John Hopkinson of Grub Street: An Elizabethan Orientalist

Abstract

Scholars have puzzled over the identity of a certain Hopkinson, a London-based teacher of the oriental languages during Elizabeth’s reign. James Whitelocke, future judge of the King’s Bench, appears to have been the only one to mention him. Prior to entering Oxford in June 1588, Whitelocke recalled in 1609, he had improved his knowledge of Hebrew—which he had begun studying at Merchant Taylors’ School under Richard Mulcaster—with a reader of the Hebrew tong at London that was reputed the famosest in that language about the towne. His name was Hopkinson, he dwelt in Grub Street, an obscure and simple man for worldly affayres, but expert in all the lefthand tongs, as Hebrew, Chaldean, Syrian, Arabian, and writ them verye fair: he had at that time great lerned men that consulted him in those languages, and especially dr. Andrews that is now bishop of Chichester.