John Heywood

John Heywood was a notable courtier in Tudor England, distinguished primarily as a playwright and musician. He maintained favour across the courts of Henry VIII, Edward VI, Mary I, and Elizabeth I - a remarkable achievement given the religious upheaval and volatile temperaments of these monarchs. Despite being sentenced to death at one point, he received a pardon and lived into his eighties.

While his plays and musical compositions have largely been forgotten, Heywood’s legacy rests on his work as a lexicographer. He compiled and published comprehensive collections of proverbs and epigrams from Tudor England, providing invaluable documentation for later scholars.

His most significant publication came in 1546: A Dialogue conteinyng the nomber in effect of all the Prouerbes in the Englishe tongue. The proverbs appear throughout extended discursive passages written in rhyming couplets. The book was printed on London’s Fleet Street by Thomas Berthelet, “prynter to the kynges hyghnesse.”

In his introduction, Heywood noted that “our coomon playne pithy prouerbes olde” held considerable value for “both old & yong.”

Heywood functioned primarily as a collector rather than originator of these sayings. After Shakespeare, he documented the largest collection of expressions that remain in modern use. Like John Bartlett would later observe, Heywood gathered “a posy of other men’s flowers,” whether original to him or transcribed from common speech - a distinction now impossible to determine for most entries.