BOSHAM, HERBERT DE°

BOSHAM, HERBERT DE° (before 1139–c. 1194), companion and biographer of Archbishop Thomas Becket. Born in Bosham, England, he studied in Paris under Peter Lombard, and studied Hebrew probably under Andrew of St. Victor. In addition to editing the Lombard's (thereafter standard) Great Gloss to the Pauline Epistles and to the Psalter, he composed (after 1190) a commentary on Jerome's literal Latin translation of the Psalms (iuxta Hebraeos). Herbert's work is replete with midrashic and other Jewish material taken mainly from Rashi, through whom he quotes by name menahem b. jacob ibn saruq and dunash ibn labrat ; but the commentary, which is known from a unique manuscript in London (St. Paul's Cathedral), apparently was ignored until it was rediscovered in the 20th century. It is said that his Hebrew studies at times caused him to doubt the truth of Christianity. -BIBLIOGRAPHY: R. Loewe, in: JHSET, 17 (1951–52), 225–49, includes bibliography; idem, in: Biblica, 34 (1953), 44–77, 159–92, 275–98 (Eng.); S. Smalley, The Study of the Bible in the Middle Ages (1952), index, S.V. Herbert of Bosham. ADD. BIBLIOGRAPHY: ODNB; F. Barlow, Thomas Beckett and His Clerks (1987). (Raphael Loewe)