John Owen

, or Audoenus as some call him, the most noted Epigrammatist in the age he lived, was born at Armon in Caernarvonshire, educated in Wykehams School, admitted perpetual Fellow of New coll. after he had served two years of Probation there, in 1584. took the degree of Bach. of Civil Law in 1590. and leaving his fellowship the year after, taught School (as some of his antient country men that remember him, have told me) at Trylegh near to Monmouth, and at Warwick (as the tradition goes there among the Schoolmasters) in the School founded by K. Hen. 8. in the place of one Tho. Hall, about the year 1594. He was a person endowed with several gifts, especially with with the faculty of Poetry, which hath made him famous for those books of Epigrams, that he hath published, wherein an ingenious liberty of joking being by him used, was, and is now with some, especially forreigners, not a little pleasing and delightful. But that which I must farther note of him is, that being always troubled with the disease that attends Poets (indigence) he was received into the patronage of his countryman and Kinsman Dr. Jo. Williams B. of Lincoln and L. Keeper of the great Seal, who for several years exhibited to his wants. He hath written,

Epigrammatum lib. 3. ad Mariam Nevill comitis Dorcestriae filiam dicati. Lond. 1606. oct. printed twice that year.

Epigrammatum lib. singularis; ad doctiss. Heroinam D. Arbellam Stewart.

Epigram. lib. 3. ad Hen. Principem Cambriae duae; ad Carolum Ebor. unus.

Epigram. ad tres Maecenates libri tres. Ad Car. Noel Eq. & Baronettum, unus. Ad Gul. Sedley Eq. & Bar. alter. Ad Rog Owen Eq. aur. tertius.

Monostica quaedam Ethica & Politica veterum sapientum.

All which coming out as successive additions to the several editions of the three first books of Epigrams, were at length published all in one vol. in oct. and twelves, not only in England but beyond the Seas. In the year 1619. Joh. Vicars Usher of Ch. Church hospital in London and a puritanical Poet having selected many of them from several of the books that were then extant, did tanslate them into Engl. verse and were that year printed at London in oct. Thomas Pecke also of the Inner Temple Gent. did translate 600. of the said Epigrams in Eng. verse, which were printed with Martial de spectaculis, or of the rarities to be seen in Rome, and with the most select Epigr. of Sir To. More: To which is annexed a Century of Heroick Epigrams, &c. All published under the general title of Parnassi puerperium, at Lond 1659. in oct. And lastly Tho. Harvey hath Englished most, or all of them; but these I have not yet seen. The first Latin impressions of the author Owen, being greedily bought, and taken into the hands of all ingenious Scholars, and forthwith conveyed beyond the Seas, they came at length into the hands of the Romish Inquisitors after Heretical matters in printed books, who finding dangerous things in them, especially these two verses following, the book was put, into the the Index expurgatorius.

An [〈…〉] Romae, sub judice lis est.

[〈…〉] Romae, nemo suisse negat.

For which verses, and others of the like nature, Owen’s Uncle, who was a Papist, or at least Popishly affected, (from whom he expected Legacies,) dashed his name out from his last Will and Testament; which was the chief reason, that he ever after lived in a poor condition. He died in sixteen hundred twenty and two, 1622 and two, and was buried in St. Pauls Cathedra within the City of London, at the charge of the before-mentioned Dr. Williams; who also, soon after, caused a monument to be erected to his memory on a pip [•••] next to the Consistory stairs, with his Effigies (a shoulder-piece in brass) crown’d with Laurel, and six verses to be engraven under it. The two first of which runs thus:

Parva tibi status [•] st, quiae parva statura, supellex

Parva, volat [〈◊〉] magna per ora liber.

The rest you may see in Hist. & Antiq. Vniv. Oxon. lib. 2. p. 144. a where the Reader is to note that by the errour of the Printer, ’tis said that Joh. Owen died 1623. and not in 1622. as before ’tis told you. As for the generosity of Dr. Williams done to the memory of this little Poet, Richard [•] rach hath an Epigram in his Epigrammatum H [•] catontades du [•] . Lond. 1627. oct. num. 3. But that which I must note of him farther is, that whereas he had made many Epigrams on several People, so but few were made on, or written to, him. Among which few, one was written by Joh. (a)(a) In [〈◊〉] a Etigr. p. 1 [•] 9. Stradling, and another by Joh. Dunbar (b)(b) In c [•] ent. 4. Epigram. Lond. 1616. [〈…〉] a Scot.