[1] The word is common to the Teutonic languages, cf. Dutch _vos_,
Ger. _Fuchs_; the ultimate origin is unknown, but a connexion has
been suggested with Sanskrit _puccha_, tail. The feminine "vixen"
represents the O. Eng. _fyxen_, due to the change from _o_ to _y_,
and addition of the feminine termination _-en_, cf. O. Eng. _gyden_,
goddess, and Ger. _Füchsin_, vixen. The _v_, for _f_, is common in
southern English pronunciation; vox, for fox, is found in the _Ancren
Riwle_, c. 1230.
FOXE, JOHN (1516-1587), the author of the famous _Book of Martyrs_, was
born at Boston, in Lincolnshire, in 1516. At the age of sixteen he is
said to have entered Brasenose College, Oxford, where he was the pupil
of John Harding or Hawarden, and had for room-mate Alexander Nowell,
afterwards dean of St. Paul's. His authenticated connexion at the
university is, however, with Magdalen College. He took his B.A. degree
in 1537 and his M.A. in 1543. He was lecturer on logic in 1540-1541. He
wrote several Latin plays on Scriptural subjects, of which the best, _De
Christo triumphante_, was repeatedly printed, (London, 1551; Basel,
1556, &c.), and was translated into English by Richard Day, son of the
printer. He became a fellow of Magdalen College in 1539, resigning in
1545. It is said that he refused to conform to the rules for regular
attendance at chapel, and that he protested both against the enforced
celibacy of fellows and the obligation to take holy orders within seven
years of their election. The customary statement that he was expelled
from his fellowship is based on the untrustworthy biography attributed
to his son Samuel Foxe, but the college records state that he resigned
of his own accord and _ex honesta causa_. The letter in which he
protests to President Oglethorpe against the charges of irreverence,
&c., brought against him is printed in Pratt's edition (vol. i.
Appendix, pp. 58-61).
On leaving Oxford he acted as tutor for a short time in the house of the
Lucys of Charlecote, near Stratford-on-Avon, where he married Agnes
Randall. Late in 1547 or early in the next year he went to London. He
found a patron in Mary Fitzroy, duchess of Richmond, and having been
ordained deacon by Ridley in 1550, he settled at Reigate Castle, where
he acted as tutor to the duchess's nephews, the orphan children of Henry
Howard, earl of Surrey. On the accession of Queen Mary, Foxe was
deprived of his tutorship by the boys' grandfather, the duke of Norfolk,
who was now released from prison. He retired to Strassburg, and occupied
himself with a Latin history of the Christian persecutions which he had
begun at the suggestion of Lady Jane Grey. He had assistance from two
clerics of widely differing opinions--from Edmund Grindal, who was
later, as archbishop of Canterbury, to maintain his Puritan convictions
in opposition to Elizabeth; and from John Aylmer, afterwards one of the
bitterest opponents of the Puritan party. This book, dealing chiefly
with Wycliffe and Huss, and coming down to 1500, formed the first
outline of the _Actes and Monuments_. It was printed by Wendelin
Richelius with the title of _Commentarii rerum in ecclesia gestarum_
(Strasburg, 1554). In the year of its publication Foxe removed to
Frankfort, where he found the English colony of Protestant refugees
divided into two camps. He made a vain attempt to frame a compromise
which should be accepted by the extreme Calvinists and by the partisans
of the Anglican doctrine. He removed (1555) to Basel, where he worked as
printer's reader to Johann Herbst or Oporinus. He made steady progress
with his great book as he received reports from England of the
religious persecutions there, and he issued from the press of Oporinus
his pamphlet _Ad inclytos ac praepotentes Angliae proceres ...
supplicatio_ (1557), a plea for toleration addressed to the English
nobility. In 1559 he completed the Latin edition[1] of his martyrology
and returned to England. He lived for some time at Aldgate, London, in
the house of his former pupil, Thomas Howard, now duke of Norfolk, who
retained a sincere regard for his tutor and left him a small pension in
his will. He became associated with John Day the printer, himself once a
Protestant exile. Foxe was ordained priest by Edmund Grindal, bishop of
London, in 1560, and besides much literary work he occasionally preached
at Paul's Cross and other places. His work had rendered great service to
the government, and he might have had high preferment in the Church but
for the Puritan views which he consistently maintained. He held,
however, the prebend of Shipton in Salisbury cathedral, and is said to
have been for a short time rector of Cripplegate.
In 1563 was issued from the press of John Day the first English edition
of the _Actes and Monuments of these latter and perillous Dayes,
touching matters of the Church, wherein are comprehended and described
the great Persecution and horrible Troubles that have been wrought and
practised by the Romishe Prelates, speciallye in this Realme of England
and Scotland, from the yeare of our Lorde a thousande to the time now
present. Gathered and collected according to the true Copies and
Wrytinges certificatorie as well of the Parties themselves that
Suffered, as also out of the Bishop's Registers, which were the Doers
thereof, by John Foxe_, commonly known as the _Book of Martyrs_. Several
gross errors which had appeared in the Latin version, and had been since
exposed, were corrected in this edition. Its popularity was immense and
signal. The Marian persecution was still fresh in men's minds, and the
graphic narrative intensified in its numerous readers the fierce hatred
of Spain and of the Inquisition which was one of the master passions of
the reign. Nor was its influence transient. For generations the popular
conception of Roman Catholicism was derived from its bitter pages. Its
accuracy was immediately attacked by Catholic writers, notably in the
_Dialogi sex_ (1566), nominally from the pen of Alan Cope, but in
reality by Nicholas Harpsfield and by Robert Parsons in _Three
Conversions of England_ (1570). These criticisms induced Foxe to produce
a second corrected edition, _Ecclesiastical History, contayning the
Actes and Monuments of things passed in every kynges tyme_... in 1570, a
copy of which was ordered by Convocation to be placed in every
collegiate church. Foxe based his accounts of the martyrs partly on
authentic documents and reports of the trials, and on statements
received direct from the friends of the sufferers, but he was too hasty
a worker and too violent a partisan to produce anything like a correct
or impartial account of the mass of facts with which he had to deal.
Anthony à Wood says that Foxe "believed and reported all that was told
him, and there is every reason to suppose that he was purposely misled,
and continually deceived by those whose interest it was to bring
discredit on his work," but he admits that the book is a monument of his
industry, his laborious research and his sincere piety. The gross
blunders due to carelessness have often been exposed, and there is no
doubt that Foxe was only too ready to believe evil of the Catholics, and
he cannot always be exonerated from the charge of wilful falsification
of evidence. It should, however, be remembered in his honour that his
advocacy of religious toleration was far in advance of his day. He
pleaded for the despised Dutch Anabaptists, and remonstrated with John
Knox on the rancour of his _First Blast of the Trumpet_. Foxe was one of
the earliest students of Anglo-Saxon, and he and Day published an
edition of the Saxon gospels under the patronage of Archbishop Parker.
He died on the 18th of April 1587 and was buried at St Giles's,
Cripplegate.
A list of his Latin tracts and sermons is given by Wood, and others,
some of which were never printed, appear in Bale. Four editions of the
_Actes and Monuments_ appeared in Foxe's lifetime. The eighth edition
(1641) contains a memoir of Foxe purporting to be by his son Samuel,
the MS. of which is in the British Museum (Lansdowne MS. 388). Samuel
Foxe's authorship is disputed, with much show of reason, by Dr S.R.
Maitland in _On the Memoirs of Foxe ascribed to his Son_ (1841). The
best-known modern edition of the Martyrology is that (1837-1841) by
the Rev. Stephen R. Cattley, with an introductory life by Canon George
Townsend. The numerous inaccuracies of this life and the frequent
errors of Foxe's narrative were exposed by Dr Maitland in a series of
tracts (1837-1842), collected (1841-1842) as _Notes on the
Contributions of the Rev. George Townsend, M.A. ... to the New Edition
of Fox's Martyrology_. The criticism lavished on Cattley and
Townsend's edition led to a new one (1846-1849) under the same
editorship. A new text prepared by the Rev. Josiah Pratt was issued
(1870) in the "Reformation Series" of the _Church Historians of
England_, with a revised version of Townsend's _Life_ and appendices
giving copies of original documents. Later edition by W. Grinton Berry
(1907).
Foxe's papers are preserved in the Harleian and Lansdowne collections
in the British Museum. Extracts from these were edited by J.G. Nichols
for the Camden Society (1859). See also W. Winters, _Biographical
Notes on John Foxe_ (1876); James Gairdner, _History of the English
Church in the Sixteenth Century_.