Born: ABT 1550

Died: ABT 1615

Father: Richard WINGFIELD (Esq.)

Mother: Mary HARDWICK

Reader in greek to Queen Elizabeth, born probably in or soon after 1550, was the third son of Richard Wingfield of Wantisden, Suffolk, by his wife Mary, younger sister of the famous Elizabeth Hardwick. He matriculated as a pensioner of Trinity College, Cambridge, in 1596,

Appears to have been entered as a student of Gray's Inn in 1572, and was elected scholar of Trinity in 1573. He graduated b.a. In 1573-4, was elected fellow of his College in 1576, and commenced m.a. In 1577. Possibly through influence of his uncle Anthony (d. 1593), usher to Queen Elizabeth, he was appointed reader in greek to the Queen. On 16 Mar 1580-1 he was elected public orator at Cambridge, and 1582 he accompanied Peregrine Bertie, lord Willoughby de Eresby, on his embassy to Denmark, but in Oct of the same year he was appointed proctor at Cambridge. On 21 Mar 1588-9 he was granted leave of absence by his university on going a broad in the Queen's service, and on condition that he supplied a deputy public orator; this post he resigned on 25 Sep 1589. On 19 Jan 1592-3 the Archbishop of York wrote to the Earl of Shrewsbury promising to "take care that Anthony Wingfield shall be returned a burgess for one of the towns belonging to the see" (Talbot mms. I, fol. 158), and in the following month he was elected for ripon.

Wingfield's relationship to Bess of Hardwick makes it probable that he was the correspondent of the Earls of Shrewsbury, whose name frequently occurs in the Talbot manuscripts in the College of Arms (cf. Hist. Mss. Comm. 13th rep. App. Ii. 21); and he may have been the Anthony Wingfield who on 25 Jan 1594-5 became joint lessee of the prebends of Sutton, Buckingham, Horton, and Horley, all in Lincoln Cathedral (cal. State papers, dom. 1595-7, p. 5). About the end of Elizabeth's reign, through the influence of the Countess of Shrewsbury or of he stepson, William Cavendish (afterwards first Earl of devonshire, to whom Wingfield was related on his father's side, he was appointed tutor to Cavendish's two son, William (afterwards second Earl of Devonshire) and Charles, the mathematician. About 1608 Thomas Hobbes, the philosopher, succeeded to this position, and Wingfield drops out of notice, though he is mentioned in the "Talbot Papers" in 1611 (lodge, illustrations, iii. 281-2). He probably died about 1615, leaving no issue, and being unmarried, unless he was the Anthony Wingfield who was licensed to marry Anne Bird on 4 Apr 1575 (Chester, London marriage licenses, col. 1489).

Wingfield has latin letters in "Epistolae Academiae" (ii. 468 sqq.), latin verses in the University collection on the death of Sir Phillip Sidney, and epigram on "the peer content", which has often been printed (lodge, illustrations, iii. 176).

It is almost impossible to distinguish the scholar with certainty from his uncle, two first cousins, two nephews, and several second cousins (one of whom was created a baronet in 1627 and died in 1638), all of them named Anthony, and it is possible that the member of Ripon was Sir Anthony Wingfield (d. 1605), who had previously sat for Oxford in 1572, Dunwich in 1584 and 1586, and Suffolk in 1588 (official return, i. 411, 415, 420, 425; cf. D'ewes, journal, p. 432; he was sheriff of suffolk in 1567-8).

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