Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 51.djvu/299

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Sewell
291
Sexburga

was sequestrated, and in 1862 he went abroad to avoid his creditors. He took up his residence at Deutz on the Rhine, opposite Cologne, and employed himself in examining critically the text of the New Testament. The result was a work published in 1878, after his death, entitled ‘The Microscope of the New Testament.’ In 1870, by the aid of friends, he was enabled to return to England. Until 1874 he resided chiefly in the Isle of Wight. He died at the residence of his nephew, the Rev. Arthur Sewell, at Litchford Hall, near Manchester, on 14 Nov. 1874, and was buried in St. Andrew's churchyard at Blackley. He was unmarried. A window inscribed to his memory is in Exeter College Chapel.

Apart from controversial pamphlets and many collected volumes of sermons (in 1831, 1832, 1835, and 1850), his chief published works were:

  1. ‘An Essay on the Cultivation of the Intellect by the Study of Dead Languages,’ 1830.
  2. ‘Hora Philologica; or Conjectures on the Structure of the Greek Language,’ 1830.
  3. ‘A Clergyman's Recreation; or Sacred Thoughts in Verse,’ 1831; 2nd edit. 1835.
  4. ‘An Introduction to the Dialogues of Plato,’ 1841.
  5. ‘Christian Politics,’ 1844.
  6. ‘The Plea of Conscience for seceding from the Catholic Church to the Romish Schism in England,’ 1845; 3rd ed. 1845.
  7. ‘The Nation, the Church, and the University of Oxford,’ 1849.
  8. ‘Christian Vestiges of Creation,’ 1861.

Sewell also wrote four novels: ‘Uncle Peter's Fairy Tales,’ 1844; ‘Hawkstone, a Tale of and for England,’ 1845; ‘Uncle Peter's Tale for the Nineteenth Century,’ 1868; and ‘The Giant, a Fairy Tale,’ 1870. He edited several of the novels written by his sister, Elizabeth Missing Sewell (1844–1850). To the ‘Quarterly Review’ he contributed fifteen articles, chiefly on theological subjects. He published translations of the ‘Agamemnon,’ 1846; the ‘Georgics,’ 1846, another edition, 1854; the ‘Odes and Epodes of Horace,’ 1850. He left in manuscript ‘Lexilogus, a Collection of Greek Words,’ 4 vols.; ‘Lectures on Inspiration;’ ‘The Microscope of the Diatessaron;’ ‘The Diatessaron, arranged,’ 2 vols.; ‘The Psalms of David in Verse;’ ‘The Iliad of Homer translated,’ 2 vols; ‘The Odyssey of Homer translated,’ 2 vols.

[The Microscope of the New Testament, 1878, pref. pp. v–xii; Some Last Words of W. Sewell, with a prefatory notice by his sister, 1876; Liddon's Life of E. B. Pusey, 1893–4, i. 293, 305, ii. 204, 287, 289, iii. 137, 174, 248; Mozley's Reminiscences, ii. 23–8 (1882); Letters of J. B. Mozley, 1885, pp. 40, 71; Burgon's Twelve Good Men, 1891, pp. 158, 187; G. D. Boyle's Recollections, 1895, pp. 105–8; Stokes's Life of George Petrie, 1868, pp. 358–60; Quarterly Review, April 1891, pp. 399, 403–4; Reminiscences of Oxford, ed. Couch (Oxford Hist. Soc.), 1892, p. 351; English Churchman, 19 Nov. 1874, p. 560; Guardian, 18 Nov. 1874, p. 1480; Times, 16 Nov. 1874 p. 7, 18 Nov. p. 11; Boase's Rectors and Fellows of Exeter College (Oxford Hist. Soc.), 1894, pp. cxliii–cl, 174; Notes and Queries, 8th ser. xii. 344; note from the Rev. H. Edmund Sharpe, vicar of Newport.]

G. C. B.


SEXBURGA, SEAXBURG, or SEXBURH (d. 673), queen of the West-Saxons, the wife of King Cenwalh, Kenwealh, or Coinwalch [q. v.], succeeded to the throne after her husband's death, and reigned for one year. William of Malmesbury says that her husband appointed her to succeed him, that she ruled with masculine energy, collecting armies, keeping her troops under control, and defying her enemies, and that her one year's reign was ended by her death. The St. Albans writer, whose work was accepted by Wendover and Paris, relates that at the end of a year she was banished from the kingdom by the nobles, who would not fight under the leadership of a woman. Bishop Stubbs notes that in reading William of Malmesbury's account of her, it should be remembered that the historian had ‘a special regard’ for her husband Cenwalh, and observes that possibly both Malmesbury and the St. Albans writer represent the ideas of the age of the empress Matilda. There was no reason why in the seventh century it should be thought unseemly that a queen should reign.

[Bede's Hist. Eccl. iv. c. 12; A.-S. Chron. an. 672; Ethelwerd, c. 7, ap. Mon. Hist. Brit. p. 506; Henry of Huntingdon, p. 65 (Rolls Ser.); Will. of Malmesbury's Gesta Regum, i. sect. 32; Flor. Wig. i. 273, Rog. Wend. i. 162 (both in Engl. Hist. Soc.); Dict. Chr. Biogr. art. ‘Sexburga’ (1), by Bishop Stubbs.]

W. H.


SEXBURGA, Saint (d. 699?), queen of Kent and second abbess of Ely, was the eldest daughter of Anna (d. 654), king of the East-Angles. Her sisters were St. Etheldreda [q. v.], first abbess of Ely; Ethelburga, abbess of Faremontier in Brie; and St. Witburga, a nun of Ely. Saethryd, abbess of Faremontier, was her half-sister. She married Earconbert, king of Kent, about 640, the year of his succession to his father Eadbald [q. v.], and lived with him twenty-four years until his death in 664, having by him two sons, Egbert (d. 673?) and Hlotheri or Lothar (d. 685?), both successively kings of Kent, and two daughters, St. Earcongota, a nun of Fare-