View source for Peter Bales

{{Use dmy dates|date=April 2022}}
{{Infobox artist
| name           = Peter Bales
| image          = 
| imagesize      =
| caption        = 
| birth_name     = 
| birth_date     = 1547
| birth_place    = [[London]], [[England]]
| occupation     = [[Calligrapher]]
| death_date     = 1610
| death_place    = 
| education      =
| field          = 
| spouse         = 
}}

'''Peter Bales''' (1547–1610?) was an English [[calligrapher]] and one of the inventors of [[shorthand|shorthand writing]]. He was born in London in 1547, and is described by [[Anthony Wood (antiquary)|Anthony Wood]] as a "most dexterous person in his profession, to the great wonder of scholars and others". We are also informed that "he spent several years in sciences among [[Oxonian]]s, particularly, as it seems, in [[Worcester College, Oxford|Gloucester Hall]]; but that study, which he used for a diversion only, proved at length an employment of profit." He is mentioned for his skill in [[micrography]] in ''[[Raphael Holinshed|Holinshed's Chronicle]]''.<ref name="EB1911">{{EB1911|inline=1|wstitle=Bales, Peter|volume=3|page=250}}</ref>

[[John Evelyn]] wrote:
{{blockquote|[[Hadrian Junius]], speaking as a miracle of somebody who wrote the [[Apostles' Creed]] and the beginning of [[Gospel of John|St. John's Gospel]] within the compass of a [[Farthing (British coin)|farthing]]: what would he have said of our famous Peter Bales, who, in the year 1575, wrote the [[Lord's Prayer]], the [[Creed]], [[Ten Commandments|Decalogue]], with two short prayers in Latin, his own name, motto, day of the month, year of the Lord, and reign of the queen, to whom he presented it at [[Hampton Court]], all of it written within the circle of a single penny, inchased in a ring and borders of gold, and covered with a crystal, so accurately wrought as to be very plainly legible; to the great admiration of her majesty, the whole privy council, and several ambassadors then at court?}}

Bales was likewise very dexterous in imitating handwritings, and between 1576 and 1590 was employed by Secretary Walsingham in certain political manoeuvres. We find him at the head of a school near the [[Old Bailey]], [[London]], in 1590, in which year he published his ''Writing Schoolemaster, in three Parts''. This book included an ''Arte of Brachygraphie'', one of the earliest attempts to construct a system of shorthand. In 1595 he had a great trial of skill with one Daniel Johnson, for a golden pen valued at £20, and won it; and a contemporary author further relates that he had also the arms of calligraphy given him, which are ''azure, a pen or'' (blue with a gold pen). Bales died about the year 1610.<ref name="EB1911"/>

==References==
{{reflist}}

{{Authority control}}

{{EB1911 article with no significant updates}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Bales, Peter}}
[[Category:1547 births]]
[[Category:1610s deaths]]
[[Category:English calligraphers]]
[[Category:Alumni of Gloucester Hall, Oxford]]
[[Category:Orthographers]]
[[Category:Artists from London]]
[[Category:16th-century English people]]
[[Category:17th-century English artists]]
[[Category:17th-century English inventors]]


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