and an enlarged view of things,’ large 4to. Among other absurdities King attempted to prove that John the Baptist was an angel from heaven, and the same who formerly appeared in the person of Elijah. The work on its first appearance was severely criticised by Richard Gough [q. v.] in the ‘Gentleman's Magazine’ (vol. lviii. pt. i. pp. 141–5). A notice of the book in Mathias's ‘Pursuits of Literature’ created some demand for it, and a second edition, to which was added a ‘supplemental part designed to show, still more fully, the perfect consistency of philosophical discoveries, and of historical facts, with the revealed Will of God,’ was published in 1800 (3 vols. folio), and also a second part of the quarto edition (Literary Memoirs of Living Authors, i. 338). In 1793 King published ‘An Imitation of the Prayer of Abel,’ and during the same year ‘Considerations on the Utility of the National Debt: and on the Present Alarming Crisis; with a Short Plan of a Mode of Relief,’ 8vo. In 1796 he wrote some whimsical ‘Remarks concerning Stones said to have fallen from the clouds, both in these days and in antient times,’ 8vo, occasioned by a supposed shower of stones in Tuscany on 16 June of that year. King's next treatise, called ‘Vestiges of Oxford Castle; or, a small fragment of a work intended to be published speedily on the History of Ancient Castles,’ &c., fol., London, 1796, was followed by his great work entitled ‘Munimenta Antiqua; or, Observations on ancient Castles, including remarks on the … progress of Architecture … in Great Britain, and on the … changes in … Laws and Customs’ (with Appendix), 4 vols. fol. London, 1799–1806. The book is full of foolish theories, misplaced learning, and blunders, but the importance of its plans and details, despite inaccuracies, is generally recognised by antiquaries. Louis Dutens having taken exception to King's theories on the invention of the arch in ‘Recherches sur le tems le plus reculé de l'usage des voûtes chez les anciens,’ 4to, 1805, King anticipated his fourth volume by publishing during the same year an ‘Introduction’ of twenty-one pages, in which he vigorously defended his views. Dutens continued the controversy in three more tracts, to which King replied in an ‘Appendix’ to ‘Munimenta Antiqua’ issued in 1806. In 1798 King wrote another extraordinary pamphlet called ‘Remarks on the Signs of the Times,’ 4to, in which he demonstrated the genuineness of the second book of Esdras. Irritated by Gough's critique on this tract in the ‘Gentleman's Magazine’ (vol. lxviii. pt. ii. pp. 591–3), he wrote a violent letter to the printer, John Nichols. King added a ‘Supplement’ to his ‘Remarks’ in 1799, but this was demolished by Bishop Horsley in ‘Critical Disquisitions on the Eighteenth Chapter of Isaiah, in a letter to E. King,’ 4to, 1799 (Gent. Mag. vol. lxix. pt. ii. pp. 496–503). In 1803 King published anonymously ‘Honest Apprehensions; or, the unbiassed … Confession of Faith of a plain honest Lay-man,’ 8vo. It is strictly orthodox. King died on 16 April 1807, aged 72, and was buried in the churchyard at Beckenham, Kent, where was his country seat, ‘The Oakery,’ on Clay Hill. He had read much, was exceedingly tenacious of his opinions, and would contend with as much zeal for the genuineness of the correspondence between St. Paul and Seneca and of the apocryphal writings as for the canonical books. His collections of prints and drawings were sold by auction in 1808.
[Chalmers's Biog. Dict.]
KING, EDWARD, Viscount Kingsborough (1795–1837), born on 16 Nov. 1795, was eldest son of George, third earl of Kingston, by Lady Helena Moore, only daughter of Stephen, first earl of Mountcashell (Burke, Peerage, 1891, p. 789). After his father succeeded to the earldom in 1799 he was known by the courtesy title of Viscount Kingsborough. He matriculated at Oxford from Exeter College on 25 June 1814, and in Michaelmas term 1818 gained a second class in classics, but did not graduate (Foster, Alumni Oxon. 1715–1886, ii. 794). In 1818 and again in 1820 he was elected M.P. for Cork county, but resigned his seat in 1826 in favour of his younger brother Robert (Lists of Members of Parliament, pt. ii.).
The sight of a Mexican manuscript in the Bodleian Library determined King to devote his life to the study of the antiquities of that country. He promoted and edited, with copious notes, a magnificent work entitled ‘Antiquities of Mexico, comprising facsimiles of Ancient Mexican Paintings and Hieroglyphics preserved in … various Libraries, together with the Monuments of New Spain, by M. Dupaix, with … accompanying Descriptions. The whole illustrated by many valuable Manuscripts by Augustine Aglio,’ 9 vols. imperial fol., London, 1830–48, including sixty pages of a projected tenth volume. Four copies were printed on vellum, with the plates coloured. It is said that the work was undertaken by the encouragement and with the advice of Sir Thomas Phillipps, in whose collection many of the manuscripts and drawings used in it were preserved (Macray, Annals of the Bodleian Library, 2nd edition, p. 322). The drift of King's speculations is to establish the colonisation
