Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Montacute, Nicholas
MONTACUTE, NICHOLAS (fl. 1466), historian, had, according to Bale, a great reputation for learning. He was not eloquent, says Bale, but lucid, and less credulous than his contemporaries. From the fact that his writings were in the sixteenth century preserved in the library of Eton College, Pits rashly conjectured that he had been a teacher in the school. His works, which seem to have disappeared from the Eton library by Tanner's time, are : 1 . 'De Romanis pontificibus a S. Petro ad Eugenium III.' Pits and Tanner mention a manuscript of this book in the Lumley library, which does not appear with the rest of the collection incorporated with the Royal Library in the British Museum ; a copy in the Cottonian Library bears the title 'Nicolai Manuacutii versus ad incorrupta nomina pontificum conservanda in quibus series illorum continetur,' Domit. A. xiii. f. 96 b. 2. 'De regibus Anglorum,' 3. 'De episcopis Anglorum,' also in the Lumley library. 4. 'Scala temporum a Christo nato.' 5. 'Epigrammata.' These appear to have been all written in verse, but Bale says that he wrote other works, both in prose and verse, whose titles he could not learn.
[Bale's Catalogus Scriptorum illustrium Brytannise, i. 596 ; Pits, De illustr. Anglise Scriptoribus, p. 656; Tanner's Bibl. Brit.-Hib. p. 531.]