Narcissus Marsh, the founder of Marsh's Library, was born in Hannigton, Wiltshire, England in 1638. According to the official web site of the library, ‘His father’s name was William Marsh and his mother was Grace Colburn. Narcissus was the youngest in the family of five: three brothers and two sisters. The name Narcissus is certainly uncommon, but his brothers were given the names Epaphroditus and Onesiphorus’ (http://www.marshlibrary.ie/about/narcissus-marsh/). He was ‘educated at Magdalen College, Oxford, where he graduated in 1658… was elected a Fellow of Exeter College’ (http://www.tcd.ie/provost/history/former-provosts/n_marsh.php#) in the same year, was ordained in 1662, and ‘awarded the living at Swindon’ (http://www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cgi?page=gr&GRid=5859253). Then he ‘was appointed chaplain to the Bishop of Exeter and Clarendon and principal of St. Alban’s Hall, Oxford in 1673’ (ibid). In 1673 – or at least by January 1678 – he was ‘appointed Provost of Trinity College Dublin on the nomination of the Duke of Ormonde, Chancellor and Lord Lieutenant’ (http://www.tcd.ie/provost/history/former-provosts/n_marsh.php#). It is said that he was sent to Ireland in 1679 and ‘was consecrated Bishop of Ferns and Leighlin and rector of Killiban’ (http://www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cgi?page=gr&GRid=5859253) in 1683. This was followed by his temporary return to England ‘Due to social unrest under James II’ (ibid) in 1689, but he soon went back to Ireland in 1691, where he further ‘held three archbishoprics: Cashel (1691-4), Dublin (1694-1703) and Armagh (1703-13)’ (http://www.tcd.ie/provost/history/former-provosts/n_marsh.php#).
On top of his career in the Church, he was also known for a scholar, who ‘wrote on logic and acoustics’ (ibid) and in 1683, ‘Marsh became one of the first members of the Dublin Philosophical Society. He contributed an early paper to that Society… in which he apparently was the first to use the word microphone’ (http://www.marshlibrary.ie/about/narcissus-marsh/). More controversially, his passion and enthusiasm went towards an awkward direction under the political climate at the time. It is said that Marsh ‘acquired a good knowledge of’ (http://www.tcd.ie/provost/history/former-provosts/n_marsh.php#) the Irish language and ‘encouraged the Irish scholars to learn it, appointing a native speaker as a lecturer to teach them. He also cooperated with Robert Boyle, the celebrated chemist, in the production of an edition of the Bible in Irish’ (ibid). His encouragement of the Irish language was an ‘unexpected aspect of his provostship’ (ibid) because the time was when the language ‘had no place therein, and was banned out of public life, the schools, the courts etc… Since the early 17th Cent… there had been no Irish speaking upper class’ (http://www.nualeargais.ie/gnag/gaeilge.htm).
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| Narcissus Marsh |
For reading the text in full: http://wrex2009.wordpress.com/2013/12/21/marshs-library/
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