John Frith

John Frith (1503 – 4 July 1533) was an English Protestant priest, writer, and martyr.

Frith was an important contributor to the Christian debate on persecution and toleration in favour of the principle of religious toleration. He was 'perhaps the first to echo in England' of that 'more liberal tradition' of 'Zwingli, Melanchthon and Bucer'.

John Frith (John Fryth) was born in 1503 in Westerham, Kent, England to Richard Frith the innkeeper of White Horse Inn (now known as Church Gate House.) The house still stands at the gates of the Westerham Parish Church of St Mary the Virgin. His name is recorded in the baptism registry of St Mary's Church in 1503. Though much of the church has been renovated several times over the centuries, the original 14th-century font in which Frith was baptised is still used today. The John Fryth Room was added in the 1960s as a meeting room and there is a stone commemorative plaque in the church surrounds. The extended church choir are known as The John Fryth Singers.

He went to Sevenoaks Grammar School. He was further educated at Eton College before being admitted as a scholar to Queens' College, Cambridge, although he received his Bachelor of Arts degree as a member of King's. While Frith was at Cambridge, his tutor was Stephen Gardiner, who would later take part in condemning him to death. He became proficient in Latin, Greek, and Mathematics.

He also met Thomas Bilney a graduate student of Trinity Hall, and began to have meetings concerning the Protestant Reformation. It may have been at one of these meetings that Frith met with William Tyndale. After graduating in 1525, Frith became a junior canon at Thomas Wolsey's Cardinal College, Oxford. While in Oxford, Frith was imprisoned, along with nine others, in a cellar where fish was stored, due to his possession of what the University's officers considered "heretical" books. Frith was released and fled England, joining Tyndale who was then residing in Antwerp.

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