Robert Cawdrey

Robert Cawdrey did not attend university, but became a school teacher in Oakham, Rutland, in 1563. In 1565, Cawdrey was ordained deacon and priest in 1570, and, on 22 October 1571, he was made rector of South Luffenham in Rutland. However, Cawdrey was sympathetic to Puritan teachings, and got in trouble with the Church authorities. In 1576, he was chastised for not reading the approved texts in his sermons, and in 1578 he performed a marriage even though he was not authorized to do so, and was briefly suspended. His suspension lasted only a few months but, in 1586, he was again in trouble for violating the rules and was called before his bishop, Richard Howland. He had powerful friends, among them his patron Lord Burghley, who tried to defend him, but he was deprived of his rectory in 1588 and had to return to teaching to support himself. ==Writing==

With the assistance of his son Thomas Cawdrey (1575–1640), who was a school teacher in London, Robert Cawdrey decided to create an instructional text; the Table Alphabeticall, which appeared in 1604 when Cawdrey was living in Coventry. As many new words were entering the English language in the 16th century, Cawdrey became concerned that people would become confused. Cawdrey worried that the wealthy were adopting foreign words and phrases, and wrote that "they forget altogether their mothers language, so that if some of their mothers were alive, they were not able to tell or understand what they say." He also described how "far journied gentlemen" learn new words while in foreign lands, and then "pouder their talke with over-sea language." This quote actually appears to be originally from The "Virtue of Simplicity" by Thomas Wilson in "The Arte of Rhetorike", though Cawdrey was a contemporary of Wilson, this quote did not originate from Cawdry and it has been misattributed to him in several papers. Thomas Cawdrey worked on improvements to the Table Alphabeticall. While he was a rector, Robert Cawdrey wrote his Short and Fruitful Treatise of the Profit and Necessity of Catechisms in 1580; he revised this work and published a second edition in 1601. Cawdrey also published A Treasurie or Store-House of Similes in 1600, and again in 1609. ==A Table Alphabeticall==

The full name of his famous dictionary is His dictionary contained about 2,500 words. He was careful to explain the alphabetical order to his readers, which even the most literate of his readers would not know or expect; "Nowe if the word, which thou art desirous to finde, begin with (a) then looke in the beginning of this Table, but if with (v) looke towards the end." Cawdrey dedicated the Table Alphabeticall to five daughters of Lucy Sidney, Lady Harington; Sarah, Lady Hastings, Theodosia, Lady Dudley, Elizabeth, Lady Montagu, Frances, Lady Leigh, and Mary, Lady Wingfield. The dictionary was re-published in 2007 by the Bodleian Library with an introduction by John Simpson, chief editor of the second edition of the Oxford English Dictionary. ==Life==

Robert Cawdrey had five sons. His youngest son, Daniel Cawdrey (ca. 1588–1664), was a Puritan minister. ==Works==

• Short and Fruitful Treatise of the Profit and Necessity of Catechisms (first edition, 1580; revised edition, 1601) • A Godlie Forme of Householde Government (first edition, 1598; "gathered by R.C" and "probably" by Cawdrey) • A Treasurie or Storehouse of Similies (first edition, 1600) • A Table Alphabeticall (first edition, 1604) ==References==