# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Bond, Nicholas

1904 Errata appended.
​BOND, NICHOLAS (1540–1608), president of Magdalen College, Oxford, born in 1540, was a native of Lincolnshire. He matriculated as a pensioner of St. John's College, Cambridge, 27 May 1559; was elected a Lady Margaret scholar on 27 July following; proceeded B.A. in 1563-4; became a fellow of Magdalen College, Oxford, in 1565; was admitted M.A. at Oxford, 17 Oct. 1574, and D.D. 15 July 1580. In 1574 he received from the crown the rectory of Bourton-on-the-water, Gloucestershire; in 1575 resigned his fellowship at Magdalen; on 24 March 1581-2 was installed canon of Westminster; in 1584 was recommended by Archbishop Whitgift to the queen for the mastership of the Temple, vacant by the death of Richard Alvey [q. v.] In October 1585 he complained to the bishop of Winchester that he was unable to contribute towards the furnishing of troops for the Low Countries, and begged exemption from the charge. Early in 1586 Cecil noted in a memorandum that Bond deserved promotion to a deanery. He became rector of Britwell, Oxfordshire, on 3 May 1586, and of Alresford, Hampshire, in 1590; he also held the offices of chaplain of the Savoy and chaplain-in-ordinary to the queen.
Bond was vice-chancellor of Oxford University from 16 July 1590 to 16 July 1591, and from 13 July 1592 to 13 July 1593. On 6 April 1590 he became president of Magdalen College. The queen had directed the fellows of the college to elect Bond to that office some months previously; but another candidate, Ralph Smith, then received a majority of the votes, and Bond's friends had recourse to a ruse by which the announcement of the result was delayed beyond the statutable time within which the fellows were lawfully able to exercise their rights of election. The duty of appointing the president thus reverted to the crown, and it was exercised in favour of Bond. Bond was brought into personal relations with Queen Elizabeth on her visit to Oxford in September 1592, during his second tenure of the vice-chancellorship. He received Prince Henry when the prince took up his residence at Magdalen, 27 Aug. 1605 (Nichols's Progresses, i. 547). As an executor of the will of the Countess of Sussex, 10 Sept. 1595, Bond helped to found Sidney Sussex College, Cambridge, on the site of the dissolved Greyfriars House. There is a letter from Bond to Lord Lisle relating to some property of Magdalen College among the Addit. MSS (15914, f. 66) at the British Museum. Bond died on 8 Feb. 1607-8, and was buried in the chapel of Magdalen College, where there is an inscription to his memory. He left 10l. and some books to the Bodleian Library. He contributed Latin verses to the collection published at Oxford on the death of Queen Elizabeth, and Wood prints in his 'Annals' some notes sent by Bond to Archbishop Bancroft concerning a complaint made by Sir Christopher Hatton of the defective discipline of the university during Bond's first tenure of the vice-chancellorship. Bond is sometimes erroneously confounded with Nicholas Bownde [q. v.]
S. L. L.
Dictionary of National Biography, Errata (1904), p.31 N.B.— f.e. stands for from end and l.l. for last line
| Page | Col. | Line | |
| 341 | i | 11 f.e. | Bond, Nicholas: for 1590 read 1589 and for 1591 read 1590 |