ment’ (Cardwell, pref. p. ix; cf. Notes and Queries, 7th ser. xi. 461, xii. 131).
The fall of Cromwell in 1540 put a stop to Taverner's literary activity and endangered his position. On 2 Dec. 1541 he was committed to Gardiner's custody for concealing from the government and communicating to others a report that Anne of Cleves was pregnant by Henry VIII. Three days later he was sent to the Tower, and his wife and mother-in-law were also imprisoned (Acts P. C. ed. Nicolas, vii. 279; State Papers, i. 697–8, 706). He was soon released, retaining his place in the signet office and the rewards his favour at court brought him. On 20 Jan. 1538–9 he had been granted the dissolved priory at Alvingham, Lincolnshire, with the rectories of Alvingham and Cokerington Mary (Letters and Papers, xiv. i. 607). In 1544 he had acquired land and begun building at Wood Eaton, Oxfordshire; in 36 Henry VIII (1544–5) the king gave him the site of the dissolved Franciscan priory at Northampton (Rot. Pat. 36 Henry VIII, f. 24); in the following year he received ‘Nun's acres,’ part of the lands of Stamford Priory, and in 1546 other lands in Horningtoft, Norfolk (Bridges, Northamptonshire, i. 455, ii. 480; Blomefield, Norfolk, ix. 522). In 1545 he was returned to parliament for Liverpool.
Taverner retained his position as clerk of the signet throughout Edward VI's reign. On 28 May 1550 he was paid 333l. 13s. 4d. as wages for soldiers who had served at Boulogne (Acts P. C., ed. Dasent, iii. 38). On 13 May 1552, though a layman, he was licensed to preach, and he is said to have frequently officiated in this capacity before Edward VI (Lit. Remains of Edw. VI, p. 376). On Mary's accession, which Taverner welcomed with ‘An Oration Gratulatory’ (printed by Day, London, n.d.), he lost his place in the signet office, but lived unmolested at his house at Norbiton, Surrey, through the reign. In 1558 he addressed a congratulatory Latin epistle to Elizabeth, who offered to knight him. Taverner declined, but he served as justice of the peace, and in 1569 as high sheriff for Oxfordshire. He signed as a witness the instrument by which Parker signified his assent to his own election as archbishop of Canterbury. While high sheriff of Oxford he preached a sermon at St. Mary's, Oxford (Wood, Athenæ, i. 420; Notes and Queries, 1st ser. xii. 214, 334). He is also said to have been in the habit of preaching in the streets and catechising children on religious topics. He died at Wood Eaton on 14 July 1575, and was buried with some ceremony in the chancel of the church.
Taverner married, first, in August 1537, Margaret, daughter of Walter Lambert, a goldsmith of London. By her, who was buried at Wood Eaton on 31 Jan. 1561–2, he had issue four sons and three daughters, of whom Martha married George Caulfeild, ancestor of the earls and viscounts Charlemont. He married, secondly, Mary, daughter of Sir John Harcourt of Stanton Harcourt; by her he had a son, Harcourt Taverner (d. 1587), and a daughter Penelope, who, by her husband Robert Petty, was maternal grandmother of Anthony à Wood [q. v.], the Oxford antiquary (Wood, Life and Times, ed. Clark, i. 38–41).
A grandson, John Taverner (1584–1638), graduated B.A. from Trinity College, Cambridge, early in 1602 and M.A. in 1605; he was incorporated at Oxford on 10 March 1605–6, was for nine years secretary to Bishop John King, and for twenty-eight (1610–38) professor of music at Gresham College. From 1624 to 1629 he was vicar of Tillingham, Essex, and from 1629 to his death vicar of Hexton, Hertfordshire, and rector of Stoke Newington, Middlesex, where he died and was buried in 1638. The autograph of his lectures, which in no way touch upon practical music, forms Sloane MS. 2329 in the British Museum (Ward, Gresham Professors, pp. 211–16; Foster, Alumni Oxon. 1500–1714; note supplied by Mr. H. Davey).
In addition to the works already mentioned Taverner published: 1. ‘A ryght frutefull Epystle … in laude … of matrymony translated … [from the Latin of Erasmus], by R. Taverner,’ London, 8vo, n.d. (conjectured in the ‘British Museum Catalogue’ to be 1530, but probably at least six years later). 2. ‘Comon places of Scripture ordrely … set forth … Translated into English [from the Latin of E. Sarcerius] by R. T.,’ London, 1538, 8vo; other editions 1553 and 1577. 3. ‘An Epitome of the Psalmes. … Translated by R. T.,’ London, 1539, 8vo. 4. ‘Proverbs or Adagies gathered out of the Chiliades of Erasmus by R. T.,’ London, 1539, 8vo; another edition 1552 (cf. Narratives of the Reformation, Camden Soc. p. 160). 5. ‘Flores aliquot Sententiarum. … The Flowers of Sentences gathered out of sundry wryters by Erasmus in Latine, and Englished by Richard Taverner,’ London, 8vo, ‘ex aula regia Idibus Septembribus 1547;’ other editions 1550 and 1560? 6. ‘Catonis Disticha Moralia ex castigatione D. Erasmi Roterodami una cum annotationibus et scholiis Richard Tauerneri …’ London, 1562, 8vo. Other works are mentioned by Bale and Wood which have not been traced (cf. Cooper,
