Author: Cottle, Amos Simon
Biography:
COTTLE, Amos Simon (c. 1768-1800: ODNB)
He was probably born in 1768, one of at least eight children of Robert Cottle and his wife Sarah Simon/Symon, who had married at Trowbridge, Wiltshire, in 1761. There is no baptism record and his age at death was recorded as 34. The Cambridge registers record his age as 28 in 1795. The earlier record is probably more reliable. His younger brother was Joseph Cottle (q.v.). He was educated at John Henderson’s classical school at Hanham, near Bristol, and then proceeded to Magdalene College Cambridge (matric. 1795, BA 1799). He then entered Clifford’s Inn, London, one of the three inns of Chancery. In Jan. 1800, with ill-health preventing further literary work, he applied to the RLF for assistance and was awarded twelve guineas. He died on 28 Sept. 1800, at his chambers in Clifford’s Inn and was buried on 3 Oct. at St. Olave’s Baptist Chapel, Maze Pond, Southwark, London. It is not known why or when he left the established church. He does not seem to have married. He published his translation, Icelandic Poetry, or The Edda of Saemund (1797) but it is not known where he learned Icelandic (if he ever did) and it is quite possible he used a Latin version. Robert Southey’s (q.v.) “To Amos Cottle” (“Amos! I did not leave without regret”) was prefixed to the translation and is now mostly remembered for its panegyric of Mary Wollstonecraft. His brother, Joseph Cottle, published his poems posthumously, with a short biographical note, in Malvern Hills and Other Poems. Third Edition (1802), 134-56, and in the second volume of the fourth edition of 1829 (2: 259-75). These consisted mostly of half a dozen sonnets and a few other poems. The 1829 edition reprinted Southey’s address. A further poem, a fable, was printed in Joseph Cottle’s Early Recollections(1837) (124-5). (ODNB 22 Feb. 2023; DNB; ancestry.co.uk 22 Feb. 2023; findmypast.co.uk 22 Feb. 2023; RLF, 1/80; Kentish Gazette 3 Oct. 1800; GM Oct. 1800, 1007; Romantic-circles.org) AA
Other Names:
- Amos Cottle