_Defender of the Faith._--In Banks' _Dormant and Extinct Baronage_, pp.
408-9., vol. iv., I find the following:--

"He ( Henry VIII.) was the first English monarch who obtained the title
of Defender of the Faith, which was conferred upon him by Pope Leo X.,
for a book written by him against Martin Luther."

To which the following note is subjoined:--

"But in a letter from Christopher Wren, Esq., to Francis Peek, M.A.
(author of the _Desiderata Curiosa_), it is thus stated, viz., 'that
King Henry VII. had the title of Defender of the Faith, appears by the
Register of the Order of the Garter in the black book, (sic dictum a
tegmine), now in my hands, by office, which having been shown to King
Charles I., he received with much joy; nothing more pleasing him than
that the right of that title was fixed in the crown long before the
Pope's pretended donation, to all which I make protestation to all
posterity.' [Greek: Autographô], hoc meo. Ità testor. Chr. Wren, à
memoria, et secretis Honoratissimi Ordinis. Wrexham, 4 March, 1736-7."

In support of this note, I find in Chamberlayne's _Present State of
England_, 1669, p. 88., this statement:

"Defender of the Faith was anciently used by the Kings of England, as
appears by several charters granted to the University of Oxford, &c."

As the word _anciently_, I conceive, applies to a period anterior to 1521,
may I express a hope that some of your learned subscribers at Oxford will
favour your readers with the dates of the charters alluded to; and, if