Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Rochford, John de
ROCHFORD, Sir JOHN de (fl. 1390–1410), mediæval writer, was apparently son of Saer de Rochford of Holland in Lincolnshire, and, according to Pits, after receiving a good education in England, studied in France and Italy. In 1381 he served on a commission to inquire into certain disturbances at Boston (Cal. Patent Rolls, Richard II, ed. 1895, p. 421). Before 1386 he was knighted, and in that year was placed on commissions in the same county to raise sums lent to the king, and to supervise the purchase of arms and horses. In the following year he was sworn to support the lords appellants. On 26 Sept. 1405 he was summoned to meet Henry IV at Coventry, and accompany him on his expedition to Wales. But his interests lay chiefly in literary work. In 1406 he completed his ‘Notabilia extracta per Johannem de Rochefort, militem, de viginti uno libris Flavii Josephi antiquitatis Judaice;’ it is extant in All Souls' College MS. xxxvii. ff. 206 et seqq. He also compiled a ‘Tabula super Flores Storiarum facta per Johannem Rochefort, militem, distincta per folia,’ contained in All Souls' College MS. xxxvii. ff. 157 et seqq. It was also extant, with an ‘Extractum Chronicarum Cestrensis Ecclesiæ per Johannem Rocheford, a Christo nato ad annum 1410,’ in Cotton MS. Vitellius D. xii. 1, which is now lost. The ‘Tabula’ is merely an index of the ‘Flores Historiarum’ of Matthew of Westminster [q. v.], the authorship of which has been erroneously ascribed to Rochford. Pits also attributes to Rochford ‘Ex Ranulphi Chronico librum unum,’ and says that he translated many works, but he does not specify them.
[Rymer's Fœdera, original edition, vii. 544, 547, viii. 413; Rolls of Parl. iii. 401 a; Hardy's Descr. Cat. of Materials, iii. 316; Matthew of Westminster's Flores Hist. (ed. Luard, in the Rolls Ser.), Pref. pp. xxix, xxx, xlii; Bale's Script. vii. 4; Pits, ed. 1619, p. 581; Fabricius's Bibl. Med. Ævi Latinitatis, iv. 363; Oudin's Comment. de Script. iii. 2227; Thomas James's Ecloga Oxonio-Cantabr. 1600, p. 45; Vossius's Hist. Lat. ed. 1651, pp. 545–6; Tanner's Bibl. Brit.-Hib.; Coxe's Cat. MSS. in Coll. Aulisque Oxon.; Chevalier's Répertoire.]