Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Chilmark, John
CHILMARK or CHYLMARK, JOHN (fl. 1386), schoolman, was a fellow of Merton College, Oxford (Leland, Collectanea, iii. 55), and a master of arts. It appears from an account preserved among the muniments of Exeter College that in 1386 he paid ten shillings ‘in parte solutionis scolarum bassarum iuxta scholas ubi scamuum situatur in medio' (Wood, History and Antiquities of the University of Oxford, ed. Gutch, vol. ii. pt. ii. p. 742); so that in that year he must have been engaged in lecturing in the schools belonging to Exeter College. (On the intercourse subsisting between Exeter and Merton see C. W. Boase, Register of Exeter College, intr. p. ix.) Chilmark enjoyed a considerable reputation for his attainments in philosophy, and specially in mathematics; but his best known work, ‘De Actione Elementorum, was a parently only an abridgment of one by Dumbleton (‘Compendium e Actione Elementorum abstractum de quarta parte J. Dumbletoni,’ Bodl. Libr. Cod. Diqb. 77, ff. 153 b to 163). Chilmark’s other productions, which are unpublished, are entitled ‘De Motu’ (Cod. Bodl. 676, ff. ll-38); ‘De Qualitate sc., Propositionis’ (ibid. ff. 69 b to 75 b); and ‘De Alteratione’ (ibid. ff. 76-101). The first and third of these exist also in a manuscript at New College, Oxford (Cod. 289), which moreover contains Chilmark’s treatises ‘De Augmentatione,' ‘De Prioritate,’ and ‘De Aggregatione’ (H. O. Coxe, Cat. of Oxford MSS., New College, p. 104, col. 2). Tanner (Bibl. Brit. p. 178) Further mentions ‘Opuscula Logica’ as found in a Merton manuscript, which seems to have disappeared, and a treatise ‘De Accidentiis Planetarum,’ which is possibly only a mistake for the ‘De Actione [also called ‘De Accidentiis,’ Leland, l.c.] Elementorum.’
[See also Leland’s Comm. de Script. Brit. cdlviii. pp. 397 f.; Bale's Script. Brit. Cat. vi. 99, 605.]