John de Northwode
Archdeacon and university chancellor

John Northwood was an English medieval churchman and university chancellor.
Origins
Born about 1310, he was the son of John Northwood (died 1318) and his wife Agnes Grandison, daughter of Sir William Grandison (died 1335), and thus the nephew of John Grandison, bishop of Exeter.
Career
From 29 November 1329 until 1330, he was Archdeacon of Exeter in Devon, later holding the post of Archdeacon of Totnes, also in Devon, from 1338 until 1349. He was appointed Chancellor of the University of Oxford from 1345 to 1349. He died in or after 1349 and a brass plaque to his memory was placed in the collegiate church of Ottery St Mary in Devon.
Begin with the source’s own compact description: “John de Northwode” is archdeacon and university chancellor. The dossier treats that line as a proposition to test through John, Northwode and Archdeacon, not as a finished interpretation.
Why this record matters
The phrase “archdeacon and university chancellor” supplies a clear boundary for inquiry. It also exposes the unanswered questions: who defined that boundary, when it became stable and which sources sit outside it.
Chronology, provenance and viewpoint should be read together before a broad social or political interpretation is accepted. The source revision retrieved here is dated Feb 13, 2025. The linked authority identifier is Q6265605. None of the 0 selected statements returned an explicit reference. The first chronological checks are 1310, 1318, 1335 and 1329.
Later summaries often reconcile disputed chronology or motive more neatly than the contemporary record permits. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.
How to read it
Compare institutional narratives with records created by participants and affected communities. Dates and formal titles are useful anchors, but not substitutes for context.
- Event chronology
- Institutional context
- Locating named record creators
Contemporary correspondence, government or organizational records, oral histories and cited historical scholarship.
Three-step research path
- Establish the record: confirm the title “John de Northwode”, its source revision and the description used here.
- Expand the search: follow John de Northwode primary sources, John de Northwode archive and John research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
- Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.
Questions for further research
- Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “John de Northwode”?
- Who created the surviving record, and for what administrative purpose?
- Which voices are present, absent or mediated by the institution?
Search terms from this dossier
This entry incorporates text from “John de Northwode” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.