John Aylmer (English constitutionalist)
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The Right Reverend John Aylmer |
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| Bishop of London | |
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| Church | Church of England |
| Province | Canterbury |
| Diocese | London |
| Elected | 12 March 1577 |
| Term ended | 3 June 1594 |
| Predecessor | Edwin Sandys |
| Successor | Richard Fletcher |
| Orders | |
| Consecration | 24 March 1577 |
| Personal details | |
| Born | 1521 Tivetshall St Margaret, Norfolk |
| Died | 3 June 1594 (aged c. 73) Fulham Palace, London |
| Buried | St Paul's Cathedral, London |
| Nationality | English |
| Denomination | Anglican |
| Previous post |
Archdeacon of Lincoln 1562–1577 Archdeacon of Stow 1553–1554 & 1559–1562 |
| Alma mater | Queens' College, Cambridge |
John Aylmer (Ælmer or Elmer; 1521 – 3 June 1594) was an English bishop, constitutionalist and a Greek scholar.
He was born at Aylmer Hall, Tilney St. Lawrence, Norfolk. While still a boy, his precocity was noticed by Henry Grey, 3rd Marquess of Dorset, later 1st Duke of Suffolk, who sent him to Cambridge, where he seems to have become a fellow of Queens' College. About 1541 he was made chaplain to the duke, and tutor of Greek to his daughter, Lady Jane Grey.
His first preferment was to the archdeaconry of Stow, in the diocese of Lincoln, but his opposition in Convocation to the doctrine of transubstantiation led to his deprivation and to his flight into Switzerland. While there he wrote a reply to John Knox's famous Blast against the Monstrous Regiment of Women, under the title of An Harborowe for Faithfull and Trewe Subjects, etc., and assisted John Foxe in translating the Acts of the Martyrs into Latin. On the accession of Elizabeth he returned to England. "God is English", Aylmer proclaimed in 1558, attempting to fill his parishioners with piety and patriotism. In 1559 he resumed the Stow archdeaconry, and in 1562 he obtained that of Lincoln. He was a member of the convocation of 1563, which reformed and settled the doctrine and discipline of the Church of England.
In 1577 he was consecrated Bishop of London, and while in that position made himself notorious by his harsh treatment of all who differed from him on ecclesiastical questions, whether Puritan or Roman Catholic. Various efforts were made to remove him to another see. He is frequently assailed in the famous Marprelate Tracts, and is characterized as "Morrell," the bad shepherd, in Edmund Spenser's Shepheard's Calendar (July). His reputation as a scholar hardly balances his inadequacy as a bishop in the transitional time in which he lived. His Life was written by John Strype (1701).
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