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Henry Knighton (or Knyghton) (died c. 1396, in England) was an Augustinians Canons Regular at the abbey of Leicester Abbey, Leicester, England, and an ecclesiastical historian (chronicler).Vaughan, p. 246 footnote 24 He wrote a history of England from the Norman conquest until 1396, thought to be the year he died.
Knighton was a supporter of King Edward III and wrote well of him,Drees, p. 271 although historian Louisa D. Duls labels Knighton as a member of the "Lancastrian Detractors of Richard" school.Duls, pp. 212–214, 250 Knighton calls five of King Richard II's trusted advisors – Robert de Vere, Alexander Neville (Archbishop of York), Sir Michael de la Pole, 1st Earl of Suffolk (lord chancellor), Sir Robert Tresilian (chief justice of the King's Bench), and Sir Nicholas Brembre – the five evil seducers of the king ("quinque nephandi seductores regis") .Martin, p. 392
Knighton lived during the same time period as John Wycliffe and had personal knowledge of him as he went to Oxford when Wycliffe was a master there. However he was neither directly associated with Wycliffe or nor with the ("Wycliffites", followers of Wycliffe's philosophies). Knighton has been called the first historian of Lollardy.Martin, p. xviii He writes that those voicing Church complaints and echoing the principles of Wycliffe in 1382, hence being associated with the principles of the Lollards, were every second man in the Kingdom of England.Vaughan, p. 150
Knighton did not care for Wycliffe's church reform doctrines or the Lollards as they threatened his monastic way of life or his personal safety. THE MIND'S EYE thesis (p. 44-47) by Sara Keehan He respected Wycliffe as an academic scholar, however, writing that he was a famous and important ecclesiastic and philosopher of the time.Deanesly, p. 239
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