Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 59.djvu/127

 

WALLENSIS or, THOMAS (d. 1255), bishop of St. David's, was of Welsh origin. He was a canon of Lincoln in 1235, when he witnessed a charter of Grosseteste's to the hospital of St. John, Leicester (, Leicestershire, ii. 324). He was a regent master in theology at Paris in 1238, when Grosseteste offered him the archdeaconry of Lincoln with a prebend, writing that he prefers his claims above all others although he is still young (, Letters, p. li). In 1243 he took an active part in the dispute which arose between Grosseteste and the abbot of Bardney. Matthew Paris ascribes the origin of the suit against the abbot to the archdeacon (Chron. Maj. iv. 246). He was elected to the poor bishopric of St. David's on 16 July 1247, and accepted it at Grosseteste's urging, and out of love for his native land. He was consecrated on 26 July 1248 at Canterbury. He was present at the parliament in London, Easter 1253, and joined in excommunicating all violators of Magna Carta. He died on 11 July 1255.



WALLENSIS, THOMAS (d. 1310), cardinal. [See .]

WALLENSIS or WALEYS, THOMAS (d. 1350?), Dominican, presumably a Welshman, was educated at Oxford and Paris, and took the degree of master of theology. On 4 Jan. 1333 he asserted before the cardinals at Avignon the doctrine of the saints' immediate vision of God, against which John XXII had recently pronounced. He was charged with heresy on 9 Jan. before William de Monte Rotundo, on the evidence of Walter of Chatton, both Franciscans. He was sent to the inquisitors' prison by 14 Feb., and about 22 Oct. was moved to the prison of the papal lodging, where he was confined in all about seventeen months. A long correspondence took place between the pope and Philip VI and the university of Paris on the subject of his trial. He was ultimately released through French influence, and the pope accepted the doctrine of the immediate vision. There is a full account of the trial in the University Library, Cambridge, Ii. ill. 10, which contains a copy of Thomas's sermon. In the ‘Calendar of Papal Petitions’ (ed. Bliss, i. 146) he describes himself in 1349 as old, paralysed, and destitute. His petition on behalf of his one friend, Lambert of Poulsholt, who will provide him with necessaries, for the parish church of Bishopton, Wiltshire, was granted.

The following is a list of the works written by or attributed to him: The epistle or tractate ‘De Instantibus et Momentis’ (Ii. iii. ff. 40–8) and ‘Responsiones’ to certain articles objected against him. His ‘De Modo Componendi Sermones,’ or ‘De Arte Predicandi,’ of which there are many manuscripts, is addressed to Theobald de Ursinis, or Cursinis, bishop of Palermo, 1338–50. His ‘Campus Florum,’ beginning ‘Fulcite me floribus,’ consisting of short tracts from the fathers and canonists, alphabetically arranged, was sent by him to Theobald for correction. There is a copy at Peterhouse, No. 86. Leland ascribes to him a work of the same name, an English-Latin dictionary, which he saw at the Oxford public library, beginning ‘Disciplina deditus apud Miram vallem.’ There was probably a copy of the same, called ‘Campeflour,’ at Syon monastery, and Bale knew of one at Magdalen College, Oxford, now lost. The ‘Promptorium Parvulorum’ (ed. Way) contains frequent references to this lost work. Commentaries on the Books of the Old Testament, Exodus to Ruth, with Isaiah. Leland gives the incipits of those which he saw at Wardon Abbey, Bedfordshire (Collect. iii. 12), and they are found in the Merton College MS. 196. A closely similar set of commentaries is ascribed to or Waleys [q. v.] Bale also ascribes to Thomas ‘De Natura Bestiarum,’ a table of beasts or book of the natures of animals, which precedes the ‘Commentaries’ in the Merton manuscript. Quétif gives reasons for assigning to Waleys a Commentary on the first thirty-eight Psalms printed at Venice, 1611, as the work of [q. v.] (a Dominican who is also called Thomas Anglicus and Thomas Wallensis); Quétif also assigns to him ‘Super duos Nocturnos Psalmos,’ which Quétif saw dated 1346 in a Belgian manuscript. The commentary on the ‘De Civitate Dei,’ printed as the joint work of Trivet and Thomas Anglicus (i.e. Jorz) at Toulouse, 1488, and elsewhere, is probably by Waleys and not by Jorz. Oudin (vol. iii. col. 687) ascribes to him ‘Adversus Iconoclastes, de formis Veterum Deorum,’ and ‘Tractatus de Figuris Deorum,’ in the Paris MS. 5224. The ‘Super Boethium de Consolatione Philosophie’ and the ‘De Concep-