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The Making of Abiezer Coppe

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  14 December 2010

ARIEL HESSAYON
ARIEL HESSAYON
Affiliation:
Department of History, Goldsmiths College, University of London, New Cross, London SE14 6NW; e-mail: a.hessayon@gold.ac.uk
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Abstract

This article seeks to uncover the origins of the ‘Ranters’ by examining Abiezer Coppe's early life and social network. It suggests that Coppe's background, experiences and milieu – particularly his Baptist phase and the associations he made during this period – are crucial to appreciate the genesis of the ‘Ranters’. As such it should be regarded as a further contribution towards the growing consensus that the origins of ‘radicalism’ in the English Revolution are to be located in the religion of the ‘hotter sort’ of Protestants lower down the social scale.

Type
Research Article
Information
The Journal of Ecclesiastical History , Volume 62 , Issue 1 , January 2011 , pp. 38 - 58
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2010

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References

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2 Cf. Luke vii.33–5.

3 Coppe, Remonstrance, title page, 1–2.

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6 Abiezer Coppe, Copp's return to the wayes of truth, London 1651 (Wing C.6090), sig. A2r–3.

7 Ibid. sig. B2; John Gadbury, Collectio geniturarum, London 1662 (Wing G.80), 106.

8 WRO, PG 3534.

9 WRO, DR 477/1; WORC (County Hall), 0087, nos 50, 62.

10 TNA, LR 2/181, fo. 196v; deposition of Thomas Coppe of Beausale (1597), E 134/38, 39 Eliz/Mich8.

11 TNA, STAC 8/158/26.

12 Warwickshire parish registers, ed. W. P. M. Phillimore, J. L. Whitfield and J. H. Bloom, London 1906, iii.130; cf. baptism of ‘Anthonie filius Thome Coppe’, 2 Sept. 1576, WRO, DR 477/1.

13 TNA, Prob 11/241, fos 391v–392r.

14 Warwickshire parish registers, iii. 132.

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16 WORO (County Hall), 0087, no. 44.

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19 WRO, DR 477/34.

20 WRO, CR 2758/1, fo. 109r.

21 E 179/193/274, 280, 301; E 179/259/1; E 179/194/308, 310.

22 Shakespeare Birthplace Trust Records Office, ER 2/450; Prob 11/278, fos 28v–29r.

23 TNA, SP 28/184 (no piece number, no foliation).

24 WRO, DR 447/1; DR 133/16 (no foliation).

25 WRO, DR 133/16 (no foliation); E 179/259/9, fo. 205v; 179/259/10, mem. 13v.

26 WORO (St Helen's), BA 2760. 802, fos 47v, 58r, 58v, 63r, 97v, 103r.

27 Original records of early Nonconformity under persecution and indulgence, ed. G. Lyon Turner, London 1911, i. 149.

28 Churchwardens' presentments, 23 Sept. 1674, WORO (St Helen's), BA 2289. 807/21 (ii) St Mary, Warwick; The Compton Census of 1676: a critical edition, ed. Anne Whiteman, Oxford 1986, 186.

29 Churchwardens' presentments, 4 June 1684, WORO (St Helen's), BA 2289. 807/21 (ii), St Mary, Warwick; churchwardens' presentments, 23 Sept. 1674, ibid. (iii), St Nicholas, Warwick.

30 WORO (County Hall), 0087, no. 62.

31 Prob 11/241, fo. 391v.

32 Shakespeare Birthplace Trust, DR 10/1754.

33 Abiezer Coppe, Some sweet sips, of some spirituall wine, London 1649 (Wing C.6093), title-page; A fiery flying roll, London 1649 (Wing C.6087), title page.

34 Idem, Copp's return, 3.

35 Ibid. 2.

36 ‘Moses in the mount’, in Several works of Mr. Iohn Murcot, London 1657 (Wing M.3083), 3.

37 BL, ms Add. 23,146, fos 31v, 32v, 33r, 33v, 38r, 40v, 41v; Hughes, A., ‘Thomas Dugard and his circle in the 1630s: a “Parliamentary-Puritan” connexion?’, HJ xxix (1986), 771–93CrossRefGoogle Scholar at p. 779.

38 Ecclesiastical terriers of Warwickshire parishes, ed. D. M. Barratt (Dugdale Society xxvii, 1971), ii. 100; John Bryan, The vertvovs davghter, London 1640 (STC 3956); Coppe, Copp's return, 20.

39 John Venn and J. Venn (eds), Alumni cantabrigienses from the earliest times to 1751, Cambridge 1922–7, iii. 492; Joseph Foster (ed.), Alumni oxonienses: the members of the University of Oxford, 1500–1714, Oxford 1891–2, iii. 1046, 1164; iv. 1342.

40 Bodleian Library, Oxford, O.U.A., S.P. 2, fo. 68r; O.U.A. S.P. 39, (no foliation), 20 May 1636.

41 BL, ms Add. 23,146, fo. 53v; Thomas Dugard, Philobasileus, London 1664 (Wing D.2463A), 13–16.

42 Bodl. Lib., ms D.D. All Souls Coll. b.78; Anthony Wood Athenae oxonienses, ed. Philip Bliss, London 1813–20, iii, col. 959.

43 Wood, Athenae oxonienses, iii, col. 959.

44 Ibid. ii, col. 316.

45 Merton College, Oxford, MCR Reg.1.3, p. 324.

46 Nottingham University Library, ms Cl. c.75; Wood, Athenae oxonienses, iii, col. 703.

47 Nicholas Clagett, The abuse of Gods grace, Oxford 1659 (Wing C.4368), sig. A2; CSPD, 1638–39, 46, 68; CSPD, 1639–40, 509; CSPD, 1640–41, 325; The works of the most reverend father in God, William Laud, ed. William Scott and James Bliss, Oxford 1847–60, iv. 220–1.

48 Edward Hinton, The vanity of self-boasters, London 1643 (Wing H.2066), 1–4, 6–7, 28–9.

49 Wood, Athenae oxonienses, iii, col. 959.

50 Richard Baxter, Reliquiae Baxterianiae, ed. Matthew Sylvester, 1696 (Wing B.1370), pt iii, pp. 36, 96; Wood, Athenae oxonienses, iii, cols. 307, 325, 381, and Wood, Fasti oxonienses, ed. Philip Bliss, London 1820, ii, col. 158.

51 Coronae Carolinæ qvadratvra, Oxford 1636 (STC 19036), sig. aaaa2v; Evcharistica oxoniensia, Oxford 1641 (Wing O.883), sig. Dv-2; Musarum oxoniensivm, Oxford 1654 (Wing O.902), 6; Britannia rediviva, Oxford 1660 (Wing O.863), no pagination.

52 Catalogus librorum bibliothecis selectissimis doctissimorum virorum viz. D. Radulphi Button, London 1681 (Wing B.6341).

53 Foster, Alumni oxonienses, iv. 1428; Wood, Athenae oxonienses, iii, col. 54.

54 Foster, Alumni oxonienses, i. 144; Wood, Athenae oxonienses, iii, col. 476.

55 Foster, Alumni oxonienses, iii. 1046; Wood, Athenae oxonienses, iii, col. 381; ‘Moses in the mount’, 4.

56 Foster, Alumni oxonienses, iv. 1670; The life and rimes of Anthony Wood, antiquary, of Oxford, 1632–1695, ed. Andrew Clark (Oxford Historical Society, xix, xxi, xxvi, xxx, xl, 1891–1900), i. 52, 197.

57 Wood, Athenae oxonienses, iii, cols 959–60.

58 Gadbury, Collectio geniturarum, 106.

59 BL, ms Add. 23,146, fo. 73v.

60 Merton College, MCR Reg.1.3, p. 335.

61 Bodl. Lib., O.U.A. Nep/Supra Q; ms Wood F.14; Wood, Athenae oxonienses, iii, col. 960.

62 BL, ms Add. 23,146, fos 92v, 93r, 94v, 96r, 96v, 97r, 100v.

63 Samuel Fisher, Baby-baptism meer babism, London 1653 (Wing F.1055), 413.

64 SP 28/136 pt 37, fo. 4v; Philip Tennant, Edgehill and beyond: the people's war in the South Midlands, 1642–1645 (Banbury Historical Society, xxiii, 1992), 160–70.

65 George Purefoy, A letter from Serjeant Major Purefoy governour of Compton House, London 1645 (Wing P.4228); Tennant, Edgehill and beyond, 205–7.

66 SP 28/136 pt 37, fo. 4v; SP 28/123 pt 2, fo. 282; SP 28/184 (no piece number).

67 Philalethes [pseud.], An answer to Doctor Chamberlaines scandalous and false papers, London 1650 (Wing A.3357), 6.

68 Coppe, Copp's return, sig. A2r-3.

69 Thomas Edwards, Gangraena, London 1646 (Wing E.228, E.234, E.237), pt 1, p. 149; Calendar of the correspondence of Richard Baxter, ed. N. Keeble and G. F. Nuttall, Oxford 1991, i. 40–1; Richard Baxter, Plain Scripture proof of infants church-membership and baptism, London 1651 (Wing B.1344), sig. b4v, and Reliquiae Baxterianiae, pt 1, pp. 45–6.

70 Baxter, Plain Scripture proof, 148.

71 Abiezer Coppe, A second fiery flying roule, London 1649 (Wing C.6087), 19–21.

72 Baxter, Plain Scripture proof, 148.

73 Wood, Athenae oxonienses, iii, col. 960.

74 Coppe, Copp's return, sig. A2r–3, p. 17.

75 Several Proceedings in Parliament xvi (11–18 Jan. 1650), 213; The Man in the Moon xxxix (16–23 January 1650), 311.

76 Nathaniel Stephens, A precept for the baptisme of infants, London 1651 (Wing S.5451), sig. A3r–v; John Ley, A discourse of disputations chiefly concerning matters of religion, London 1658 (Wing L.1877), 7, 74–5.

77 The confession of faith, of those Churches which are commonly (though falsly) called Anabaptists, London 1644 (Wing C.5790); A confession of faith of seven congregations or Churches of Christ in London, London 1646 (Wing C.5780); The writings of William Walwyn, ed. Jack McMichael and Barbara Taft, Athens, Ga 1989, 121–2; Journals of the House of Commons, iv. 420.

78 Confession of faith, no pagination.

79 Coppe, Some sweet sips, 54.

80 Hanserd Knollys, Christ exalted, London 1645 (Wing K.706), title-page, 3, and The life and death of that old disciple of Jesus Christ … Mr. Hanserd Knollys, ed. William Kiffin, London 1692 (Wing K.715), 22.

81 Original letters illustrative of English history, 3rd ser., ed. Sir Henry Ellis, London 1846, iv. 265–6.

82 Paul Hobson, A garden inclosed, and wisdom justified only of her children, London 1647 (Wing H.2274), 68–9, 73–4, 80.

83 Coppe, Remonstrance, 1–2.

84 Idem, Fiery flying roll, preface, p. 1.

85 Robert Lancaster, ‘Preface to the reader’, in Tobias Crisp, Christ alone exalted, London 1643 (Wing C.6955).

86 Hartlib papers, Sheffield University Library, HP 39/2/2A–B; Crisp, Christ alone exalted, 19.

87 Journals of the House of Lords, iv. 494; Edwards, Gangraena, pt 1, p. 97; Knollys, Christ exalted, 5–6.

88 Coppe, Copp's return, sig. A2r–3.

89 Idem, Some sweet sips, 17.

90 Remarkable passages in the life of William Kiffin, ed. William Orme, London 1823, 14–15; Middlesex county records, 1625–1667, ed. John Jeaffreson, London 1886–92, iii. 170; E[dward] W[histon], The life and death of Mr. Henry Jessey late preacher of the Gospel, London 1671 (Wing W.1679), 10; cf. Jeremiah xii.10; Matt. xxi.33–41; Luke xx.9–16.

91 Baxter, Plain Scripture proof, 148.

92 CJ v. 34; cf. Coventry City Record Office, BA/H/C/17/2, fo. 58v.

93 Coppe, Copp's return, sig. A2r-3, and Second fiery flying roule, 20.

94 Idem, Fiery flying roll, 7, and Second fiery flying roule, 20; CJ iv. 659; [Anon.], A vindication of a printed paper, London 1646 (Wing V.465), sig. Br–v.

95 Coppe, Second fiery flying roule, 5.

96 Idem, Copp's return, 2, 10.

97 Ibid. 3; Second fiery flying roule, 21, 22.

98 Idem, ‘An additional and preambular hint, – as a general epistle written by ABC’, in Richard Coppin, Divine teachings, London 1649 (Wing C.6096), preface; Coppe, Copp's return, 10–11, and Second fiery flying roule, 22.

99 Coppe, ‘Additional and preambular hint’; Some sweet sips, ‘Contents’; and Fiery flying roll, ‘preface’.

100 Idem, Fiery flying roll, ‘preface’.

101 Dr Williams's Library, ms Baxter, Treatises, III 67 fo. 302r.

102 Coppe, Some sweet sips, 15–16, 22–3, 50, and Fiery flying roll, ‘preface’.

103 Idem, Some sweet sips, 11, 47, 2.

104 Ibid. 2, 13.

105 Idem, Fiery flying roll, ‘preface’.

106 Ibid. 8, and Some sweet sips, 37–8.

107 Idem, Some sweet sips, 37, and Fiery flying roll, 8.

108 Idem, Fiery flying roll, 8.

109 Ibid., ‘preface’; Several Proceedings in Parliament xvi (11–18 Jan. 1650), 213Google Scholar.

110 Baxter, Plain Scripture proof, 148.

111 Coppe, Fiery flying roll, 8–9.

112 Idem, Second fiery flying roule, 12.

113 Thomas Bakewell, A confutation of the Anabaptists, London 1644 (Wing B.530), ‘To the reader’.

114 A proclamation for the further restraint of prophane swearing and cursing, 8 Apr. 1644 (Wing C.2616); William Strode, A sermon concerning swearing, Oxford 1644 (Wing S.5985).

115 Baxter, Plain Scripture proof, 148; Shakespeare Birthplace Trust, BRT 4/1/1, nos 29–32.

116 Coppe, Copp's return, sig. Bv, and Some sweet sips, 37, 46.

117 Idem, Second fiery flying roule, 10, 11.

118 Wood, Athenae oxonienses, iii, col. 960; cf. 2 Sam. xi. 4.

119 Edwards, Gangraena, pt 3, p. 189.

120 Coppe, Second fiery flying roule, 7.