Thomas Speght (died 1621) was an English schoolmaster and editor of Geoffrey Chaucer.

Life

He was from a

Yorkshire Yorkshire ( ; abbreviated Yorks), formally known as the County of York, is a historic county in northern England and by far the largest in the United Kingdom. Because of its large area in comparison with other English counties, functions have ...

family, and matriculated as a

sizar At Trinity College, Dublin and the University of Cambridge, a sizar is an undergraduate who receives some form of assistance such as meals, lower fees or lodging during his or her period of study, in some cases in return for doing a defined jo ...

of Peterhouse, Cambridge in 1566, graduating B.A. in 1570, and M.A. in 1573. At Cambridge he was supported by a scholarship from Lady Mildred Cecil. He went to London, and became a schoolmaster. According to the epitaph on the tomb of his son Lawrence, Speght as schoolmaster was a "paragon".

Works

In 1598 Speght edited the works of Chaucer. He had the assistance of John Stow the chronicler, and built on Stow's Chaucer edition of 1561. He included a glossary, and an influential biography of Chaucer, as well as annotations. He included works now not associated with Chaucer.

First Chaucer edition (1598)

The full title of his edition ran: ''The Workes of our Antient and learned English Poet, Geffrey Chaucer, newly Printed. In this Impression you shall find these Additions: (1) His Portraiture and Progenie Shewed. (2) His Life collected. (3) Argument to euery Booke gathered. (4) Old and Obscure Words explained. (5) Authors by him cited declared. (6) Difficulties opened. (7) Two Bookes of his neuer before printed'' (i.e. his ''Dreame'' and '' The Floure and the Leafe''), published London, folio 1598. The volume was dedicated to

Sir Robert Cecil Robert Cecil, 1st Earl of Salisbury, (1 June 156324 May 1612), was an English statesman noted for his direction of the government during the Union of the Crowns, as Tudor England gave way to Stuart rule (1603). Lord Salisbury served as the ...

. Some copies were published by George Bishop, and others by Thomas Wight. A prefatory letter, addressed to the editor in 1597, by Francis Beaumont (d. 1624) of West Goscote, Leicestershire, supplied "a judicious apology for the supposed levities of Chaucer". Neither the ''Dreame'' nor ''The Floure and the Leafe'' is now thought to be connected to Chaucer.

Second Chaucer edition (1602)

Meanwhile Francis Thynne, whose father William Thynne had published a 1532 edition of Chaucer, was preparing notes for a commentary on the poet's works. On the publication of Speght's edition, Thynne abandoned his project and criticised Speght's performance in a long manuscript letter of ''Animadversions'' addressed to Speght and dedicated to

Sir Thomas Egerton Thomas Egerton, 1st Viscount Brackley, (1540 – 15 March 1617), known as 1st Baron Ellesmere from 1603 to 1616, was an English nobleman, judge and statesman from the Egerton family who served as Lord Keeper and Lord Chancellor for twenty-on ...

. The manuscript went to the Bridgwater library, was first printed in 1810 by Henry John Todd in his ''Illustrations of Gower and Chaucer'' (pp. 1–83), and was reprinted for the

Early English Text Society The Early English Text Society (EETS) is a text publication society founded in 1864 which is dedicated to the editing and publication of early English texts, especially those only available in manuscript. Most of its volumes contain editions of ...

in 1865 (new edit. 1875). When a reprint of Speght's edition of Chaucer was called for in 1602, he used Thynne's assistance, acknowledged in the preface, with also notes and corrections supplied by John Stow. The second edition bore the title: ''The Workes of our Ancient and learned English Poet Geoffrey Chaucer newly printed. To that which was done in the former Impression thus much is now added: (1) In the life of Chaucer many things inserted. (2) The whole Worke by old Copies reformed. (3) Sentences and Prouerbes noted. (4) The Signification of the old and obscure words prooued. (5) The Latine and French not Englished by Chaucer translated. (6) The Treatise called Jacke Vpland against Friers: and Chaucer's A.B.C. called La Prière de nostre Dame, at this Impression added'', published London, folio 1602. The volume was again dedicated to Sir Robert Cecil. '' The Treatise called Jacke Vpland'' is not by Chaucer, but ''Chaucer's A B C'' is a genuine work. A later edition, with

John Lydgate John Lydgate of Bury (c. 1370 – c. 1451) was an English monk and poet, born in Lidgate, near Haverhill, Suffolk, England. Lydgate's poetic output is prodigious, amounting, at a conservative count, to about 145,000 lines. He explored and estab ...

's ''Siege of Thebes'', appeared in 1687.

Other works

Speght also contributed Latin

commendatory verse The epideictic oratory, also called ceremonial oratory, or praise-and-blame rhetoric, is one of the three branches, or "species" (eidē), of rhetoric as outlined in Aristotle's ''Rhetoric'', to be used to praise or blame during ceremonies. Origin ...

s to Abraham Fleming's ''Panoplie of Epistles'' (1576) and to John Baret's ''Alvearie'' (1580).

Family

Speght married Anne, whose surname may have been Hill, and they had a family of at least 11, with three sons and eight daughters. They lived near

Cripplegate Cripplegate was a gate in the London Wall which once enclosed the City of London. The gate gave its name to the Cripplegate ward of the City which straddles the line of the former wall and gate, a line which continues to divide the ward into ...

, in a house by the chapel of St James in the Wall, where Speght taught. This house and school were surveyed in 1612 by Ralph Treswell, as the property belonged to the Clothworkers' Company. Speght's son Laurence accompanied Sir Paul Pindar on his embassy to Constantinople, and was on 10 March 1639 granted in reversion the office of surveyor-general of the customs. He was buried at Clopton, Northamptonshire.

Humfrey Dyson Humfrey Dyson (1582–1633) was a London scrivener and notary,. and notable early book collector in England. He was the son of, Christopher Dyson, a wax-chandler of the parish of St Alban in central London. Humfrey himself may also have been a ...

(died 1633) the book collector married one of the daughters. Rachel Speght the poet, daughter of the Calvinist cleric James Speght, may have been a relation; James Speght, D.D., of Christ's College, Cambridge (son of John Speght of Horbury, Yorkshire), published in 1613 ''A briefe demonstration who have and of the certainty of their salvation that have the spirit of Christ''. Thomas Speght's will mentions a brother James, who has been identified tentatively with the cleric.

Notes

;Attribution {{DEFAULTSORT:Speght, Thomas Year of birth missing 1621 deaths English book editors 16th-century English educators Schoolteachers from London