Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Langley, Thomas (fl.1320)

From Wikisource
Jump to navigation Jump to search
534289Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900, Volume 32 — Langley, Thomas (fl.1320)1892Charles Lethbridge Kingsford

LANGLEY, THOMAS (fl. 1320?), writer on poetry, was a monk of S. Benet Hulme, Norfolk, and author of 'Liber de Varietate carminum in capitulis xviii distinctus cum prologo.' Ten chapters are preserved in Digby MS. 100, f. 178, at the Bodleian Library. The prologue consists of an epigram beginning 'Dudum conflictu vexatus rithimachie,' which seems to be Bale's only authority for ascribing to Langley a book of epigrams. The treatise is dedicated to a bishop of Norwich, but in the Digby MS., which is evidently a copy and not the original, the bishop's name is omitted. Tanner gives the bishop's name as John, and Langley's date as 1430, which would suit John Wakeryng, who was bishop from 1416 to 1426. But the Digby copy is probably not much later than 1400, and if the bishop's name was really John, John Salmon must be meant, who was bishop from 1299 to 1335.

[Bale. xi. 43; Tanner's Bibl. Brit.-Hib. p. 465; Cat. of Digby MSS.; information kindly supplied by F. Madan, seq., of the Bodleian Library.]

C. L. K.