Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Badby, John
BADBY, JOHN (d. 1410), Lollard, was a blacksmith, or, according to other accounts, a tailor in Worcestershire, whose Lollard opinions involved him in the persecution of heresy which marked the clerical reaction on the accession of Henry IV, and the passing of the statute 'de hæretico comburendo.' Badby seems to have been a man of parts, of unflinching courage and resolution, and possessed of both ingenuity and dialectical power. He carried out to extreme rationalistic consequences that denial of transubstantiation which had become characteristic of the more hardy Wycliffites. The host, he maintained, was in no sense the body of Christ, but something inanimate, and less worthy therefore of honour than a toad or a spider, which at least had the gift of life. Such outspoken heresy insured his condemnation before the diocesan court at Worcester; but the case came for final decision, probably by way of appeal, before Archbishop Arundel, in the spring of 1410. Arundel strengthened his court by the addition of numerous ecclesiastical and lay assessors; but Badby's heresy admitted of no doubt. He was condemned and delivered to the secular arm for execution, and met his fate on 1 March at Smithfield. Henry, Prince of Wales, already conspicuous for the fervour of his orthodoxy, was among the spectators, and offered Badby a free pardon if he recanted. The Lollard refused, but his piteous groans after the fire was lighted again excited Henry's hopes of his conversion. He ordered the extinction of the fire, and offered the half-burnt wretch life, liberty, and a pension as the price of conformity. But with unflinching constancy Badby refused. The fire was rekindled, and death soon ended his sufferings. His was the second martyrdom to Lollardy.
[Walsingham's Historia Anglicana, p. 282 (Rolls edition); Foxe's Book of Martyrs, i. 593-5, is very circumstantial if not very trustworthy; Hook's Lives of the Archbishops of Canterbury, iv. 507-10, gives a good modern account.]