Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 21.djvu/248

 transita B. Virginis et gestis discipulorum’ (Otia, i. 928, 968, 976). For a long time he was believed to be the author of the ‘Dialogus de Scaccario’ and the lost ‘Tricolumnus.’ Madox first showed this was impossible. Two books attributed to him by Bale, ‘De Mundi descriptione’ and ‘De Mirabilibus Orbis,’ are parts of the ‘Otia,’ and a third, the ‘Galfridi Munmuthensis Illustrationes,’ was probably a compendium from Geoffrey's work. There is a manuscript of the ‘Otia Imperialia’ in Cotton MS. Vespasian, E. iv., and others in the National Library in Paris. Portions of it were printed in Duchesne's ‘Historiæ Francorum Scriptores,’ iii. 363–379, Paris, 1641, fol., and separately by J. J. Mader, Helmstadt, 1673, 4to. Large portions, though, according to Mr. Stevenson, not the whole, were published by G. G. Leibnitz in his ‘Scriptores Rerum Brunsvicensium,’ i. 884–1004; with emendations and additions, ii. 751–84; Hanover, 1707–10. The third part was edited with notes by F. Leibrecht, Hanover, 1856, 8vo, and extracts are given by Stevenson in his edition of Ralph of Coggeshall, Rolls Series.

 GETHIN, GRACE, (1676–1697), learned lady, daughter of Sir George Norton of Abbot's Leigh, Somersetshire, was born in 1676, married Sir Richard Gethin, baronet, of Gethin Grott, Ireland, and died on 11 Oct. 1697. She was buried at Hollingbourn, Kent, and a monument was erected to her in Westminster Abbey. A sermon was founded to be preached in the abbey upon Ash Wednesday in memory of her. A collection of papers found after her death was published in 1699 as ‘Reliquiæ Gethinianæ;’ a second edition appeared in 1700, and a third, to which a portrait was prefixed, in 1703. The last includes a copy of verses by Congreve, and to it is appended a funeral sermon by Peter Birch [q. v.], published separately in 1700. The book is more creditable to the taste than to the knowledge of her executors. Many passages are from Bacon's ‘Essays,’ copied in her commonplace book and mistaken for her original composition by several of her biographers.

 GETHING, RICHARD (1585?–1652?), calligrapher, a native of Herefordshire, and a scholar of John Davies [q. v.], the famous writing-master of Hereford, was thought to surpass his master in every branch of his art. Coming to London, he started in business at the ‘Hand and Pen’ in Fetter Lane. In 1616 he published a copy-book of various hands in twenty-six plates, oblong 4to, which are very well executed. In 1645 he brought out his ‘Chirographia,’ consisting of thirty-seven plates engraved by Goddart. In it Gething says ‘he has exactly traced and followed certain pieces, both in character and language, of the ablest calligraphotechnists and Italian masters that ever wrote, with certain pieces of cursory hands, not heretofore extant, newly come in use.’ Another edition of the ‘Chirographia,’ probably published after his death, is entitled ‘Gething Redivivus, or the Pen's Master-Piece. Being the last work of that eminent and accomplished master in this art, containing exemplars of all curious hands written,’ London, 1664, oblong 8vo. Prefixed is his portrait engraved by J. Chantry. In 1652 he published ‘Calligraphotechnia, or the art of faire writing set forth and newly enlarged.’ It contains thirty-six folio plates, and his portrait inscribed ‘Richardus Gethinge, Herefordiensis, æt. 32.’ This work is probably an enlargement of his first book, as some of the plates are dated 1615 and 1616. Moreover there is a dedication to his ‘very good master, Sir Francis Bacon, knight,’ afterwards the lord chancellor.

Massey considers that ‘on account of his early productions from the rolling press, he may stand in comparison with Bales, Davies, and Billingsley, those heads and fathers, as I may call them, of our English calligraphic tribe;’ and Fuller, speaking of Davies and Gething, quaintly remarks: ‘Sure I am, when two such Transcendant Pen-Masters shall again come to be born in the same shire, they may even serve fairly to engross the Will and Testament of the expiring Universe.’

 GETSIUS, JOHN DANIEL (1592–1672), divine and tutor, born at Odernheim in the Palatinate in 1592, was a descendant of the ancient family of the barons of Goetz, 