Thomas Ruthall

, or Rowthall, was born in a Market Town in Gloucestershire called Cirencester, in the Church of which place I saw some years since a monument for one John Avenying and his Wife: Which John dying 1401. might probably be (according to time) Grandfather to…..Avenyng, (whom some call Avelyng) Mother to Tho. Ruthall before-mentioned. He was educated for some years in this University, as it evidently appears in one (a)(a) Reg. vel lib. Epistol. Univ. Oxon. FF. Epist. 22. 55. 109. &c. Vide Hist. & Antiq. Univ. Oxon. lib. 2. p. 422. a. or more of our Registers, but in what coll. or hall I know not. Thence, as ’tis said, he went to Cambridge for a time, but when, it doth not appear. Sure it is that one Rothall took the degree of D. of D. in this University, and in the year 1500. was (b)(b) In the Cat. of Chanc. Proct. and of Proceeders at Cambridge, at the end of Matth. Parkers Aniq. Britan. Ecclesiae—Printed in fol. 1572. or 73. incorporated at Cambridge, with Dr. Rich. Mayhew President of Magd. coll. In 1503. he was elected Chancellour of the University of Cambridge, (being then Archdeacon of Gloucester,) and in the beginning of Sept. 1505. he was made Dean of Salisbury, in the place, as it seems, of one Edw. Cheyney, who occurs Dean of that Church in Aug. 1499. About that time, he being esteemed a person of great vertue and prudence, he was made Secretary to K. Hen. 7. who a little before his death nominated him to the See of Durham upon the translation of Bainbridge to York. Soon after K. Hen. 8. succeeding in the Throne, he made him his Secretary for a time, and one of his Privy Council. And being then elected to the said See of Durham, the temporalities thereof were (c)(c) Pat. [•] 1. Hen. 8. p. 2. m. [•] 6. restored to him, 3. July 1. Hen. 8. dom. 1509. Afterwards he was made (d)(d) Pat. 8. Hen. 8: pag. 1: L. Privy Seal, was esteemed a famous Clerk, and admirably well read in both the Laws, being, as ’tis said, Doctor or Professor of them. Towards his latter end he founded a Free School at the place of his nativity, and gave an house and seven pounds per an. for the maintenance of a Master: Which School having for the most part flourished in good sort, hath educated many that have been eminent in Church and State. He paid his last debt to nature at Durham place near London, on Wednesday the fourth of Feb. 1522-23. in fifteen hundred twenty and two, and was buried in the Chappel of S. John Baptist joyning to the Abbey-Church of S. Peter in Westminster; at which time Dr. Rowl. Phillips Vicar of Croydon a great Divine and a renowned Clerk preached an excellent Sermon. Some years after was a fair raised Tomb built over his grave with his Statua thereon mitred and vested, and a small inscription on it, but false as to the year of his death.