Thomas Spell (d. 1640)

Thomas Spell gained his BA from St John's in 1602/3, his MA in 1606, and became BD in 1614. He was a Fellow from 1605 until his death. In 1612, the same year that he was made Taxor, he was ordained at Peterborough, and appears to have been Rector at Scraptoft in Leicestershire. While a senior Fellow of the College he helped oversee the building of the Old Library at St John's.

Spell's gift to the Library

Spell left fifty pounds to the Library, which appears to have been chiefly used to purchase a range of theological works.

Provenance markings

The books bought with the money given by Spell bear a book label detailing his gift. In translation this reads:

Given by the Reverend Thomas Spell, a most worthy President of this College and (with due deference to the most honoured founder) a father of this Library, the building of which he superintended, and which once built he also adorned; noted for his double genersoity, a kind spender of his own money and a wise manager of others', he repeated his generosity and pledged himself, as if in marriage, to the Library which had lately been born with the first fruits of kindness, and dying, as though to consumate the marriage, endowed it with 50 pounds.