Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 03.djvu/110

Bampton attention to the works of Aristotle, and was at last admitted to his doctor's degree in divinity ('supremo theologi titulo donatus fuit'). He is said to have had an acute intellect, but to have been much inclined to 'sophistical tricks.' The names of two treatises by this author have been preserved, respectively entitled 'Octo quæstiones de veritate propositionum' and 'Lecturæ scholasticæ in Theologiâ.' The year 1340 is assigned as the date when he flourished; but he must have been alive some years later than this, if Tanner's entry of the death of John de Bampton, rector of Stavenley in the archdeaconry of Richmond in 1361, refer to the subject of this article ( quoting 'e regist. comiss. Richmond'). There is a tradition to be found in some topographical works that makes him the first lecturer on Aristotle's philosophy in Cambridge University. But there does not seem to be any sufficient authority for this statement, which is probably only based upon a misinterpretation of Leland's words with reference to Bampton's Aristotelian studies.

 BAMPTON, JOHN (d. 1751), founder of the Bampton lectures at Oxford, received his education at Trinity College in that university, where he graduated B.A. in 1709, and M.A. in 1712. Having taken orders, he was, in 1718, collated to the prebend of Minor pars altaris in the cathedral church of Salisbury, which preferment he held till his decease in 1751. In pursuance of his will, eight divinity lecture-sermons are preached on as many Sunday mornings in term between the commencement of the last month in Lent term, and the third week in Act term, upon one of the following subjects: To confirm and establish the christian faith, and to confute all heretics and schismatics; upon the divine authority of the holy scriptures; upon the authority of the writings of the primitive fathers, as to the faith and practice of the primitive church; upon the divinity of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ; upon the divinity of the Holy Ghost; upon the articles of the christian faith as comprehended in the Apostles' and Nicene creeds. The lecturer, who must be at least a M.A. of Oxford or Cambridge, is chosen annually by the heads of colleges on the fourth Tuesday in Easter term. No one can be chosen a second time. Although the founder died in 1751, his bequest did not take effect till 1779, when the first lecturer was chosen.

 BANASTRE, ALARD (fl. 1174), was sheriff of Oxfordshire under Henry II in 1174 and 1176, and in this capacity was appointed, in company with the constable of Oxford, to fix the tallages and assizes on the king's demesnes in that county. He seems likewise to have been empowered to settle the pleas of the crown and the common pleas of the same shire. In 1175, though Alard Banastre was still sheriff, he does not appear to have acted in the capacity of justice errant. Possibly the king was again dissatisfied with the conduct of his sheriffs in judging their own counties; for, while in 1174 the number of counties judged by their own sheriffs bears a very considerable proportion to the whole, in 1176 the whole kingdom seems to have been practically placed under the power of six justices acting in couples. It was probably as a result of the great rebellion of 1174 that Henry II inaugurated this change; but in any case the name of Alard Banastre does not, apparently, occur again as one of the king's justices. The sheriff of Oxfordshire for the four years preceding 1174 was one, Adam Banastre, who, as Foss suggests, may have been the father of Alard Banastre.

 BANASTRE, BANESTER, or BANISTER, GILBERT (d. 1487), poet and musician, probably belonged to the Yorkshire family of that name (cf. Harleian MS. 805, ff. 29-30, and Cal. Patent Rolls, 1467-1477, p. 257), and may have been educated at Bardney Abbey, Lincolnshire, where in later life he held a corrody. He devoted himself to the study of literature and music, and his earliest work was probably composed about 1450. This is extant in British Museum Addit. MS. 12526, the greater part of which consists of a transcript in Banastre's hand of Chaucer's 'Legend of Ladies,' or 'Legend of Good Women;' appended to it in the same hand is an English poem in seven-line stanzas on 'Sismonda,' which in the last stanza Banastre says he wrote at the request of one John Rayner. This poem appears to be the earliest known English version of the legend of Sismonda and Guiscard;' [cf. art. ]; in the 'Cat. of Additonal MSS.' the manuscript is erroneously ascribed to the end of the fourteenth century; a nineteenth-century transcript is in Brit. Mus. Addit. MS. 20775. Another work by 