The college of Six Preachers of
Canterbury Cathedral was created by Archbishop
Thomas Cranmer
Thomas Cranmer (2 July 1489 – 21 March 1556) was a leader of the English Reformation and Archbishop of Canterbury during the reigns of Henry VIII, Edward VI and, for a short time, Mary I. He helped build the case for the annulment of Henry ...
as part of the reorganisation of the monastic Christ Church Priory into the new secular Cathedral.
First mentioned in a letter of Cranmer to
Thomas Cromwell
Thomas Cromwell (; 1485 – 28 July 1540), briefly Earl of Essex, was an English lawyer and statesman who served as chief minister to King Henry VIII from 1534 to 1540, when he was beheaded on orders of the king, who later blamed false char ...
in 1540, the Six Preachers were established by the Statutes of 1541.
They were provided with houses in the Precincts but quickly became non-resident and rented out their properties.
They had the right to dine with the Dean and Canons and to sit in the stalls in the quire with the canons during services.
They were required to preach 20 sermons a year in their own parishes or in a church dependent on the Cathedral, as well as preaching in the Cathedral.
There has been an unbroken succession of Six Preachers from 1544 to the present day. In 1982 one of the twentieth-century Six Preachers, Canon
Derek Ingram Hill, marked the appointment of the 200th Six Preacher with the publication of a small book detailing the history of the institution and giving a short biography of each of its occupants.
Notable Six Preachers
*
John Scory : 1541
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Lancelot Ridley : 1541–1554, 1560–
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Richard Turner : 1550
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Thomas Beccon : c. 1550
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Rowland Taylor
Rowland Taylor (sometimes spelled "Tayler") (6 October 1510 – 9 February 1555) was an English Protestant martyr during the Marian Persecutions.
At the time of his death, he was Rector of Hadleigh in Suffolk. He was burnt at the stake at ne ...
: 1551
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Richard Clarke : 1602
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Richard Culmer : 1644
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John Cooke : 1687
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Thomas Wise : 1711
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John Duncombe : c.1760
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Evelyn Levett Sutton : 1811 (see under
Charles Manners-Sutton
Charles Manners-Sutton (17 February 1755 – 21 July 1828; called Charles Manners before 1762) was a bishop in the Church of England who served as Archbishop of Canterbury from 1805 to 1828.
Life
Manners-Sutton was the fourth son of Lord G ...
)
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Henry John Todd: 1818
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Thomas Bartlett: 1832
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Francis Nixon : 1841
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Francis James Holland : 1859
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Randall Thomas Davidson 1882
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Richard Hodgson : 1908
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John A. T. Robinson : 1958
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Derek Ingram Hill : 1964
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Michael Green
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Michael Battle : 2010
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Tory Baucum : 2014
References
*{{cite book, last=Ingram Hill, first=Derek , author-link=Derek Ingram Hill, title=The Six Preachers of Canterbury Cathedral, 1541-1982: Clerical Lives from Tudor Times to the Present Day, url=https://books.google.com/books?id=4ISzAAAACAAJ, year=1982, publisher=K.H. McIntosh, isbn=978-0-9502423-6-1
Canterbury Cathedral