Politics, Publishing and Patronage: The Collaborative Roles of Subscribers and Patrons in the Publishing of Thomas Hearne at Oxford, 1710-1720

Thomas Hearne, 1678–1735, was an Oxford resident of St. Edmund Hall and sublibrarian at the Bodleian Library who published by subscription through use of the University Press at Oxford. Hearne's rejection of the Oaths of Allegiance to George I led to his removal from the library in 1716, leaving him entirely dependent upon patrons and subscribers for the remainder of his publishing career. This dissertation shows that the relationship between publisher and patron was pro-active, collaborative and was undergirded by a legitimate political ideology subsequently marginalized by the dominant Whig historical perspective. Hearne's Jacobitism led invariably to conflict with authorities at Oxford who restricted his access to the press and charged Hearne with seditious libel. With access to the press denied, Hearne's patrons exerted their influence at the highest level of University governance in order to free the publisher from prosecution and guarantee access to the press. The publication of William of Newburgh's Chronicle, widely understood at the time as a defense of hereditary right, is presented to show how patrons and subscribers such as Richard and Samuel Mead, John Bridges, John Anstis, Thomas and Richard Rawlinson, Thomas Wagstaffe, Sir Thomas Sebright and William King influenced publication and were instrumental in Hearne's defense.