King, William

(1663-1712)

   Born in London, the son of Ezekiel King, from whom he inherited a small estate in Middlesex. Educated at Westminster School, King graduated M.A. from Christ Church, Oxford, in 1688 and was made doctor of civil law in 1692. He was secretary to Princess Anne (who was queen from 1702 to 1714) and judge of the admiralty court in Ireland. He wrote the poem "Mully of Mountown" in 1704 (Mountown is near Dublin; Mully was the red cow that furnished him with milk). He is buried in the North Cloister of Westminster Abbey. He is noted for his humorous and satirical writings. Some of his publications: Some Remarks on the Tale of a Tub, 1704. Miscellanies in Prose and Verse, 1709. Historical Account of the Heathen Gods and Heroes, 1710. Rufinus, or the Favourite, 1712. Britain's Palladium, 1712 (poetry). Some of his poems: "Apple Pye," "Imitation of Horace," "Orpheus and Eurydice (the Fairy Feast)," "The Art of Cookery," "The Art of Love," "The Art of Making Puddings," "The Beggar Woman," "The Furmetory."

   Sources: Dictionary of National Biography. Electronic Edition 1.1. Oxford University Press, 1997. EighteenthCentury English Verse. Dennis Davison, ed. Penguin Books, 1988. Encyclopedia.com (http://www.encyclopedia.com/html). English Poetry, Second Edition Bibliography (http:// collections.chadwyck.co.uk/html/ep2/bibliography/g.htm). English Poetry: Author Search. Chadwyck-Healey Ltd., 1995 (http://www.lib.utexas.edu:8080/search/epoetry/author.html). Fellow Mortals: An Anthology of Animal Verse. Roy Fuller, ed. Macdonald and Evans, 1981. The National Portrait Gallery (www.npg.org.uk). Oldpoetry (www.oldpoetry.com). The Columbia Granger's Index to Poetry. 11th ed. The Columbia Granger's World of Poetry, Columbia University Press, 2005 (http://www.columbiagrangers.org). The Faber Book of Useful Verse. Simon Brett, ed. Faber and Faber, 1981. The Oxford Companion to English Literature. 6th edition. Margaret Drabble, ed. Oxford University Press, 2000. Mully of Mountown. See Samuel Johnson's Lives of the English Poets, 1779-1781 (http://www2.hn.psu.edu/Faculty/KKemmerer/poets/preface.htm). Westminster Abbey Official Guide (no date).