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Brief Lives, Vol. 1

Chapter 179: Notes.
By John Aubrey
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BiographiesHistory - Early Modern (c. 1450-1750)

About This Book

A collection of concise biographical sketches compiled from the author's manuscript notes, offering anecdotal portraits of a wide range of literary, scientific, political, and social figures across several generations. Entries blend remembered quotations, learned citation, personal recollection, and occasional gossip, producing uneven but vivid character sketches. Material is presented alphabetically and supplemented by antiquarian notes, a short theatrical piece, and facsimiles of manuscript drawings and plans. An introduction outlines editorial principles and reproduces the manuscript spellings and citations where appropriate, preserving the informality and immediacy of the original notes.

Henry Danvers, earl of Danby (1573-1644).

[719]Henry Danvers[DB], earl of Danby; vide his christning and epitaph in libro[DC] A. in Dantesey church: vide <David> Lloyd's State-worthies, 8vo, 1679.

Quaere my brother William, and J. Stokes, for the examination order of the murther[DD] at Cosham in North Wilts. Old L. Shippon, Oxon,

'From Turke and Pope,' etc.

R. Wisdome was then lecturer and preacht that day, and Henry Long expired[720] in his armes. My great-grandfather, R. Danvers, was in some trouble about it, his horses and men being in that action. His servants were hanged and so ... Long of Linets. Vide Degory Wheare's Epistles and John Owen's Epigrams.

Physick Garden <at Oxford>: inscriptions there; inscription at Dantesey.

<He> gave to Sir Thomas Overbury cloath.

<He> perfected his Latin when a man by parson Oldham of Dodmerton. <He was a> perfect master of the French; a historian; tall and spare; temperate; sedate and solid; a very great favorite of prince Henry; lived most at Cornbury; a great improver of his estate, to 11000 li. per annum at the least; sold the 7 Downes, and turned the[721] ⓐ into lease; afterwards bought fee-simple neer Cirencester.

[722]Henry, earl of Danby, <was a> great oeconomist. All his servants <were> sober and wise[723] in their respective places. <He> kept ... gentlemen: <among them> colonel Legge[724] (governor of Portsmouth); and his brother; Mr. Arthur Drake (brother of Sir ... Drake, baronet).

[725]Earl of Danby—he was page to Sir Philip Sydney—from my cozen Elizabeth Villers: quaere +.

[726]Memorandum:—anno Domini, 16—, regno regis Caroli primi, Henry, earle of Danby, built an almeshowse in this parish <Dantesey, co. Wilts> for <six> poore people and[727] a schoole—quaere the salary[DE] of both.

Notes.

[DB] Aubrey gives in trick the coat:—'<gules>, a chevron between 3 mullets <or> [Danby]; quartering, <gules>, a saltire engrailed <argent>, an annulet for difference [Nevill, lord Latimer],' surmounted by an earl's coronet.

[DC] i.e. in MS. Aubr. 3, fol. 46: see supra, p. 192. The epitaph contains English verses by George Herbert.

[DD] Henry, brother of Sir Robert, Long was killed, possibly in fair fight, by Sir Charles, brother of this Henry, Danvers: see the Archaeological Magazine, i. 306. In consequence, the Danvers brothers had to seek safety in France. In MS. Aubr. 3, fol. 44v, Aubrey notes 'Sommerford magna—the assassination of Harry Long was contrived in the parlour of the parsonage here. Mr. Atwood was then parson; he was drown'd comeing home.'

Richard Atwood, M.A. Oxon, 1576: another instance of 'Digitus Dei.'

[DE] See Jackson's Aubrey's Wiltshire Collections, p. 228.