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for searching only. CHAPTER XIV
THE WINCHESTER SYSTEM UNDER
QUEEN ELIZABETH
WE HAVE SEEN that the Eton system was derived from that at Winchester and that in the first half of the sixteenth century the two systems were regularly and justly bracketed together. The same bracketing continues in the second half of the century. For instance, in 1560, Dr. William Bill provided detailed statutes for Westminster. At some time after Dr. Gabriel Goodman had succeeded Dr. Bill in 1561, he continued these special statutes, noting that they were, "Very like the Orders used in Eton and Winchester Schools."i As a matter of fact, we shall see that the Westminster curriculum is a slightly adapted copy of that at Eton, which is not surprising, since Dr. Bill had become fellow and provost of Eton in 1559. Similarly, as was to be expected, Dr. Goodman himself modelled upon Westminster when about 1574 he provided a curriculum for a grammar school which he had founded at Ruthin in Wales.2 So, to return to the original point, the systems at Winchester and Eton were evidently still in the second half of the sixteenth century notably alike.
A great deal of information concerning Winchester is to be had from a surviving notebook by William Badger, who entered Winchester at the age of ten in 1361, remaining over eight years till admitted to New College April 2, 1569' This volume contains the dictates of the master, Christopher Johnson,' and when Johnson was absent at election time in some years those of Miller, the usher, from the time Badger entered the fourth form after Michaelmas, 1563, for a little more than three and one-half years.5 It will be remembered that we have heard of these dictates by the master in various systems. They are naturally colored by the work of the form, and at times make direct reference to some author or process which is being studied. They also give a wealth of information concerning the
Strype, Annals (1725), Vol. II, Appendix, p. 113.
3 See below, pp. 328 if. i V. C. H., Hampshire, Vol. II, p. 310.
s As one of the boys at Winchester, Johnson made his contribution to a volume of verse dated September 5, 1552, which was presented to King Edward upon a visit to the school (B. M.; Royal MS. 12. A. XXXIII). But Johnson was no longer a contributor when in 1554 the boys presented a collection of verse to Philip and Mary at their marriage (B. M.; Royal MS. I2. A. XX). In the first collection, & s ao ream-Armen, who was later to become the Roman Catholic controversialist, writes his name in Greek characters. But the verse in both collections is in Latin. 6 For the chronology of these exercises, see Appendix IV.
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