John Wordsworth

John Wordsworth (1843–1911) was an English prelate and classical scholar. He was Oriel Professor of the Interpretation of Holy Scripture at the University of Oxford from 1883 to 1885, and Bishop of Salisbury from 1885 to 1911.

He was born at Harrow on the Hill, to the Reverend (later Right Reverend) Christopher Wordsworth, nephew of the poet William Wordsworth. He was born into a clerical family: his father was to become Bishop of Lincoln, his uncle, the Right Reverend Charles Wordsworth, Bishop of Saint Andrews, Dunkeld and Dunblane, and his grandfather, the Reverend Dr Christopher Wordsworth had been Master of Trinity College, Cambridge.

John Wordsworth was a precocious child, the third in a family of seven and the elder of two brothers. His younger brother Christopher (1848–1938) was to become a noted liturgical scholar, and his eldest sister Elizabeth a pioneer of women's higher education. He studied at Winchester College and New College, Oxford, where he was awarded a First in Classical Moderations (1863) and a Second in Greats (1865) (MA 1868). He became an Assistant Master at Wellington College in 1866. In the following year he was elected Craven Scholar and a Fellow of Brasenose College, Oxford and was ordained in the Church of England. He was Select Preacher before the University of Oxford in 1876 and 1888, Grinfield Lecturer on the Septuagint 1876–78, and Bampton Lecturer in 1881. From 1883 until 1885 he held concurrently the positions of Oriel Professor of the Interpretation of Holy Scripture and Fellow of Oriel at Oxford and Canon of Rochester Cathedral. He had already been appointed a Prebendary of Lincoln Cathedral in 1870 and Whitehall Preacher in 1879.