This section deals with Tyndale's life and work and, not including the timeline below, contains five separate sections, all of which can be seen via the MENU items above (under "William Tyndale").
When William Tyndale was in Gloucestershire and talking with local priests,
he is supposed to have said that if God gave him a good number more years of life
he would make sure that the ploughboy understood the Bible better than they did.
Important moments in his life
| 1491 - 1494 | His exact date of birth is unknown. Most likely he was born in Gloucestershire, probably from a family living in or near Stinchcombe. |
| 1512 | He was awarded the degree of Bachelor of Arts (B.A.) after studying for several years at Magdalen Hall, Oxford (later to become Hertford College). |
| 1514 | He was ordained a sub-deacon by the Bishop of Hereford. Being ordained a sub-deacon was one of several stages towards becoming a priest. |
| 1515 | In London he was ordained as a deacon and then as a priest. In the same year he was awarded the degree of Master of Arts (M.A.) by Oxford University. |
| 1516 - 1522 | Little is known for certain about his life in these years. He may have spent some time at Cambridge University. Also he may have worked as a priest in Gloucestershire at Frampton on Severn and Breadstone. |
| 1522 - 1523 | For some months he acted as tutor to the children of Sir John Walsh who lived at Little Sodbury Manor in Gloucestershire. By now it seems likely that he had decided to translate the Bible into English. At this period the Bible was only available in Latin so that it meant little to most people when read in church. |
| 1523 | He went to London in the hope that the bishop of London would support his plan for a Bible in English. He was to be disappointed in this hope. The English authorities did not want the Bible in English. They feared that if people could understand it they might start challenging the teaching of the church. |
| 1524 | He left England to work on the mainland of Europe, hoping for more support there. |
| 1525 | At Cologne he completed his translation of the New Testament. He translated from the Greek in which the New Testament had originally been written. Printing began but it seemed likely that he would be arrested and so he fled to Würms. |
| 1526 | At Würms the complete edition of the New Testament was published. It began to be smuggled into England. The bishop of London had copies collected up and burned by St. Paul's Cathedral. |
| 1527 - 1533 | He wrote a number of books. Some criticised teachings of the church. Others were about books of the Bible. He learned Hebrew, a difficult language, in which the Old Testament was written. He then translated the first five books of the Old Testament, Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Number and Deuteronomy (known as the Pentateuch), and made a translation of the Book of Jonah. It seems likely that he also translated some of the historical books of the Old Testament. |
| 1534 | In Antwerp he went to live with an English merchant, Thomas Poyntz, and there he completed a revised version of his translation of the New Testament. |
| 1535 | In the spring of 1535 he was betrayed to the authorities by a young English student, Henry Phillips. He was arrested and taken to Vilvoorde Castle near Brussels. He was charged with heresy, teaching things with which the leaders of the church disagreed. |
| 1536 | After eighteen months in prison he was taken out to be executed. He was first strangled and then burned. He is supposed to have called out a prayer : "Lord, open the king of England's eyes", meaning that the king should allow a Bible in English. |