Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 55.djvu/240

 as extremely lucid, but Edward's only answer was, ‘Since you do not keep the homage you have sworn to me for your baronies, I will in no wise be bound to you’ (, p. 318). Swinfield did not, however, associate himself with the subsequent opposition which finally led Winchelsey into ruin.

With all his tact and pains, Swinfield was involved in constant difficulties within his diocese, which he vigilantly visited, and took much trouble to reform the religious houses. The roll of his expenses incurred during a visitation between Michaelmas 1289 and Michaelmas 1290, drawn up by his chaplain, Richard de Kemeseye, has survived, and was published with copious illustrations by the Rev. John Webb for the Camden Society. It depicts Swinfield's manner of discharging his episcopal functions with a copiousness of detail that is rare in the history of an obscure prelate of the thirteenth century.

Swinfield was a bountiful patron of learning, maintaining poor scholars at his expense at Oxford. He was particularly friendly to the mendicant friars, and in especial to the Franciscans. Among his dependents was Robert of Leicester [see ], who in 1294 dedicated to his patron his first extant work, ‘De compoto Hebreorum aptato ad Kalendarium’ (, Grey Friars in Oxford, pp. 168–9). His gifts and benefactions to the Minorites have induced Mr. Webb to believe that Swinfield was himself a professed Franciscan, but his career and appointments make this highly improbable. He kept the episcopal houses and estates and the extensive fortress of Bishop's Castle in an excellent state of repair. He died at Bosbury on 15 March 1317, and was buried in his cathedral, where a monument in the wall, beneath an arch in the north wall of the eastern transept, marks the spot. He is represented in episcopal habit with mitre and staff, and holding in his hand a model of a turreted edifice, which suggests some special connection with a restoration or enlargement of his cathedral, the early ‘decorated’ portion of which, including the nave-aisles, the north-west transept, the clerestory and vaulting of the choir, the eastern transepts, in one of which his tomb lies, and the upper part of the central tower, may well have been erected during his long episcopate. Mr. Webb gives the two clauses that remain of his testament, in which he left ornaments, books, and vestments to his chapel, and expressed the hope that his large expenditure on his buildings will exonerate his heir from any charge for dilapidations, a request which Adam of Orlton [q. v.], his successor, allowed. He is described as a man of notable goodness and holiness (Flores Hist. iii. 177).

[A Roll of the Household Expenses of Richard de Swinfield, bishop of Hereford, 1289–90, edited with abstract, illustrations, &c., by the Rev. John Webb, includes, besides the roll itself, numerous extracts from Swinfield's Episcopal Register, while Mr. Webb in the introduction has put together almost all that is known of the bishop's biography; a useful summary is in Phillott's Hereford, pp. 84–101; Godwin, De Præsulibus, p. 488 (1743); Acta Sanctorum, tom. i. Oct.; Rishanger, Cotton, Chronicles of Edward I and Edward II., Annales Monastici, Registrum Epistolarum J. Peckham, Flores Historiarum, all in Rolls Ser.; Trivet (Engl. Hist. Soc.); Rymer's Fœdera (Record edit.)] 

SWINFORD, CATHERINE (d. 1403), mistress of John of Gaunt. [See .]

SWINNERTON, THOMAS (d. 1554), protestant divine, son of Robert Swinnerton, came of a Staffordshire family, and was born probably at Swinnerton in that county. He is said to have been educated at Oxford and Cambridge, and perhaps graduated at the latter university, B.A. in 1515 and M.A. in 1519, under the name John Roberts, which he adopted to screen himself from persecution on account of his heretical opinions. Under that name he published in 1534 a rare work, ‘A mustre of scismatyke Bysshoppes of Rome | otherwyse naming themselues popes | moche necessarye to be redde of al the Kynges true Subiectes,’ printed by Wynkyn de Worde for John Byddell, 21 March 1534 (Brit. Museum). The first part, consisting of a prologue, ‘describeth and setteth forth the maners, fassyons, and usages of popes … where in also the popes power is brevely declared, and whether the Worde of God be suffycient to our Saluation or not.’ The second part contains a life of Gregory VII, translated from the Latin of Cardinal Beno; and the third a life of the Emperor Henry IV, who ‘was cruelly imprisoned and deposed by the means of the sayde Gregory.’ These parts seem to have previously been issued separately, and Wood mentions an edition of the ‘Life of Gregory,’ published in 1533, 4to. But these editions do not now seem to be extant. Bale also attributes to Swinnerton two other works, ‘De Papicolarum Susurris’ and ‘De Tropis Scripturarum.’

Subsequently Swinnerton preached at Ipswich and Sandwich, and on Mary's accession in 1553 fled to Emden, probably with John Laski or à Lasco [q. v.], who became pastor there. Swinnerton died and was buried at Emden in 1554.