Ward's Book of Days.
Pages of interesting anniversaries.
What happened on this day in history.
JANUARY 22nd
On this day in history in 1561, was born Francis Bacon.
Bacon was a lawyer, politician, philosopher, author and scientist. Bacon trained as a lawyer and became an M.P. in 1584. His early career was devoted to writing of essays on a wide variety of subjects. Some people even say he wrote the works of Shakespeare. There is some evidence that Bacon did indeed write Shakespeare. Bacon was responsible for having the Bible translated into English and even translated many passages personally. Many of the idioms and styles of language in the Authorised Version of the Bible bear an uncanny resemblance to Shakespeare’s work.
When James I came to the throne, Bacon rose to political prominence. He raised objections to James’ grand design for unification of England and Scotland, and objected to many more of James’ grand schemes. Despite making himself objectionable at The Court, Bacon rose to become Solicitor general, Attorney General and eventually Lord Chancellor but sadly his public career came to an abrupt end when he was convicted of taking bribes.
With his professional career at an end, Bacon took to the philosophy of science. One of his notions was that food could be preserved if it were frozen. His method of experiment was to stuff a chicken with snow in the hope that the meat would remain wholesome. Sadly the project ended in disaster when Bacon consumed the frozen meal and caught a cold and subsequently died.
©2006 Ward’s Book of Days