author
Richard Rainolde
d. 1606
An English clergyman and writer from the Tudor period, he is remembered for one of the earliest substantial rhetoric manuals in English and for a chronicle of the Roman emperors. His surviving work offers a vivid glimpse of how language, persuasion, and history were taught in the 1500s.
1 Audiobook
About the author
Richard Rainolde, also written as Reynolds, was a 16th-century English author and clergyman who died in December 1606. Sources describe him as coming from Essex and studying at St John's College, Cambridge, where he entered as a sizar in 1546 and later took his degrees.
He is best known for A booke called the Foundacion of Rhetorike (1563), an early English guide to rhetoric and persuasive speaking. He also wrote a chronicle of the Roman emperors, showing a strong interest in classical history as well as the moral and religious lessons readers were expected to draw from it.
Not much is securely recorded about his personal life, which is common for lesser-known Tudor writers. What remains clear is that his books helped bring learned subjects like rhetoric and history to English readers in a practical, accessible form.