John Wycliffe

Britain – John Wycliffe and the Lollards, 1350-1500

In this course, Professor John Arnold (University of Cambridge) explores the theology of John Wycliffe and the heretical movement which he inspired known as Lollardy. In the first module, we think about the life and times of John Wycliffe himself, focusing in particular on his relationship with John of Gaunt and some of his theological views. After that, we think about how Wycliffe's ideas spread out beyond Oxford where they were formed and came to be seen as a much greater threat – both by the church and by the state. In the third module, we think about how political situation in the early 15th century facilitated the greater prosecution of heresy in England, before moving on in the fourth module, to look in more detail at some of the individuals actually prosecuted for heresy. In the fifth module, we think about how Lollardy actually spread, before turning in the sixth and final module to Lollardy in the later 15th and early 16th centuries, and the rise of Martin Luther and the Reformation proper.

Primary Sources:
– English translations of all the Norfolk Heresy Trials (1428-31) can be found on the Virtual Norfolk website.

John Wycliffe

In this module, we think about the life and times of John Wycliffe, focusing in particular on his relationship with John of Gaunt, his theory of dominion by grace and his views on the centrality of Bible to Christian theology – a doctrine known as solā scriptura ('by Scripture alone').