Thomas Bradwardine

Thomas Bradwardine (c. 1290-1349), English archbishop, called "the Profound Doctor," was born either at Hartfield in Sussex or at Chichester.

He was educated at Merton College, Oxford, where he took the degree of doctor of divinity, and acquired the reputation of a profound scholar, a skilful mathematician and an able divine. He was afterwards raised to the high offices of chancellor of the university and professor of divinity.

From being chancellor of the diocese of London, he became chaplain and confessor to Edward III, whom he attended during his wars in France. On his return to England, he was successively appointed prebendary of Lincoln, archdeacon of Lincoln (1347), and in 1349 archbishop of Canterbury. He died of the plague at Lambeth[?] on August 26 1349, forty days after his consecration.

Chaucer in his Nun's Priest's Tale ranks Bradwardine with St Augustine. His great work is a treatise against the Pelagians[?], entitled De causa Dei contra Pelagium et de virtute causarum, edited by Sir Henry Savile (London, 1618). He wrote also De Geometria speculativa (Paris, 5530); De A rithmetica practica (Paris, 1502); De Proportionibus (Paris, ‘495; Venice, 1505); De Quadratura Circuli (Paris, 1495); and an Ars Memorative, Sloane manuscripts. No. 3974 in the British Museum.

See Quétif-Echard, Script. Praedic. (1719), i. 744; WF Hook, Lives of the Archbishops of Canterbury, vol. iv.