Life

He was baptised at Saffron Walden

Saffron Walden

Saffron Walden is a medium-sized market town in the Uttlesford district of Essex, England. It is located north of Bishop's Stortford, south of Cambridge and approx north of London...

, Essex

Essex

Essex is a ceremonial and non-metropolitan county in the East region of England, and one of the home counties. It is located to the northeast of Greater London. It borders with Cambridgeshire and Suffolk to the north, Hertfordshire to the west, Kent to the South and London to the south west...

, 13 February 1564, the son of John Harvey, master ropemaker, and younger brother of Gabriel Harvey

Gabriel Harvey

Gabriel Harvey was an English writer. Harvey was a notable scholar, though his reputation suffered from his quarrel with Thomas Nashe...

 and of Richard Harvey. He matriculated as a pensioner of Queens' College, Cambridge

Queens' College, Cambridge

Queens' College is a constituent college of the University of Cambridge, England.The college was founded in 1448 by Margaret of Anjou , and refounded in 1465 by Elizabeth Woodville...

, in June 1578 (B.A. 1580 and M.A. 1584).

In 1587 the university granted him a license to practise physic, and he became a practitioner at King's Lynn

King's Lynn

King's Lynn is a sea port and market town in the ceremonial county of Norfolk in the East of England. It is situated north of London and west of Norwich. The population of the town is 42,800....

 in Norfolk. Robert Greene

Robert Greene

Robert Greene may refer to:*Robert Greene , English writer*Robert Greene *Robert Greene American author of books on strategy*Robert L. Greene, American psychologist...

's contemptuous reference to Harvey and Harvey's father and two brothers in his ‘Quippe for an Upstart Courtier’ (1592) led to Gabriel Harvey's defence of his family in his ‘Foure Letters’ (1592). Gabriel describes John as ‘a proper toward man,’ ‘a skilful physician,’ and a M.D. of Cambridge, and mentions that he died, aged 29, shortly after returning to Lynn from Norwich in July 1592. He supplies a Latin epitaph. ‘John Harvey's Welcome to Robert Greene’ is the title of a sonnet included in Gabriel Harvey's ‘Foure Letters.’

Works

Harvey published:

• ‘An astrologicall addition or supplement to be annexed to the late discourse [by his brother Richard Harvey ] upon the Great Conjunction of Saturn and Jupiter, together with the Learned Worke of Hermes Trismegistus intituled Iatromathematica, that is his Physical Mathematiques. … Lately englished by Iohn Harvey at the request of M. Charles P.,’ London, 1583 (by Richard Watkins).
• ‘A Discoursive Probleme concerning Prophesies, how far they are to be valued or credited,’ London (J. Jackson for Richard Watkins), 1588.
• ‘An Almanacke or annuall Calendar, with a Compendious Prognostication for … 1589,’ London, 1588 (Lambeth).