Thomas Churchyard

For the nineteenth-century painter, seeThomas Churchyard (painter).

Thomas Churchyard(c. 1523 – 1604) was an English author and soldier. He is chiefly remembered for a series of autobiographical or semi-autobiographical verse collections, includingChurchyardes Chippes(1575);Churchyard's Choise(1579);Churchyardes Charge(1580);The Worthines of Wales(1587);Churchyard's Challenge(1593); andChurchyards Charitie(1595).

Early life

Thomas Churchyard was born atShrewsburyin c. 1529, the son of a farmer.He received a good education, and, having speedily dissipated at court the money with which his father provided him, he entered the household ofHenry Howard, Earl of Surrey.There he remained for twenty years, learning something of the art of poetry from his patron; some of the poems he contributed later (1555) toNicholas Grimald's andRichard Tottel's collection,Songes and Sonettes(known more often asTottel's Miscellany), may well date from this early period.

Career

In 1541 Churchyard began his career as a soldier of fortune, being, he said, "pressed into the service". He fought his way through nearly every campaign inScotlandand theLow Countriesfor thirty years. He served under the emperorCharles Vin Flanders in 1542, returning to England after thePeace of Crépy(1544).

In theScottishcampaign of 1547 he was present at the barren victory ofPinkie,and in the next year was taken prisoner atSaint Monance,but aided by his persuasive tongue he escaped to the English garrison atLauder,where he was once more besieged, only returning to England on the conclusion of peace in 1550.

In the same year he went to Ireland to serve thelord deputy of Ireland,Sir Anthony St Leger,who had been sent to pacify the country. Here Churchyard enriched himself, at the expense of the Irish; but in 1552 he was in England again, trying vainly to secure a fortune by marriage with a rich widow. After this failure he departed once more to the wars to theSiege of Metz (1552),and "trailed a pike" in the emperor's army, until he joined the forces underWilliam Grey, 13th Baron Grey de Wilton,with whom he says he served eight years. Grey was in charge of the fortress ofGuînes,which was besieged by theduke of Guisein 1558.

Churchyard arranged the terms of surrender, and was sent with his chief to Paris as a prisoner. He was not released at thePeace of Cateau Cambrésisfor lack of money to pay his ransom, but he was finally set free on giving his bond for the amount, an engagement which he repudiated as soon as he was safely in England. He is not to be identified with the "T.C." who wrote for theMirror for Magistrates(ed. 1559), "How the Lord Mowbray... was banished... and after died miserablie in exile", which is the work ofThomas Chaloner;but "Shore's Wife", his most popular poem, appeared in the 1563 edition of the same work, and to that of 1587 he contributed the "Tragedie ofThomas Wolsey".These are plain compositions in the seven-lined Chaucerianstanza.

Repeated petitions to theQueenfor assistance produced at first fair words, and then no answer at all. He therefore returned to active service under Lord Grey, who was in command of an English army sent in 1560 to help the Scottish rebels at theSiege of Leith,and in 1564 he served in Ireland underSir Henry Sidney.The religious disturbances in theNetherlandsattracted him toAntwerp,where, as the agent ofWilliam of Orange,he allowed the insurgents to place him at their head, and was able to save much property from destruction. This action made him so hated by the mob that he had to fly for his life in the disguise of a priest. In the next year he was sent by theearl of Oxfordto serve definitely under the prince of Orange. After a year's service he obtained leave to return to England, and after many adventures and narrow escapes in a journey through hostile territory he embarked forGuernsey,and thence for England. His patron, Lord Oxford, disowned him, and the poet, whose health was failing, retired toBath.He appears to have made a very unhappy marriage at this time, and returned to theLow Countries.Falling into the hands of the Spaniards he was recognized as having had a hand in the Antwerp disturbance, and was under sentence to be executed as a spy when he was saved by the intervention of a noble lady. This experience did not deter him from joining in the defence ofZutphenin 1572, but this was his last campaign, and the troubles of the remaining years of his life were chiefly domestic.

Later life

Churchyard was employed to devise apageantfor the Queen's reception atBristolin 1574, and again atNorwichin 1578. He had published in 1575The Firste parte of Churchyarde's Chippes,the modest title which he gives to his works. No second part appeared, but there was a much enlarged edition in 1578. A passage inChurchyarde's Choise(1579) gave offence to Elizabeth, and the author fled toScotland,where he remained for three years. He was only restored to favour about 1584, and in 1593 he received a small pension from the Queen.

On Good Friday, 8 April 1580, Churchyard (then aged nearly 60) published a short account of the earthquake which had struck London and much of England only two days earlier. The pamphlet,A Warning to the Wyse, a Feare to the Fond, a Bridle to the Lewde, and a Glasse to the Good; written of the late Earthquake chanced in London and other places, 6 April 1580, for the Glory of God and benefit of men, that warely can walk, and wisely judge. Set forth in verse and prose, by Thomas Churchyard, gentlemanprovides the earliest accounts of the1580 Dover Straits earthquake.

Dispute with Thomas Camel

InChurchyards Challenge(1593) the author refers to hisbroadsideballad,Davie Dicars dreame(c. 1551–1552), which he says was written against by oneThomas Camelwhom Churchyard then "openly confuted". Their argument came to involve not only Churchyard and Camel but alsoWilliam Waterman,Geoffrey Chappell,andRichard Beard.All their various contributions were collected and reprinted inThe Contention bettwyxte Churchyeard and Camell, upon David Dycers Dreamein 1560. A short and seeminglyalliterativepoem in the manner ofPiers Plowman,Davie Dicarbrought Churchyard into trouble with theprivy council,but he was supported byEdward Seymour, 1st Duke of Somersetand dismissed with a reprimand.

Carried out in broadside ballads, the Churchyard-Camel debate was concerned with the relative merit of the plain style in native English literary tradition and the proper literary use of the English language itself. In a verse dedication toJohn Stow'sPithy Pleasaunt and Profitable Workes(1568), Churchyard defended the native tradition, grounding it in "Peers plowman... full plaine" andChaucer.Churchyard mocked Camel's classical, Latinate sophistication, and Camel attacked Churchyard's churlish words and "uncouth speeche". This public controversy resembled the old medieval practice offlyting—a staged, collaborative battle of the wits that was also, in this case, an occasion for the public discussion of moral issues, education, religion, and politics. It was also a means of commercial self-promotion on the part of writers and printers.

Perhaps inspired byRobert Crowley's 1550 publication ofPiers Plowman,Davy Dycar (i.e., Davy the ditcher or digger) is a character drawn from a line at the end ofPassus 6in the B-text and the end ofPassus 9in the C-text where it is prophesied that "Dawe the dyker" will die of starvation because of the corruption of landlords and clergy. ( "Dawe", written or printed as "Davve", could be read as "Davy" or "Davie".) This is the concluding event in a list of disasters caused by corrupt elites, a part ofPiers Plowmanthat was appreciated by some English Protestants in the mid-sixteenth century. (Notably, the Davy Digger lines were copied into a manuscript of political prophecies compiled around 1553–1554.) Churchyard turns Davy into a Piers-like truth-teller andprophetof amillennialkingdom of justice:

When truth doth tread the strets and liers lurke in den,
And Rex doth raigne and rule the rost, and weedes out wicked men:
Then baleful barnes be blyth that here in England wonne,
Your strife shall stynt I undertake, your dredfull dayes ar done.

William Waterman added to the debate with hisWesterne Wyll,calling explicit attention to Davy's roots:

This Diker sems a thryving ladde, brought up in pieres scole
The plowman stoute, of whom I thynke ye have often harde....
And for your lesson, lo by Christ I lyke it well
And such a lyke I wiene, doth pierce the ploughman tell.

Reputation

The affectionate esteem with which Churchyard was regarded by the younger Elizabethan writers is expressed byThomas Nashe,who says (Foure Letters Confuted) that Churchyard's aged muse might well be "grandmother to our grandiloquentest poets at this present".Francis Meres(Palladis Tamia,1598) mentions him in conjunction with many great names among "the most passionate, among us, to bewail and bemoan the perplexities of love".Spenser,in "Colin Clout's Come Home Again ", calls him with a spice of raillery" old Palaemon "who" sung so long until quite hoarse he grew ".

His writings, with the exception of his contributions to theMirror for Magistrates,are chiefly autobiographical in character or deal with the wars in which he had a share. They are very rare and have never been completely reprinted. Churchyard lived right through Elizabeth's reign, and was buried inSt. Margaret's, Westminster,on 4 April 1604. It was said he was taken ill in the presence ofAnne of Denmark's ladies in waiting and carried away in a faint a fortnight before his death.

Works

The extant works of Churchyard, exclusive of commendatory andoccasional verses,include:

• A lamentable and pitifull Description of the wofull warres inFlanders(1578)
• A Prayse, and Reporte of Maister MartyneFrobishers Voyage to Meta Incognita (A Name Given by a Mightie and most Great Personage) in Which Praise and Report is Written Divers Discourses Never Published by any Man as Yet(1578)
• A general rehearsall of warres, called Churchyard's Choise(1579), really a completion of theChippes,and containing, like it, a number of detached pieces
• A light Bondel of livelie Discourses,calledChurchyardes Charge(1580)
• A Warning to the Wyse,an immediate account of England's 1580 earthquake (1580)
• The Worthines ofWales(1587), a valuable antiquarian work in prose and verse, anticipatingMichael Drayton
• Churchyard's Challenge(1593)
• A Musicall Consort of Heavenly harmonic,calledChurchyards Charitie(1595)
• A True Discourse Historicall, of the succeeding Governors in the Netherlands(1602)

See also

• Piers Plowman Tradition

Sources

The chief contemporary authority for Churchyard's biography is his own "Tragicall Discourse of the unhappy man's life" (Churchyardes Chippes).George Chalmerspublished (1817) a selection from his works relating to Scotland, for which he wrote a useful life. See also an edition of theChippes(ed.JP Collier,1870), of theWorthines of Wales(Spenser Soc., 1876), and a notice of Churchyard by H. W. Adnitt (Transactions of the Shropshire Archaeological and Natural History Society,reprinted separately 1884).

• Churchyard, Thomas (1817).Churchyard's Chips concerning Scotland.London: Constable.
• Lyne, Raphael (2006) [2004]. "Churchyard, Thomas (1523?–1604)".Oxford Dictionary of National Biography(online ed.). Oxford University Press.doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/5407.(Subscription orUK public library membershiprequired.)
• Oakley-Brown, Liz (2008). "Taxonomies of travel and martial identity in Thomas Churchyard'sA Generall Rehearsall of WarresandA Pirates Tragedie(1579) ".Studies in Travel Writing.12(1): 67–84.doi:10.3197/136451408X273844.S2CID162298056.
• Oakley-Brown, Liz (2011). "Elizabethan exile after Ovid: Thomas Churchyard'sTristia(1572) ". In Ingleheart, Jennifer (ed.).Two Thousand Years of Solitude.Oxford: Oxford University Press. pp. 103–118.ISBN978-0-19-161913-7.
• Oakley-Brown, Liz (2012). "Thomas Churchyard". In Sullivan, Garrett A. Jr; Stewart, Alan (eds.).The Encyclopedia of English Renaissance Literature.Chichester: Wiley Blackwell.ISBN978-1405194495.
• Oakley-Brown, Liz (2012). "Writing on Borderlines: Thomas Churchyard'sThe Worthines of Wales".In Mottram, Stewart; Prescott, Sarah (eds.).Writing Wales, from the Renaissance to Romanticism.Aldershot: Ashgate. pp. 39–57.ISBN9781409445098.
• Ward, Bernard M. (1928).The Seventeenth Earl of Oxford, 1550–1604: from contemporary documents.London: John Murray. pp. 29–30.
• Woodcock, Matthew (2016).Thomas Churchyard: pen, sword, and ego.Oxford: Oxford University Press.ISBN9780199684304.
• This article incorporates text from a publication now in thepublic domain:Chisholm, Hugh,ed. (1911). "Churchyard, Thomas".Encyclopædia Britannica.Vol. 6 (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. pp. 348–349.