Life

He was the eldest of Richard Taverner

Richard Taverner

Richard Taverner is best known for his Bible translation, The Most Sacred Bible whiche is the holy scripture, conteyning the old and new testament, translated into English, and newly recognized with great diligence after most faythful exemplars by Rychard Taverner, commonly known as Taverner's...

's younger brothers. He was a surveyor

Surveying

See Also: Public Land Survey SystemSurveying or land surveying is the technique, profession, and science of accurately determining the terrestrial or three-dimensional position of points and the distances and angles between them...

 and writer, said by Anthony Wood

Anthony Wood

Anthony Wood or Anthony à Wood was an English antiquary.-Early life:Anthony Wood was the fourth son of Thomas Wood , BCL of Oxford, where Anthony was born...

 in Athenae Oxonienses to have studied at Cambridge

University of Cambridge

The University of Cambridge is a public research university located in Cambridge, United Kingdom. It is the second-oldest university in both the United Kingdom and the English-speaking world , and the seventh-oldest globally...

 but not graduated, though university records do not confirm this.

Probably in the 1540s he became deputy to Sir Francis Jobson as surveyor for the Court of Augmentations

Court of Augmentations

The Court of Augmentations was established during the reign of King Henry VIII of England along with three lesser courts following the dissolution of the monasteries. Its primary function was to gain better control over the land and finances formerly held by the Roman Catholic Church in the kingdom...

, and later he was employed (also as deputy surveyor) by the exchequer until 1573 (we have surviving various reports by him on crown woods, in British Library, Lansdowne MSS 43, 56, 62). He was elected to Parliament in 1555 as a member for Newport-juxta-Launceston

Newport (Cornwall) (UK Parliament constituency)

Newport was a rotten borough situated in Cornwall. It is now within the town of Launceston, which was itself also a parliamentary borough at the same period...

, Cornwall (possibly at Jobson's instigation). He was also a writer of tracts on economic issues, such as ‘Remedies … of derth of victualles’ (Corpus Christi College, Cambridge, MS 376 - dedicated to Queen Elizabeth), a similar work sent to her two years previously (mentioned in the previous work's dedication), and - unprinted, but more influential - his ‘Arte of surveyinge’ of 1565.

With his wife, a member of the Hulcote family, he had three sons, one of whom, John, Wood reports became a surveyor.