SOURCE: Hughes, Celia. “Coverdale's Alter Ego.” Bulletin of the John Rylands University Library of Manchester, 65, no. 1 (Autumn, 1982): 100-24.

In the following essay, Hughes considers Coverdale's role as a religious reformer and in this context examines his lesser-known works of translation, as well as his original compositions.

The name of Miles Coverdale is so closely associated with Bible translation that it is easy to overlook the other aspect of his life, that of the reformer. He played a not insignificant part in spreading the ideas of the Continental Reformers in England, and during his lifetime from 1488 to 1569 experienced eight decades of crucial importance in religious history. In his first forty years he became an Austin friar in Cambridge and witnessed the coming of Erasmian and Lutheran teaching from its early stages. Between 1528 and 1559 he spent long periods abroad in such cities as Antwerp, Strasbourg, and Geneva; and his old...