Richard Foxe

Roman Catholic
Previous post(s)	Bishop of Exeter Bishop of Bath and Wells Bishop of Durham
Coat of arms

Richard Foxe (sometimes Richard Fox) (c. 1448 – 5 October 1528)^[2] was an English churchman, the founder of Corpus Christi College, Oxford. He was successively Bishop of Exeter, Bath and Wells, Durham, and Winchester, and became also Lord Privy Seal.

Life

Foxe was born at

In 1484, Foxe was in Paris possibly in pursuit of studies or possibly because he had become unpopular with Richard III. There he came into contact with Henry Tudor, who was beginning his quest for the English throne, and took Foxe into his service. In January 1485 Richard intervened to prevent Foxe's appointment to the vicarage of Stepney on the ground that he was keeping company with the "great rebel, Henry ap Tuddor."

The important offices conferred on Foxe immediately after the

Meanwhile, in July 1494 Foxe had been translated to the

In August 1501 he was translated once more, this time to the

In 1500 Foxe was elected chancellor of

The accession of Henry VIII only increased Foxe's power, the personnel of his ministry remaining unaltered. The Venetian ambassador called Foxe "alter rex" and the Spanish ambassador Carroz said that Henry trusted him more than any other adviser, although he also reports Henry's warning that the Bishop of Winchester was, as his name implied, "a Foxe indeed." He was the chief of the ecclesiastical statesmen of Morton's school, believed in frequent parliaments, and opposed the spirited foreign policy which laymen like Surrey are supposed to have advocated. His colleagues were William Warham and Ruthal, but Warham and Foxe differed on the question of Henry's marriage, Foxe advising the completion of the match with Catherine of Aragon while Warham expressed doubts as to its canonical validity. They also differed over the prerogatives of Canterbury with regard to probate and other questions of ecclesiastical jurisdiction.

Foxe now devoted himself to his long-neglected episcopal duties. He expressed himself as being as anxious for the reformation of the clergy as Simeon the Righteous for the coming of the Messiah; but was too old to accomplish much himself in the way of remedying the clerical and especially the monastic depravity, licence and corruption he deplored. His sight failed during the last ten years of his life, and Matthew Parker claimed that Wolsey suggested his retirement from his diocese on a pension. Foxe refused, and Wolsey had to wait until Foxe's death before he could add occupation of Winchester to his holding the archdiocese of York and the abbey of St Albans, and thus leave Durham vacant as he hoped for his own illegitimate son. Foxe died on 5 October 1528.^[8]

The crown of Foxe's career was his foundation of

• List of Erasmus's correspondents
• List of chancellors of the University of Cambridge

Citations

References

• Allen, P. S. & H. M. (eds.) Letters of Richard Fox 1486-1527, Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1929.
• Fryde, E. B.; Greenway, D. E.; Porter, S.; Roy, I. (1996). Handbook of British Chronology (Third revised ed.). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
  ISBN 0-521-56350-X
  .
•  This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Pollard, Albert Frederick (1911). "Fox, Richard". Encyclopædia Britannica. Vol. 10 (11th ed.). pp. 766–767.
• Letters and Papers of henry VII. and Henri. VIII., vols. i.-iv.;
• Spanish and Venetian Calendars of State Papers;
• James Gairdner, Lollardy and the Reformation and Church History 1485–1558;
• Pollard, A. F. Henry VIII; Longman's Political History, vol. v.;
• authorities cited in the article by
  Thomas Fowler in the Dictionary of National Biography
  .

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Richard Foxe.