Humphrey Prideaux

Humphrey Prideaux (3 May 1648 – 1 November 1724) was a Cornish churchman and orientalist, Dean of Norwich from 1702. His sympathies inclined to Low Churchism in religion and to Whiggism in politics.

Life The third son of Edmond Prideaux, he was born at Padstow, Cornwall, on 3 May 1648. His mother was a daughter of John Moyle. After education at Liskeard grammar school and Bodmin grammar school, he went to Westminster School under Richard Busby, recommended by his uncle William Morice. On 11 December 1668 he matriculated at Christ Church, Oxford, where he had obtained a studentship. He graduated B.A. 22 June 1672, M.A. 29 April 1675, B.D. 15 November 1682, D.D. 8 June 1686. In January 1674, Prideaux recorded in his letters a visit to his home of William Levett; with Levett came Lord Cornbury, son of the Earl of Clarendon, Levett's principal patron. In other letters, Prideaux mentioned alliances with Levett in ongoing church political manoeuvrings. At the university he was known for scholarship; John Fell employed him in 1672 on an edition of Florus. He also worked on Edmund Chilmead's edition of the chronicle of John Malalas. with a polemical tract against the deists. Its scholarship depended in particular on Pococke. The Old and New Testament connected, title page to fifth edition of 1718. The Old and New Testament connected in the History of the Jews and Neighbouring Nations (1715–17) was a significant work, of which many editions were brought out; it drew on James Ussher. though Kepler used the term as early as 1635. It covered the historical interval between the Old and New Testaments, and led to a controversy between Prideaux and his cousin, Walter Moyle. Jean Le Clerc wrote a critical examination of it, which was published in English in 1722. The French translation was by Moses Solanus and Jean-Baptiste Brutel de la Rivière.

He published the following pamphlets: The Validity of the Orders of the Church of England (1688), Letter to a Friend on the Present Convocation (1690), The Case of Clandestine Marriages stated (1691). De Jure Pauperis et Peregrini, &c., Oxford, 1679, (edition of the Hebrew of Maimonides, with a Latin version and notes). A Compendious Introduction for Reading ... Histories, &c., Oxford, 1682. Directions to Churchwardens, &c., Norwich, 1701; 7th edition, 1730. The Original and Right of Tithes, &c., Norwich, 1710; reprinted 1713; 1736. Ecclesiastical Tracts, &c., 1716.

His letters (1674–1722) to John Ellis were edited for the Camden Society in 1875 by Edward Maunde Thompson.

Marriage and children On 16 February 1686 Prideaux married Bridget Bokenham, only child of Anthony Bokenham of Helmingham, Suffolk, and left a son: Edmund Prideaux (1693–1745) of Prideaux Place, Padstow, Cornwall, a lawyer of the Middle Temple and a talented amateur architectural artist.