A HISTORY OF BUCKINGHAMSHIRE 



Eton, but to Saffron Walden School, at which 

 Smith is said to have been educated. Aldrich 

 left Eton after six years' teaching to go on an 

 embassy to France and the pope. On Lupton's 

 resignation in 1535 he was, in compliance with 

 a royal mandate, elected provost, the first, and, 

 for almost exactly 200 years, the only Etonian 

 and Kingsman to become provost. Next year 

 he was appointed to the bishopric of Carlisle, 

 which he held with the provostry in breach of 

 all custom, consecration to a bishopric vacating 

 all other preferment. He was also almoner to 

 Queen Jane (Seymour), and when she died 

 solemnly received her body on its passage through 

 Eton to Windsor. He was succeeded as master 

 at Lady Day 1521 by yet another Wykehamist, 

 Thomas White, scholar of Winchester 1508, of 

 New College 1513 to 1520. The identity is 

 made sure, in spite of the commonness of the 

 name, by the protocol at New College, which 

 states that his successor was appointed in place 

 of him ' promoti ad informandum pueros Etone,' 

 while Robert Walker's costs in riding to Oxford 

 with letters for him were 2s. id. John Gold- 

 wyn 79 succeeded White at Lady Day 1525. 

 His provenance has not been traced. As usher 

 he had John Barons, who, having come in 

 February 1524, stayed no less than four and a 

 . half years, to Midsummer 1528. Goldwyn 

 enjoys the distinction of having had his time- 

 table preserved, thus furnishing the first authentic 

 information of the Eton curriculum. A free 

 grammar school had been maintained at Cuck- 

 field in Sussex from about 1504 by Edmund 

 Flower, citizen and merchant tailor of London, 

 which in 1521 he endowed by his will. The 

 endowment, being worth only some ,6 ids. a 

 year, was augmented by William Spicer, rector 

 of the neighbouring parish of Balcombe, with a 

 new endowment, producing another 5 a year, 

 and settled by a deed of i October 1528. This 

 provided that the schoolmaster 'shall teach the 

 scholars in the said school grammar after the 

 form, order, and usage taught in the Grammar 

 School at Eton near Windsor, from form to 

 form, according to the acts and rules there made, 

 kept, and used, and to keep the houres of learn- 

 ing in the said school.' Annexed to the deed 

 was the oath of the master in seven items, the 

 last binding him to teach ' after the form and 

 usage taught in the Grammar School of Eton, 

 the which form for this time is as it followeth.' 

 The ' Form ' 80 is fortunately preserved at Cuck- 



79 Maxwell Lyte, op. cit. 105, quoting Strype's 

 Life of Sir T. Smith, 6. 



80 Though printed in Carlisle's End. Gram. Schools 

 (ii, 594) in 1818, it has escaped the notice of all the 

 Eton historians, as the first authentic curriculum of 

 Eton. Carlisle's copy contains several mistakes of his 

 own in addition to those in the Vicar's Book. They 

 are corrected in the abstract now given. Cf. V.C.H. 

 Suss, ii, 417. 



field, though only in a copy, in ' the Vicar's 

 Book,' an MS. written about 1626 ; it contains 

 some evident mistakes arising from misreading 

 of the originals. The mere fact that a tailor 

 and a parson could endow a school to be carried 

 on like Eton shows how little at this time the 

 great and famous ' Public ' schools differed from 

 other grammar schools, to which the local gentry 

 flocked, and where they enjoyed the same kind 

 of teaching as the great schools and sometimes 

 perhaps better teachers. 



The ' Form ' shows that there were six Forms, 

 and below Form I ' the children first beginning 

 the grammar.' These last were to ' read the 

 accidence of Mr. Stanbridge,' a famous Wyke- 

 hamist, first usher of Magdalen College School 

 and afterwards master of Banbury School, which 

 Bishop Oldham in 1515 made the model for 

 Manchester Grammar School. After many 

 centuries Stanbridge's grammar had superseded 

 ' Old Donatus.' In this the boys were to be 

 ' diligently exercised every working-day and 

 upon . . . Saturday in the morning every one 

 of them rehearse and render by heart all the 

 lessons they have learned all the week before, 

 and if Saturday be holyday, then the said render 

 be made the working day before.' 



It is ordained also that every working-day, Friday 

 and Saturday except, one of the 8 parts of Reason 

 [i.e. parts of speech], with the verb according to the 

 same, that is to say, Nomen with Amo, Pronomen 

 with Amor, and so forth, be said by heart by all the 

 learners of the accidence, if they have learnt that part, 

 and of all the First, Second, and Third Forms. 



This -was to be ' by and by after 6 of the clock ' 

 in summer and 7 in winter. ' After the part 

 done the learners of the accidence shall labour 

 their lessons, which lesson the Master shall hear 

 more often or more seldom after his discretion 

 and to the more profit of the scholars.' 



Form I were to learn Stanbridge's English 

 Rules called the ' Parvula.' 



These rules shall be said by and by after the Part 

 done, and upon repeating the rules the Master shall 

 cause them to make small and easy Latins, proper and 

 such as the children may understand and have a 

 delight in. 



Form II the same, ' except that the Master may 

 by his discretion add more matter to the Latin 

 for the Second Form.' 



These Latins must be so given that the children 

 may write 81 them before breakfast. After their 

 breakfast one of the next Form above, by the Master's 

 assigning, shall read to them one Rule for the next 

 day and in the Master's presence ; upon which the 

 scholars of this Form shall apply themselves to the 

 understanding construing saying and answering to the 

 parts of their Latins unto the dinner-hour fn a.m.]. 



If the Master's discretion shall think the babies 

 able easily to overcome it, he may give them also. 



I7 6 



81 Not as in Carlisle, End. Gram. Schools, ' recite.' 



