The only authenticated circumstances in Lydgate's biography (excepting
a few dates to poems), are the following:--He was ordained subdeacon,
1389; deacon, 1393; and priest, 1397. In 1423 he left the Benedictine
Abbey of Bury, in Suffolk, to which he was attached, and was elected
prior of Hatfield Brodhook; but the following year had license to
return to his monastery again. These dates are derived from the
Register of Abbott Cratfield, preserved among the Cotton MSS. Tiber,
B. ix.

My object in calling the attention of your readers to the state of
Lydgate's biography is, to draw forth new facts. Information of
a novel kind may be in their hands without appreciation as to its
importance.

I take this opportunity of noticing the different dates given of Myles
Coverdale's death.

Strype says he died 20th May, 1565, (_Annals of Reformation_, vol.
i. pt. ii. p. 43., Oxf. ed.), although elsewhere he speaks of his as
being alive in 1566. Neale (_Hist of Pur._, vol. i. p. 185.) says, the
20th May, 1567. Fuller (_Church Hist._, p. 65. ed. 1655) says he died
on the 20th of January, 1568, and "Anno 1588," in his _Worthies of
England_, p. 198., ed. 1662.

The following extract from "The Register of Burials in the Parish
Church of St. Bartholomew's by the Exchange" sets the matter at rest.
"Miles Coverdall, doctor of divinity, was buried anno 1568., the 19th
of February."