Arthur Faunt

Laurence Arthur Faunt (1554 – 28 February 1591) was an English Jesuit theologian and missionary to Poland.

Family background

Arthur Faunt was the third son of William Faunt of Foston, Leicestershire, by his second wife, Jane, daughter of George Vincent of Peckleton, and widow of Nicholas Purefoy of Fenny Drayton. The family was Roman Catholic. His nephews included Robert Burton and William Burton.

Life

In 1568, Faunt was sent to Merton College, Oxford, and placed under the tuition of the philosopher John Pott, who previously taught him in Leicestershire. Pott, also a Roman Catholic, removed Faunt from Oxford with the consent of his parents, and at the beginning of 1570 took him to Louvain and placed him in the Jesuit college at the Catholic University.

After graduating B.A. at Louvain, Faunt lived for a time in Paris, and then proceeded to Munich in Germany. William V, Duke of Bavaria chose him as his scholar, and maintained him at the Munich Jesuit College there, where he studied for his Master’s degree. In 1575, he went to the English College at Rome to study divinity. Pope Gregory appointed Faunt to be its first rector, and he left Rome on 10 June 1581. Philippe Alegambe states that he was professor of Greek at Posen for three years, and of moral theology and controversy for nine years.

He was highly esteemed by the spiritual and temporal estates of the Polish nation. A letter sent by him to his brother Anthony, dated at Danzig in 1589, shows that he was sent for at the same time by three different princes.

Death Faunt died on 28 February 1591 at Vilnius, capital of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania (then part of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth).

Works His theological works included: (Posen, 1580) ["Theological assertions of Christ's Church on earth, what are they and who may make them"] (Posen, 1584) (Posen: Joannem Wolrab, 1582) ["Book Three: In which Calvinists, Lutherans, and the rest, who call themselves Evangelicals, are, from arguments and miracles, most clearly proved to be outside the Christian Church, & simultaneously a defense of the same assertion against false accusations contained in the writing of Anthony Sadeel"] (Posen: Joannem Wolrab, 1584) (Posen, 1582) (Posen, 1583) (Posen, 1584) (Posen, 1584) (Posen, 1586) ([Cracow?], 1587); reprinted in 1632, and again in the Opuscula collected by Melchior Stephanidis (Cracow, 1632) (Cologne, 1589) (anon.) (1592) (Posen)