NOWELL, ALEXANDER (15o7?-16o2), dean of St. Paul's, London, son of John Nowell of Read Hall, Whalley, Lan cashire, was educated at Brasenose College, Oxford, where he is said to have shared rooms with John Foxe. He was elected fellow of Brasenose in 1526. He became master of Westminster school (1543), and prebendary of Westminster (1551). In Mary's reign he was deprived of his prebend, probably as being a married man, before May and sought refuge at Strasbourg and Frankfort, where he developed puritan and almost presbyterian views. He submitted, however, to the Elizabethan settlement of religion, and was rewarded with the archdeaconry of Middlesex, a canonry at Canterbury and in 156o with the deanery of St. Paul's. His ser mons occasionally created some stir, and on one occasion Eliza beth interrupted his sermon, telling him to stick to his text and cease slighting the crucifix. He held the deanery of St. Paul's for
forty-two years, surviving until Feb. 13, 1602. Nowell is believed to have composed the Catechism inserted before the Order of Con firmation in the Prayer Book of 1549, which was supplemented in 1604 and is still in use. Early in Elizabeth's reign he wrote a larger catechism, to serve as a statement of Protestant principles; it was printed in 157o, and in the same year appeared his "middle" catechism, designed for the instruction of "simple curates." See R. Churton, Life of Alexander Nowell (1809) ; G. Burnet, His tory of the Reformation (new ed., 1865) ; and R. W. Dixon, History of the Church of England. Also the Works of John Strype ; the Publica tions of the Parker Society ; the Calendar of State Papers, Domestic; and the Diet. Nat. Biog., vol. lv.