Classic Hymns and Their Stories
Puzzle 09 · Isaac Watts and His World · Page 23 in print
Southampton Beginnings
Isaac Watts was born in Southampton on July 17, 1674. He was the eldest of nine children.
Jump to a word
The words
Acrostic
Verse whose line initials spell a word; young Watts wrote acrostics in his Bible. Early verse from his Southampton boyhood.
specialcollectionsuniversityofsouthampton.wor (opens a new tab)
All Saints
Southampton parish church of which Pinhorne was rector.
Bargate
Southampton’s medieval gatehouse, which held the town gaol. Where his father was held for nonconformity.
Clothier
Cloth merchant; trade of Watts’s father.
Dissenter
Protestant outside the Church of England. Religious identity of his family and congregation.
asaurc.org.uk: The History of Above Bar (opens a new tab) · Hymnary.org: Isaac Watts (opens a new tab)
Grammar School
Southampton’s free grammar school (now King Edward VI School).
Hymnary.org: Isaac Watts (opens a new tab) · Project Gutenberg: Isaac Watts; his life (opens a new tab)
Greek
Classical language Watts learned at school.
Hampshire
English county containing Southampton.
Huguenot
French Protestant ancestry attributed to Watts’s mother.
DNB: Watts, Isaac (1674-1748) (opens a new tab) · Project Gutenberg: Isaac Watts; his life (opens a new tab)
John Pinhorne
Rector of All Saints, Southampton, and master of the grammar school who taught Watts.
DNB: Watts, Isaac (1674-1748) (opens a new tab) · Project Gutenberg: Isaac Watts; his life (opens a new tab)
Latin
Classical language Watts learned at school.
Prison
The confinement endured by Watts’s father for his religious opinions.
Sarah Taunton
Watts’s mother, wife of Isaac Watts senior. His mother, from a Southampton alderman’s family.
specialcollectionsuniversityofsouthampton.wor (opens a new tab)
Southampton
English port town where Watts was born in 1674.
Toleration Act
1689 Act of Parliament granting nonconformists freedom of worship. Ended the legal pressure on his father’s congregation when Watts was fifteen.
Sources
- Isaac Watts (1674-1748) Son of Southampton, Father of English HymnologyUniversity of Southampton Special Collections
- Isaac WattsHymnary.org
- Heritage: 350 years since the birth of Southampton born hymn writer, Isaac WattsIn Common (Southampton)
- Isaac Watts; his life and writings, his homes and friendsProject Gutenberg (E. Paxton Hood, 1875)
- The History of Above Bar ChurchAvenue St Andrews United Reformed Church, Southampton
- Isaac WattsWikipedia
- Dictionary of National Biography: Watts, Isaac (1674-1748)Dictionary of National Biography (via CCEL)
- Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900: Watts, IsaacDictionary of National Biography (1885–1900), public domain