AUBREY SENDS BIOGRAPHICAL RESEARCH TO ANTHONY WOOD
AUBREY (JOHN, 1626-1697, antiquary) AUTOGRAPH BIOGRAPHICAL
NOTES, evidently prepared for and sent to Anthony Wood, mentioning the translation
of an Abridgement of Plowden's Commentaries into English by Fabian
Hicks ('our frend Fabian Philips never heard of till from you') and a benefaction
by Edmund Wyld, correcting a mistaken identification of George for John Wyld,
with a short biography of the latter ('You still in yr Qs talke of George
Wyld'), sending information about Sir Richard and Dr Richard Napier, and also
referring to having sent him a pamphlet with verses of John Earles at the
end; Aubrey's notes are written on the verso and recto of part of an address
leaf in what is almost certainly Wood's engrossing (ie. address panel) handwriting
('For Mr John Aubrey At Mr Kents house at the three black posts in Suffolk
street neare'); the information about the Napiers on the verso is in the hand
of Sir Richard Napier's son according to two notes by Aubrey ('The learned
Dr Rich: Napier of Linford in [B]ucks was Sr Rich: uncle. Elias Ashmole Esq
hath all the MSS that he
Autograph material by Aubrey is extremely rare outside the Bodleian Library, particularly relating in any way to his work as a compiler of lives. No manuscripts by Aubrey have appeared at auction in the last twenty five-years at least.
While the present notes evidently date from the period when Aubrey was providing research for Anthony Wood, primarily for his biographical work Athenae Oxonienses, and with which these notes are clearly connected, the information provided here about the place of death of Sir Richard Napier ('Bessells-leigh in Barkesheire') could also have informed the biography of Sir Richard Napier which appears in Brief Lives, published 1696 (edited Andrew Clark, 1898): 'Sir Richard Napier is buryed at Lindford, but died at Besels-leigh.' Aubrey later acknowledged that it was Wood who had suggested the project which resulted in Brief Lives ('a Taske that I never thought to have undertaken till you imposed it upon me') and that he made use of information gathered while assisting Wood with his projects.
The question of Sir Richard Napier's status as a non-author
answered in this manuscript is clearly linked with the letter from Aubrey
to Wood quoted by Oliver Dick in the Introduction to his edition of Brief
Lives (p. lvi): 'On Sunday last I dined with Mr. Ashmole, who bids me
answer you POSITIVELY that Sir Richard Napier never did write anything and
sayes that he haz [sic] acquainted you thus much before by letter.'
In his edition of Brief Lives, Clark mentions two other letters, dated
1689, in which Aubrey and Ashmole were supplying information about Sir Richard
Napier. In his edition of Wood's Life and Times, under a general heading
'memoranda in connection with the Athenae', Clark quotes a note by
Wood that in March 1688/9 he wrote to Aubrey '
Edmund Wyld was Aubrey's patron and friend. Mr Kent may be the man to whom Aubrey sold Chalke Farm, his family home.
Aubrey and Wood enjoyed a ragged friendship (like Hazlitt and Leigh Hunt). Wood once meanly described Aubrey as 'a shiftless person, roving and magotie-headed, and sometimes little better than crased. And being exceedingly credulous, would stuff his many letters sent to A.W. with fooleries, and misinformations, which sometimes would guid him into the paths of errour.'
£3,250