hunter are preserved in Add. MS. 24871, ff. 145–60.
[Gent. Mag. 1844, pt. ii. p. 96; Lincoln's Inn Reg.; Athenæum, 1844, pp. 285, 407; Quarterly Review, October 1839; Moore's Diary, ed. Lord John Russell, 1854, vi. 320; Chancery Comm. Rep. 1826; London Gazette, 6 Dec. 1831; Brit. Mus. Cat.; Dublin Univ. Mag. 1840, pt. ii. p. 403; Blackwood's Mag. vols. xxxiii. xxxiv.; Transactions of the Devonshire Association, 1884 (art. by Dr. Charles Merivale).]
MERKE, THOMAS (d. 1409), bishop of Carlisle, has usually been called Merks, but this form is almost certainly an error. Undoubtedly so are the names Newmarket and Somastre sometimes given to him. The former originated with Bale, who, misled by a slight verbal similarity, confused Merke with Thomas of Newmarket, a Cambridge scholar who wrote on mathematics and rhetoric (Pits, p. 591; Proceedings of Cambridge Antiquarian Soc. vol. ii. pt. xiv. p. 18). ‘Somastre’ is a corruption of his later episcopal title. Merke was educated at Oxford, where he became doctor of divinity, and stood next to the chancellor among the delegates selected in November 1395 to convey to the king the submission of the university touching the rooting out of Lollardy enjoined earlier in that year (Wood, Antiquities of University of Oxford, i. 528 (Gutch); Kennett, Third Letter, pp. 6–7; Godwin, De Præsulibus, p. 766). He is described as a monk of Westminster when, about the beginning of 1397, he was thrust upon the chapter of Carlisle by the pope at the king's request (ib. p. 767; Fœdera, vii. 844, 848; Adam of Usk, p. 42). The temporalities were restored to him on 18 March (Godwin, loc. cit.) His appointment, which connects itself with the close relations between Richard and the abbot and monks of Westminster, was probably the reward of some service to the king; for in little more than a month, about the end of April, he was sent on a mission to the German princes with the Earls of Rutland and Nottingham (Kennett, pp. 34–5; Fœdera, vii. 858, viii. 1). Merke was present in the famous September parliament of 1397, was sent by Richard to order Archbishop Arundel not to appear therein, probably had some hand in the proceedings against Thomas, duke of Gloucester, and on 30 Sept. swore obedience on the relics with other prelates to the king (Adam of Usk, p. 9; Rot. Parl. iii. 355; Annales Henrici IV, p. 314; Stow, Annals, p. 321).
On 19 Oct. 1398 Merke was commissioned with the Earl of Salisbury to obtain payment of Queen Isabella's dowry (Fœdera, viii. 52). He is coupled by the Monk of Evesham (ed. Hearne, p. 168) and in two manuscript chronicles with Tydeman, bishop of Worcester, also a monk, as ill adviser and boon
