seizure, and was buried in the cathedral. His widow erected a monument over his tomb with a Latin inscription, under a bust of the composer surmounted by his arms. He is said in it to have died ‘accito ictuque heu Sanguinis Crudo.’ There was at the time some suspicion that Gibbons had died of the plague, and the tradition that small-pox was the cause seems to have been early circulated. It is actually inserted in all the translations of the inscription, and has been accepted by all musical historians as a satisfactory equivalent of the Latin words; but fortunately in November 1885 Mr. W. Barclay Squire communicated to the ‘Athenæum’ (No. 3029) a letter discovered by him among the State Papers from Sir Albertus Morton to his fellow secretary of state, Lord Edward Conway, and it is endorsed ‘June 6, 1625. Mr. Secretarie Morton Touchinge the musitian that dyed at Canterburie and suggested to have the plague.’ The writer encloses a medical certificate of death signed by Drs. Poe and Domingo, stating that his sickness was at first ‘lethargicall,’ that subsequently convulsions came on, and he ‘then grew apoplecticall and so died.’ His widow, Elizabeth, was the daughter of John Patten of Westminster, yeoman of the vestry of the Royal Chapel. Between 1607 and 1623 she bore him seven children, of whom one only, Christopher [q. v.], attained distinction in music. She outlived him only by a year, her will being proved 30 July 1626. A portrait of the composer by an unknown artist is in the Music School at Oxford. It is a copy from a lost original once in the possession of a Mrs. Fussell.
[Authorities and documents quoted above; Grove's Dict. i. 594, iv. 310, 312, 313, 647; Hawkins's Hist. pp. 572–3; Chester's Westminster Abbey Registers, p. 190; Cooper's Annals of the University and Town of Cambridge, iii. 176; Ouseley's Preface to complete Sacred Works of Gibbons, 1873; Old Cheque Book of the Chapel Royal; Catalogues of Christ Church and Music School Libraries, Oxford, and Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge; Wood's Fasti, i. 406 n.; Brit. Mus. Addit. MSS. 17840, 17841, 17792–6, 29289, 29366–8, 29372–7, 29430, 30933, 31281, 31403–5, 31415, 31443, 31460, 31462, &c.; Wither's Hymns and Songs of the Church, reprint of 1856 (the British Museum copy of the 1623 edition wants the dedication, in which Gibbons's name appears); Athenæum, No. 3029; Mus. Ant. Soc. reprint of Gibbons's Madrigals and Fantasies, pref. &c. Musical Society, No. 1, 1886; Dart's Hist. of Canterbury, pp. 51, 52.]
GIBBONS, RICHARD (1550?–1632), jesuit, younger brother of Father John Gibbons [q. v.], was born at Winchester about 1550, and, after making his lower studies in England, went through a two years' course of philosophy at Louvain and in the German College at Rome. He entered the Society of Jesus on 1 Sept. 1572. He again studied philosophy for three years, and was professor of mathematics and philosophy for thirteen years, partly in Rome and partly in France. He was also a professor of canon law and Hebrew for some time in Italy, Spain, and Portugal, besides holding a like office at Tournay, Toulouse, Douay, and Louvain, where he was also prefect of studies. For a while he was preacher in the jesuit college at St. Omer. He was professed of the four vows in the college of Coimbra in Portugal in 1591. His latter years were spent at Douay, where he was occupied in printing ancient manuscripts, and in translating, editing, and annotating various learned works. He died at Douay on 11 June (O.S.) 1632.
He published:
- ‘A Spiritual Doctrine, conteining a Rule to Live Wel, with divers Praiers and Meditations,’ from the Spanish of Luis de Granada, Louvain, 1599, 12mo, dedicated to Sir William Stanley, ‘coronel’ of the English regiment.
- ‘Francisci Toleti … Cardinalis de Instructione Sacerdotum et peccatis mortalibus libri VIII. Quibus accessit … Martini Fornarii de Ordine Tractatus,’ edited by Gibbons, Douay, 1608, 8vo.
- ‘Meditations uppon the Mysteries of our Holy Faith, with the Practise of Mental Praier touching the same,’ from the Spanish of Luis de la Puente, 2 parts [Douay?], 1610. John Heigham is credited with a similar translation, St. Omer, 1619, reprinted 1852 (Gillow, Dict. of the English Catholics, iii. 258).
- ‘Joannis Nider … Præceptorium: sive orthodoxa et accurata Decalogi explicatio,’ edited by Gibbons, Douay, 1611, 8vo.
- An edition of the ‘Sermones funebres’ of Joannes de Sancto Germiniano, 8vo; Douay, 1611, 12mo; Antwerp, 1611 and 1630, 8vo.
- ‘Francisci Riberæ … in librum duodecim Prophetarum commentarii … ab infinitis mendis typographicis expurgati, et ubique dictionibus Hebraicis et Chaldaicis in Latinam prolationem permutatis lucidati,’ Douay, 1612, fol.
- ‘Ludovici de Ponte Meditationum de Vita et Passione Christi libri II. ex Hispanico in Latinum versi,’ Cologne, 1612, 12mo.
- ‘Divi Amedei … Episcopi Lausaniæ de Maria Virginea Matre Homiliæ,’ St. Omer, 1613, 12mo.
- ‘The First Part of the Meditations of the Passion and Resurrection of Christ our Saviour’ [1614?], 12mo, from the Latin of Father Vincent Bruno.
- ‘Historia admiranda de Jesu Christi stigmatibus ab Alphonso Paleato Archiepisc. Bononiensi explicata,’
