Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Maihew, Edward
MAIHEW, EDWARD (1570–1625), Benedictine monk, born at Dinton, Wiltshire, in 1570, was descended from an ancient family who had suffered for their attachment to the catholic faith. He, with his brother Henry, was admitted a student of the English College of Douay, then temporarily removed to Rheims, on 10 July 1583. After remaining there seven years he removed to Rome, and was admitted into the English College in that city on 23 Oct. 1590. Having taken orders he was sent to England, where he exercised his functions for twelve years as a secular priest. Desiring to revive the Benedictine order in this country, he took the habit at the hands of Father Anselm Beach. At the end of his novitiate he was, on 21 Nov. 1607, professed by Father Sigebert Buckley, then a prisoner in the Gatehouse at Westminster, and was aggregated to the abbey of Westminster and the old English congregation (Weldon, Chronicle, p. 60; and see Buckley, Robert). From 1614 to 1620 he was prior of the monastery of St. Laurence at Dieulwart in Lorraine, and in 1617 he was appointed one of the nine definitors of the order. He died at Cambray, where he was vicar of the English nuns, on 14 Sept. 1625, and was buried in the church of St. Vedast.
His works are: 1. ‘A Treatise of the Grovndes of the Old and Newe Religion. Devided into two parts. Whereunto is added an Appendix, containing a briefe confutation of William Crashaw his first Tome of Romish forgeries and falsifications’ (anon.), sine loco, 1608, 4to. This was attacked in a book entitled ‘A Sufficient Answere unto James Gretser and Anthony Possevine, Jesuits, and the unknowne Author of the Grounds of the Old Religion and the New,’ by Thomas James, published with his ‘Treatise of the Corruption of Scripture, Counsels, and Fathers,’ 1611. 2. ‘Manuale Sacerdotum … juxta usum insignis ecclesiæ Sarisburiensis. (Annotationes in præcedentem sacram institutionem’), Douay (L. Kellam), 1610, 8vo. 3. ‘A Paradise of Prayers,’ from several authors. 4. ‘Congregationis Anglicanæ Ordinis Sanctissimi Patriarchæ Benedicti Trophæa tribus tabulis comprehensa. In quibus plurima, non tantum quæ ad res Angliæ, sed etiam quæ ad historias Germaniæ, Hyberniæ, Scotiæ, et Belgii spectant, accuratè traduntur et discutiuntur: nonnulla etiam Sanctorum vitæ nondum in lucem editæ habentur,’ Rheims, 1625, 4to; dedicated to Dr. William Gifford, archbishop of Rheims.
[Dodd's Church Hist. ii. 401; Douay Diaries, p. 431; Foley's Records, vi. 184; Oliver's Catholic Religion in Cornwall, pp. 354, 519; Pits, De Angliæ Scriptoribus, p. 815; Snow's Necrology, p. 35; Weldon's Chronicle, pp. 60, 107, 112, 146, 163, Append. pp. 4, 14; Wood's Athenæ Oxon. (Bliss), ii. 177.]