'John Yonge' (c. 1465 -
April 25,
1516),
English ecclesiastic and
diplomatist, was born at Heyford,
Oxfordshire, and educated at
Winchester and
New College, Oxford, where he became a fellow in
1485. Probably the son of John Yonge, Lord Mayor of London (1466). He was ordained in
1500 and held several livings before receiving his first diplomatic mission to arrange a commercial treaty with the
archduke of Austria in 1504, and in the
Low Countries in
1506 in connection with the projected marriage between
Henry VII and
Margaret of Savoy.
In
1507 he was made
Master of the Rolls, and in the following year was employed in various diplomatic missions. He was one of the ambassadors who arranged the
Holy League in
1513, and accompanied
Henry VIII during the ensuing campaign.
In
1514 he was made
dean of York in succession to
Wolsey, and in 1515 he was one of the commissioners for renewing the peace with
Francis I. He died in London on the 25th of April 1516. Yonge was on terms of intimate friendship with
Dean Colet, and was a correspondent of
Erasmus.
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