Aaron Thompson (1681 or 1682 – 27 July 1751)

Parentage

Aaron Thompson was born, apparently in 1681 or 1682, ^{[1] [2]} the youngest son of George Thompson, owner of the estate of Farmanby, north east of Penrith in Cumberland. George Thompson came from a Cavalier and therefore presumably Church of England family, but his wife Jane, daughter of William Jameson of Parkhead, Kirkoswald, from a Presbyterian one; both were excommunicated for recusancy in 1666, though George seems to have returned to the Church of England. ^[3]

Career

George Thompson died while Aaron was still a child, leaving him £100 in his will, ^[4] but when Aaron entered Queen's College Oxford on 27 January 1700 and matriculated on 2 July 1700 ^[5] he was entered in the university records as a pauper puer, "poor boy". ^[6]

"...entered Queen's College Oxford on 27 January 1700; university records say that he matriculated at the university on 2 July of that year, at the age of eighteen. He took his BA in 1705 and appears to have then left the college. At some point, Thompson became a domestic chaplain to Richard Boyle, the third earl of Burlington; and was appointed to the living of Broad Chalke, Wiltshire, in 1724." https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=RmTlAgAAQBAJ&pg=PA145&dq=%22aaron+thompson%22&hl=en&newbks=1&newbks_redir=0&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwiR-JStzPyGAxXLXUEAHSRaAt04FBDoAXoECAsQAg#v=onepage&q=%22aaron%20thompson%22&f=false p. 145

Marriage in 1734. https://www.opcdorset.org/LittonCheneyFiles/LittonCheneyMarsPH1614-1812.htm, https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=H61CAAAAYAAJ&q=aaron+thompson+jane+ryman&dq=aaron+thompson+jane+ryman&hl=en&newbks=1&newbks_redir=0&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwjrpp_q0v6GAxXuWEEAHQskDzQQ6AF6BAgIEAI

Death 27th July 1751. https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=rwsoAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA381#v=onepage&q&f=false

Buried at Broad Chalk 1st August 1751. https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=LeEFEQAAQBAJ&pg=PA59#v=onepage&q&f=false

Obituary. Email 30th June, https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=yYO8-OUGyJ0C&pg=PA161#v=onepage&q&f=false

Work

Pope (110) p. 193

Cambridge p. 107

Arthurian p. 451

Geoffrey pp. 31-34

Jones pp. 384-386

Brutus's historicity. https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=c3L6EAAAQBAJ&pg=PA21

First translation into Modern English. https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=GPb7EAAAQBAJ&pg=PA218

An unusually large number of the subscribers to Thompson's History were women, probably unable to read Latin, and it has been argued that his translation exercised a large influence on female writers' understanding of the Arthurian legend for the next century and more, from Clara Reeve to Caroline Norton. https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=grJCDwAAQBAJ&pg=PA118&dq=%22aaron+thompson+published+the+british%22&hl=en&newbks=1&newbks_redir=0&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwiqmImikv-GAxUhVEEAHRKMC0YQ6AF6BAgJEAI#v=onepage&q=%22aaron%20thompson%20published%20the%20british%22&f=false

"While Thompson suggests that there was some demand for his translation, writing that friends requested that he should undertake it, the work was greeted with a degree of bewilderment by the eminent English antiquarian Thomas Hearne, who noted, shortly after its appearance, 'One Aaron Thompson, formerly of Queen's College, hath put out Jeffry of Monmouth in English. For which there was no occasion, Jeffery being already in English in our Chronicles. He hath prefix'd a large Preface, in which there is no great Matter, but what had been observ'd before'. There is perhaps an element of competition in Hearne's attitude, as he notes that Thompson's preface disputes Hearne's own dating of Alfred of Beverley: Hearne thus had some interest in dismissing Thompson as 'but a Dabbler'. But Hearne was famous, and Thompson unknown, and in any case Hearne, like most eighteenth-century historians, had little time for Geoffrey." https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=RmTlAgAAQBAJ&pg=PA145&dq=%22aaron+thompson%22&hl=en&newbks=1&newbks_redir=0&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwiR-JStzPyGAxXLXUEAHSRaAt04FBDoAXoECAsQAg#v=onepage&q=%22aaron%20thompson%22&f=false p. 145 AND SEE Notebook p. 114

Citations

References

External links

https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=7zsJAAAAQAAJ&printsec=frontcover#v=onepage&q&f=false

https://archive.org/details/britishhistory00thomgoog/page/n5/mode/2up

https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=mdp.39015073762646&seq=5

https://wellcomecollection.org/works/hbmqy6mm/items?canvas=9

Category:1681 births Category:1682 births Category:1751 deaths Category:18th-century Church of England clergy Category:18th-century English translators Category:Alumni of the Queen's College, Oxford Category:Church of England priests Category:Clergy from Cumbria Category:Clergy from Wiltshire Category:Geoffrey of Monmouth Category:Latin–English translators Category:People from Eden District