in Lincolnshire. A ledger stone to one of his relatives in the Church of St John of Beverley, Whatton, near Aslockton is inscribed as follows: Hic jacet Thomas Cranmer, Armiger, qui obiit vicesimo septimo die mensis Maii, anno d(omi)ni. MD centesimo primo, cui(us) a(n)i(ma)e p(ro)p(i)cietur Deus Amen ("here lies Thomas Cranmer, Esquire, who died on the 27th day of May in the year of our lord 1601, on whose soul may God look upon with mercy"). The arms of the Cranmer and Aslockton families are displayed. The figure is that of a man in flowing hair and gown, and a purse at his right side. Their oldest son, John Cranmer, inherited the family estate, whereas Thomas and his younger brother Edmund were placed on the path to a clerical career. Early years (1489–1527) Historians know nothing definite about Cranmer's early schooling. He probably attended a grammar school in his village. At the age of 14, two years after the death of his father, he was sent to the newly created Jesus College, Cambridge. It took him eight years to attain his Bachelor of Arts degree, following a curriculum of logic, classical literature and philosophy. During this time, he began to collect medieval scholastic books, which he preserved faithfully throughout his life. For his master's degree he studied the humanists, Jacques Lefèvre d'Étaples and Erasmus. He finished the course in three years. Shortly after receiving his Master of Arts degree in 1515, he was elected to a Fellowship of Jesus College. Sometime after Cranmer took his MA, he married a woman named Joan. Although he was not yet a priest, he was obliged to give up his fellowship, resulting in the loss of his residence at Jesus College. To support himself and his wife, he took a job as a reader at Buckingham Hall (later reformed as Magdalene College). When Joan died during her first childbirth, Jesus College showed its regard for Cranmer by reinstating his fellowship. He began studying theology and by 1520 he had been ordained, the university already having named him as one of its preachers. He received his Doctor of Divinity degree in 1526. Not much is known about Cranmer's thoughts and experiences during his three decades at Cambridge. Traditionally, he has been portrayed as a humanist whose enthusiasm for biblical scholarship prepared him for the adoption of Lutheran ideas, which were spreading during the 1520s. A