Life

He was born in Westbury, Shropshire

Westbury, Shropshire

Westbury is a village and parish in Shropshire, England. It lies 8 miles west of the town of Shrewsbury, very close to the Wales-England border.During the Roman settlement of Britain it was an outpost of Wroxeter....

. After being educated at the Adams' Grammar School

Adams' Grammar School

Adams' Grammar School is a selective state grammar school in Newport, Shropshire, rated by the Office for Standards in Education, Children's Services and Skills as a Grade 1 outstanding school , the latest OFSTED report concludes "this is a truly impressive school"...

 in Newport, Shropshire

Newport, Shropshire

Newport is a market town in the borough of Telford and Wrekin and ceremonial county of Shropshire, England. It lies some north of Telford and some west of Stafford sitting on the Shropshire/Staffordshire border...

 and at Christ Church, Oxford

Christ Church, Oxford

Christ Church or house of Christ, and thus sometimes known as The House), is one of the largest constituent colleges of the University of Oxford in England...

, he took orders in 1832, became chaplain of Christ Church, sublibrarian of the Bodleian

Bodleian Library

The Bodleian Library , the main research library of the University of Oxford, is one of the oldest libraries in Europe, and in Britain is second in size only to the British Library...

, and, in 1837, assistant keeper of manuscripts in the British Museum

British Museum

The British Museum is a museum of human history and culture in London. Its collections, which number more than seven million objects, are amongst the largest and most comprehensive in the world and originate from all continents, illustrating and documenting the story of human culture from its...

. He was afterwards appointed select preacher to the University of Oxford

University of Oxford

The University of Oxford is a university located in Oxford, United Kingdom. It is the second-oldest surviving university in the world and the oldest in the English-speaking world. Although its exact date of foundation is unclear, there is evidence of teaching as far back as 1096...

, chaplain in ordinary to the queen, rector of St Margaret's, Westminster, and canon of Westminster Abbey

Westminster Abbey

The Collegiate Church of St Peter at Westminster, popularly known as Westminster Abbey, is a large, mainly Gothic church, in the City of Westminster, London, United Kingdom, located just to the west of the Palace of Westminster. It is the traditional place of coronation and burial site for English,...

. He was elected a fellow of the Royal Society

Royal Society

The Royal Society of London for Improving Natural Knowledge, known simply as the Royal Society, is a learned society for science, and is possibly the oldest such society in existence. Founded in November 1660, it was granted a Royal Charter by King Charles II as the "Royal Society of London"...

 and a trustee of the British Museum

British Museum

The British Museum is a museum of human history and culture in London. Its collections, which number more than seven million objects, are amongst the largest and most comprehensive in the world and originate from all continents, illustrating and documenting the story of human culture from its...

, and was also honored by several continental societies. For a time Cureton also served as curate of St.Andrew's, Odddington, Oxfordshire.

Works

Cureton's most remarkable work was the edition with notes and an English translation of the Epistles of Ignatius to Polycarp

Polycarp

Saint Polycarp was a 2nd century Christian bishop of Smyrna. According to the Martyrdom of Polycarp, he died a martyr, bound and burned at the stake, then stabbed when the fire failed to touch him...

, the Ephesians

Epistle to the Ephesians

The Epistle of Paul to the Ephesians, often shortened to Ephesians, is the tenth book of the New Testament. Its authorship has traditionally been credited to Paul, but it is considered by some scholars to be "deutero-Pauline," that is, written in Paul's name by a later author strongly influenced by...

 and the Romans

Epistle to the Romans

The Epistle of Paul to the Romans, often shortened to Romans, is the sixth book in the New Testament. Biblical scholars agree that it was composed by the Apostle Paul to explain that Salvation is offered through the Gospel of Jesus Christ...

, from a Syriac

Syriac language

Syriac is a dialect of Middle Aramaic that was once spoken across much of the Fertile Crescent. Having first appeared as a script in the 1st century AD after being spoken as an unwritten language for five centuries, Classical Syriac became a major literary language throughout the Middle East from...

 manuscript that had been found in the monastery of St Mary Deipara, in the desert of Nitria, near Cairo

Cairo

Cairo , is the capital of Egypt and the largest city in the Arab world and Africa, and the 16th largest metropolitan area in the world. Nicknamed "The City of a Thousand Minarets" for its preponderance of Islamic architecture, Cairo has long been a centre of the region's political and cultural life...

. He held that the manuscript he used gave the truest text, that all other texts were inaccurate, and that the epistles contained in the manuscript were the only genuine epistles of Ignatius that we possess, a view which received the support of Ferdinand Christian Baur

Ferdinand Christian Baur

Ferdinand Christian Baur was a German theologian and leader of the Tübingen school of theology...

, Bunsen

Christian Charles Josias Bunsen

Christian Charles Josias, Baron von Bunsen was a German diplomat and scholar.-Early life and education:Bunsen was born at Korbach, an old town in the little German principality of Waldeck....

, and many other eminent scholars, but which was opposed by Charles Wordsworth

Charles Wordsworth

The Reverend Charles Wordsworth, M.A. was bishop of Bishop of St Andrews, Dunkeld and Dunblane in Scotland. He was a classical scholar, and taught at a public schools in England and Scotland...

 and by several German scholars, and is now generally abandoned. Cureton supported his view by his Vindiciae Ignatianae and his Corpus Ignatianum, a Complete Collection of the Ignatian Epistles, genuine, interpolated and spurious.

He also edited:

• a partial Syriac text of the Festal Letters of St Athanasius, which was translated into English by Henry Burgess
  Henry Burgess (clergyman)
  -Life:He was educated at a dissenting college at Stepney, where he studied Hebrew as well as the classics. After ministering to a nonconformist congregation, he was ordained deacon in 1850 and priest in 1851 by Prince Lee, bishop of Manchester. He took the degree of LL.D. at Glasgow University in...
  
   (1854), and published in the Library of Fathers of the Holy Catholic Church;
• Remains of a very Ancient Recension of the Four Gospels in Syriac, hitherto unknown in Europe; This came to be known as the Curetonian Gospels
  Curetonian Gospels
  The Curetonian Gospels, designated by the siglum syrcur, are contained in a manuscript of the four gospels of the New Testament in Old Syriac, a translation from the Aramaic originals, according to William Cureton differing considerably from the canonical Greek texts, with which they had been...
  
   after Cureton.
• Spicilegium Syriacum, containing Remains of Bardesan, Meliton, Ambrose
  Ambrose
  Aurelius Ambrosius, better known in English as Saint Ambrose , was a bishop of Milan who became one of the most influential ecclesiastical figures of the 4th century. He was one of the four original doctors of the Church.-Political career:Ambrose was born into a Roman Christian family between about...
  
  , Mara Bar Serapion;
• The third Part of the Ecclesiastical History of John, Bishop of Ephesus, which was translated by Robert Payne Smith;
• Fragments of the Iliad
  Iliad
  The Iliad is an epic poem in dactylic hexameters, traditionally attributed to Homer. Set during the Trojan War, the ten-year siege of the city of Troy by a coalition of Greek states, it tells of the battles and events during the weeks of a quarrel between King Agamemnon and the warrior Achilles...
  
   of Homer
  Homer
  In the Western classical tradition Homer , is the author of the Iliad and the Odyssey, and is revered as the greatest ancient Greek epic poet. These epics lie at the beginning of the Western canon of literature, and have had an enormous influence on the history of literature.When he lived is...
  
   from a Syriac Palimpsest;
• an Arabic work known as the Thirty-first Chapter of the Book entitled The Lamp that guides to Salvation, written by a Christian of Tekrit;
• The Book of Religious and Philosophical Sects, by Mohammed al Sharastani;
• a Commentary on the Book of Lamentations
  Book of Lamentations
  The Book of Lamentations ) is a poetic book of the Hebrew Bible composed by the Jewish prophet Jeremiah. It mourns the destruction of Jerusalem and the Holy Temple in the 6th Century BCE....
  
  , by Rabbi Tanchum;
• the Pillar of the Creed of the Sunnites.

Cureton also published several sermons, among which was one entitled The Doctrine of the Trinity not Speculative but Practical. After his death William Wright

William Wright (orientalist)

William Wright was a famous British Orientalist, and Professor of Arabic in the University of Cambridge. Many of his works on Syriac literature are still in print and of considerable scholarly value, especially the catalogues of the holdings of the British Library and Cambridge University Library...

 edited with a preface the Ancient Syriac Documents relative to the earliest Establishment of Christianity in Edessa

Edessa, Mesopotamia

Edessa is the Greek name of an Aramaic town in northern Mesopotamia, as refounded by Seleucus I Nicator. For the modern history of the city, see Şanlıurfa.-Names:...

and the neighboring Countries, from the Year of our Lords Ascension to the beginning of the Fourth Century; discovered, edited and annotated by the late W. Cureton.