John Chamber of Leeds and the Length of the Year

 

John Chamber 1546-1604 was born at Swillington near Leeds little is known of his early life but he was a fellow of Merton College, Oxford where he lectured on astronomy, with his friend Henry Savile, he would later go to Eton College. He became a clergyman of the Church of England and an author, especially on astronomy and astrology. He worked with Savile on the proposed introduction date of the Gregorian calendar. Chamber wrote several works where he claimed that astrology had many technical faults and only stupid people would rely on it. This caused him many problems because astrology was still regarded as a serious science at the time. In fact George Carleton bishop of Chichester had to defend his name after his death because the works he wrote regarding astrology were causing such an offence to astrologers.

He became a canon at St George’s Chapel, Windsor where he was entombed when he died in 1604.

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