ABSTRACT
ALMAN, WILLIAM, probably gave John Balbus, Catholicon (Paris, 1499). Alman was a notary public and gentleman of Bury St Edmunds, and a feoffee of the guildhall lands. He matriculated a pensioner in St John's College, Cambridge in 1565 and his son studied at the grammar school in Bury, proceeding to Caius College, Cambridge in 1594. Alman occasionally appears as a scrivener of Bury wills. ASHFIELD, ROBERT, gave a copy of Zanchius, De Operibus Dei (Neustadt, 1591) in 1596. Ashfield was a gentleman of Stowlangtoft, Suffolk; matriculated pensioner from St Edmund's Hostel, Cambridge in 1544; magistrate; friend of Sir Robert Jermyn and Sir John Higham; signed the petition of 1583 in defence of the Suffolk nonconforming clergy. BAIST, THOMAS, gave a copy of Nicephorus Callistus, Scriptoris Vere Catholici Ecclesiasticae Historiae (Frankfurt, 1588), in 1596. Baist was a grocer in Thetford and a common councillor, later, a burgess of the borough. He signed his own name on the title-page. BARBER, ROGER, gave Theodoret, Opera (Cologne, 1573) on 7 December 1595. The signature of Miles Mosse is on the title-page. Barber was a gentleman of Bury, a feoffee of the guildhall lands, and a governor of the grammar school. BENNETT, THOMAS, gave a copy of Martin Bucer, Metaphrasis et Enarratio in Epist D. Pauli apostoli ad Romanes (Basel, 1562) in 1595. Bennett was a 'clothier of the parish of St Mary in the towne of BSE' and inscribed his name on the titlepage. BLAGGE, HENRY, gave at least eleven titles: including Bodin, De Republica (Lyons, 1586) in September 1595; Petrarch, Opera (Basel, 1581) in September 1595; Christopherson, Historiae Eccles. Scriptores (Cologne, 1570) (curiously not mentioned in the inventory of 1599) on 6 September 1595; Jewel, Reply to Harding's Answer (London, 1565), on 6 September 1595; Lonicer, Chronica
The following information is derived from the surviving book plates together with other information derived from material in the Suffolk Record Office, Bury St Edmunds, such as wills. The university details are to be found in Venn, Alumni Cantabrigienses. This does not pretend to be a complete prosopography of identified donors but a beginning. Cf. Appendices 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 and 7. This list only includes those who donated books between 1595 and 1599. I have excluded men like Samuel Aylmer, John Jewell and Robert Reyce who made donations in the early years of the seventeenth century.
