Henry Brinklow

Henry Brinklow, also Brynklow or Brinkelow, (d. 1545 or 1546), was an English polemicist. As he worked for a number of years under the pseudonym Roderyck, or Roderigo, Mors, he may also be referred to by this name in contemporaneous accounts.

Henry Brinklow was the ninth child of Sibyl (or Isabell) Butler, and her husband, Robert Brinklow, a farmer in Kintbury, Berkshire. Both parents died shortly before Henry, Sibyl ca. 1545, and Robert in 1543.

Brinklow lived most of his life in London, where he could observe many of the political changes in England. He became a mercer – at that time probably meaning a merchant in cloth and similar commodities. This career brought him into company with Evangelical Christians, such as the Mercers' Company chaplain and reformer Richard Harris, and was to influence his favour for evangelical reform.

Brinklow claimed to have been a Franciscan friar. If so, then at some point he left the order and married. He claimed to have been for a time exiled from England for his outspoken criticism of the bishops.

If Brinklow wrote before 1542, it was not published. It was only at this time that the work of 'Roderyck Mors' began to be dissipated in England.

Brinklow died on or shortly before 20 January 1546. At death he was worth at least £350, and bequeathed £109 13s. 4d. This included £5 to the godly learned men … that wt goddes worde doo fight ayenst Antechrist and his membres, and £9 to the remission of debt. He also left a widow, Margery (d. 1557), and a son, John. His will, of 20 June 1545, was as vigorous as much of his writing, demanding a funeral without pomp or ceremony, and that his wife not wear mourning.

Throughout his life, Brinklow was never publicly associated with the writings of Roderick Mors. It was not until the 1550s that it was revealed, by the churchman and controversialist John Bale, that Mors was Brinklow's pseudonym. The pseudonym was carefully protected; Brinklow had all his work printed abroad. Bishop Stephen Gardiner suspected that Mors was a pseudonym, but that it was the creation of George Joye.

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