The Friends of Mr W.m Wiseman, burying his Body in the Fields near London.
[London: Alexander Hogg, 1784.]
Etching. Printed area 125 x 170mm, 5 x 6¾". Trimmed to near title, with added margin or old paper.
Two men lowering a corpse into a grave in fields north of London. On the left are mourners; on the right are two men holding bows, probably Finsbury Archers suggesting the site of the burial is Finsbury Fields. This was an illustration to Hogg's edition of Foxe's 'Book of Martyrs', 1784, listing the Protestant martyrs who were killed for their faith during the reign of the Catholic Queen Mary (1553-1558). The text tells: 'The thirteenth of December, in the Lollards' Tower [in St Paul's Cathedral], died William Wiseman, a clothworker of London, where he was in prison and bonds for the gospel and word of God -- how and whereupon he deceased, it is not fully certain... After the said William was departed (as is said) in the Tower, the holy catholic church-men cast him out into the fields, commanding that no man should bury him; according as their devout manner is to do with all such as die in like sort, whom they account as profane, and worthy of no burial, but to be cast to dogs and birds... And yet all this their merciless commandment notwithstanding, some good Tobits there were, which buried him in the evening, as commonly they did all the rest, thrown out in like sort, whom they were wont privately by night to cover; and many times the archers in the fields standing by, and singing together psalms at their burial'.
[Ref: 26523] £160.00
Etching. Printed area 125 x 170mm, 5 x 6¾". Trimmed to near title, with added margin or old paper.
Two men lowering a corpse into a grave in fields north of London. On the left are mourners; on the right are two men holding bows, probably Finsbury Archers suggesting the site of the burial is Finsbury Fields. This was an illustration to Hogg's edition of Foxe's 'Book of Martyrs', 1784, listing the Protestant martyrs who were killed for their faith during the reign of the Catholic Queen Mary (1553-1558). The text tells: 'The thirteenth of December, in the Lollards' Tower [in St Paul's Cathedral], died William Wiseman, a clothworker of London, where he was in prison and bonds for the gospel and word of God -- how and whereupon he deceased, it is not fully certain... After the said William was departed (as is said) in the Tower, the holy catholic church-men cast him out into the fields, commanding that no man should bury him; according as their devout manner is to do with all such as die in like sort, whom they account as profane, and worthy of no burial, but to be cast to dogs and birds... And yet all this their merciless commandment notwithstanding, some good Tobits there were, which buried him in the evening, as commonly they did all the rest, thrown out in like sort, whom they were wont privately by night to cover; and many times the archers in the fields standing by, and singing together psalms at their burial'.
[Ref: 26523] £160.00