Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 39.djvu/176

 Albemarle; and Devorguila, wife of John Baliol (d. 1269) [q. v.]  MORWEN, MORING, or MORVEN, JOHN (1518?–1561?), divine, born about 1518, was a Devonshire man of a good family (Visitations of Devon, Harl. Soc., p. 193). Going to Oxford, he was placed under a relative, Robert Morwen [q. v.], the president of Corpus Christi College, and under Morwen's influence he adopted reactionary religious views. He was scholar of the college 1535, fellow 1539, graduated B.A. 1538, proceeded M. A. 1543, and B.D. 1552. Becoming a noted Greek scholar, he was appointed reader in that language in his college. Among his pupils was Jewel. Seeing how things went in Edward VI's time, he is said to have studied physic, but this, though confirmed by an entry in the registers, seems at variance with the fact of his graduation in divinity. When Mary came to the throne Morwen became prominent. He was secretary to Bonner, and assisted in the trials of heretics (cf., Acts and Monuments, vi. 721). On Good Friday 1557 he preached at St. Paul's Cross. In 1558 he became a prebendary of St. Paul's, and received the livings of St. Martin's Ludgate, Copford, Asheldam, and Whickam Bishops, all in London diocese. He lost all at Elizabeth's accession, and was put in the Fleet for preaching at Ludgate in favour of the mass. He was released on submission, and perhaps was protected by William Roper, son-in-law to More, whose daughter he taught; but he was again in trouble in 1561 for scattering a libel in Cheshire—that is to say a reply to Pilkington's sermon about the fire at St. Paul's, which Romanists considered as a portent. From this time he disappeared.

Morwen contributed epitaphs in Greek and Latin on Henry and Charles Brandon to the collection issued in 1551, and published a Latin epitaph on Gardiner in 1555 (London, 4to), which Hearne reprinted in his 'Curious Discourses.' Julines Palmer [q. v.], who was burnt in 1556, composed a reply an 'epicedium' to the epitaph on Gardiner, and it was found when his study was searched. Bodleian MS. 439 contains opuscula in Greek and Latin by Morwen. Translations from Greek into Latin of 'The Lives of Artemius and other Saints,' dedicated to Queen Mary, form MS. Reg. 13, B, x, in the British Museum.  MORWEN, MORWENT, or MORWINGE, PETER (1530?–1573?), translator, graduated B.A. from Magdalen College, Oxford, in 1550, and was elected a fellow in 1552. In June next year he supplicated for the degree of M.A., but he was a rigid protestant, and when Bishop Gardiner made a visitation of the university in October 1553, he was expelled from his fellowship. He took refuge in Germany (, Reg. Magdalen College, Oxford, ii. pp. liv, cvi;, Memorials, in. i. 82). On the accession of Elizabeth he returned home, was ordained deacon by Grindal on 25 Jan. 1559-60 (, Grindal, p. 54), and was granted his master's degree at Oxford on 16 Feb. following. He became rector of Langwith, Nottinghamshire, in 1560; of Norbury, Derbyshire, in 1564, and of Ryton, Warwickshire, in 1556. Thomas Bentham [q. v.], bishop of Lichfield, an old college friend, made him his chaplain, and afterwards collated him to the prebend of Pipa Minor in the cathedral of Lichfield on 27 Oct. 1567. A successor was appointed in the prebend on 6 March 1572-3 (, Fasti, i. 618). Morwen probably died a month or two before.

Morwen was a fair scholar and translated into English, apparently from the Hebrew,' Joseph Ben Gorion's 'History of the Jews.' This task Morwen undertook at the entreaty of the printer, Richard Jugge [q. v.], and it must have been mainly accomplished while Morwen was an exile in Germany. The first edition, of which no copy is in the British Museum, was dated 1558, and bore the title 'A compendious and moste marveylous History of the latter Times of the Jewes Commune Weale' (London, b. l. 8vo). Other editions—'newly corrected and amended'—appeared in 1561, 1507, 1575, 1579, 1593, and 1615. All these are in the British Museum. Morwen also rendered into English from the Latin, Conrad Gesner's 'Treasure of Euonymus conteyninge the Wonderfull hid Secretes of Nature touchinge the most apte formes to prepare and destyl medicines,' London, b. l. by John Daye, 1559, 4to. The printer signs an address to the Christian reader, which is dated 2 May 1559, and a few engravings are scattered through the text. A new edition 'A new Booke of Distillation of Waters,