John Martiall

, a zealous man for the R. Cath. Cause, was born at Dalysford in Worcestershire, near Chippingnorton in the County of Oxon; educated in Grammatical learning in Wykeham’s School near Winchester, admitted perpetual Fellow of New coll. after he had served two years of probation, an. 1551. took the degree of Bach. of the Civil Law five years after, about which time he was made Usher, or second Master, of the aforesaid School under Tho. Hide, whom I shall anon mention. In the beginning of Q. Eliz. he left his Employment, Fellowship, and at length the Kingdom, and going beyond the Seas to Lovaine, he made proficiency there in the studies of Divinity, and at length by the procurement of Lewis Owen Archdeacon of Cambray, (afterwards Bishop of Cassano) he was made Canon of St. Peters Church at L’isle in Flanders. Which place he keeping eight years, resigned it, (being then D. of D.) to the end that he might give himself solely upto his devotions, and prepare himself for another World. He hath written,

A Treatise of the Cross, gathered out of the Scriptures, Councils, and ancient Fathers of the primitive Church. Antw. 1564. in oct. Whereupon Jam. Calfhill of Ch. Ch. making an answer to it, our Author came out with a reply intit.

A reply to Mr. Calfhills blasphemous answer against the Treatise of the Cross. Lov. 1566. qu. Afterwards he wrote,

Treatise of the tonsure of the Clerks.—Left imperfect and therefore never printed. He departed this mortal Life at L’isle beforementioned, (to the great grief of the R. Catholicks,) in the Arms or Embraces of Will, Gifford Dean of that Church, 1597 on the 3. of Apr. (a)(a) Jo. Pits in lib. De illustr. Angl. Scriptorih. Aet. 16. nu. 1045. in fifteen hundred ninety and seven, and was buried in the Collegiate Church of St. Peter before-mentioned. At his death he bequeathed a rich ring, with a stone in it, to adorn a piece of our Saviour’s Cross, in the Cathedral there. Whose Will being performed by the said Gifford, that bequest was esteemed as a Trophy of Victory over Calfhill, and is at this day, as I have been informed, preserved as a choice relick there.