Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Chefer, Richard
CHEFER or CHEFFER, RICHARD (fl. 1400?), theologian, was an Augustinian friar, and the author of the following works: ‘Sermones elegantes,’ ‘De nativitate Christi liber i.,’ ‘De quatuor novissimis liber i.,’ and ‘Collationes lures.’ These particulars were taken by Bishop Bale, ‘ ex reliquiis Thomæ Godsalve’ (see his manuscript note-book in the Bodleian Library, cod. Seld., supra, 64, f. 150 b), a Norwich gentleman, into the possession of whose family the Augustinian priory in that city had passed shortly after its dissolution (see Blomefield, History of Norfolk, ii. 549, 1745). Hence, apparently, it was a natural inference that Chefer was a member of that house (Bale, Script. Brit. Cat. vii. 33, p. 532). He is further said to ave been a Norfolk man, and it is presumed that he studied for some years at Cambridge; but both these statements seem to be conjectural, and it is probably only the titles of his works that have led his biographers to describe him as an industrious student and a powerful preacher. How little is really known of him appears from the fact that Bale placed him in the reign of Henry IV, while Pits (De Angliæ Scriptoribus, pp. 479, 480) states that he flourished in 1354, and Pamphilus (Chron. Ord. Fratr. Eremit. S. August., f. 70 b, Rome, 1581), who (like Pits) in other respects depends wholly on Bale, gives the date as 1408. The former year (1354) has been given as the date of Chefer's death in Blomefield's ‘History of Norfolk,' ii. 552, and in the 1830 edition of Dugdale's ‘Monasticon,’ vi. 1595, where he is also said to have been prior of his house. The true date remains unknown.
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