Editing Jonathan Swift (section)

===Early life===
Jonathan Swift was born on 30 November 1667 in [[Dublin]] in the [[Kingdom of Ireland]]. He was the second child and only son of Jonathan Swift (1640–1667) and his wife Abigail Erick (or Herrick) of [[Frisby on the Wreake]] in [[Leicestershire]].<ref>{{cite DNB|wstitle=Swift, Jonathan|last=Stephen|first=Leslie|author-link= Leslie Stephen |volume=55|pages=204-227|short=1}}</ref> His father was a native of [[Goodrich, Herefordshire|Goodrich]], Herefordshire, but he accompanied his brothers to [[Ireland]] to seek their fortunes in law after their [[royalist]] father's estate was brought to ruin during the [[English Civil War]]. His maternal grandfather, James Ericke, was the vicar of [[Thornton in Leicestershire]]. In 1634 the vicar was convicted of [[Puritan]] practices. Sometime thereafter, Ericke and his family, including his young daughter Abigail, fled to Ireland.<ref>{{cite book |last=Stubbs |first=John |title=Jonathan Swift: The Reluctant Rebel |pages=25–26 |publisher=WW Norton & Co |location=New York |date=2016}}</ref>

Swift's father joined his elder brother, Godwin, in the practice of law in Ireland.<ref>Stubbs (2016), p. 43.</ref> He died in Dublin about seven months before his namesake was born.<ref>{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=so6ZNdlRfLIC&q=jonathan+swift%27s+father+died&pg=PA412|title=Jonathan Swift|isbn=978-1438108513|last1=Degategno|first1=Paul J.|last2=Jay Stubblefield|first2=R.|year=2014|publisher=Infobase |access-date=4 October 2020|archive-date=26 January 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210126142416/https://books.google.com/books?id=so6ZNdlRfLIC&q=jonathan+swift%27s+father+died&pg=PA412|url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|url=http://bnreview.barnesandnoble.com/t5/A-Reading-Life/Jonathan-Swift-His-Life-and-His-World/ba-p/11769|title=Jonathan Swift: His Life and His World|work=The Barnes & Noble Review|access-date=16 March 2014|archive-date=2 July 2014|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140702000858/http://bnreview.barnesandnoble.com/t5/A-Reading-Life/Jonathan-Swift-His-Life-and-His-World/ba-p/11769|url-status=live}}</ref> He died of [[syphilis]], which he said he got from dirty sheets when out of town.<ref>Stubbs (2016), p. 54.</ref>

His mother returned to England after his birth, leaving him in the care of his uncle Godwin Swift (1628–1695), a close friend and confidant of [[John Temple (judge)|Sir John Temple]], whose son later employed Swift as his secretary.<ref name=LS205>Stephen ''DNB'', p. 205.</ref>

At the age of one, child Jonathan was taken by his [[wet nurse]] to her hometown of [[Whitehaven]], [[Cumberland]], England. He said that there he learned to read the Bible. His nurse returned him to his mother, still in Ireland, when he was three.<ref>Stubbs (2016), pp. 58–63.</ref><br>

[[File:Houghton Lowell 1816.7.3 - Life of Jonathan Swift, p 8.jpg|thumb|left|The house in which Swift was born; 1865 illustration]]
Swift's family had several interesting literary connections. His grandmother Elizabeth (Dryden) Swift was the niece of [[Sir Erasmus Dryden, 1st Baronet|Sir Erasmus Dryden]], grandfather of poet [[John Dryden]]. The same grandmother's aunt Katherine (Throckmorton) Dryden was a first cousin of [[Elizabeth Raleigh|Elizabeth]], wife of [[Sir Walter Raleigh]]. His great-great-grandmother Margaret (Godwin) Swift was the sister of [[Francis Godwin]], author of ''[[The Man in the Moone]]'' which influenced parts of Swift's ''[[Gulliver's Travels]]''. His uncle Thomas Swift married a daughter of poet and playwright [[Sir William Davenant]], a godson of [[William Shakespeare]].

Swift's benefactor and uncle Godwin Swift took primary responsibility for the young man, sending him with one of his cousins to [[Kilkenny College]] (also attended by philosopher [[George Berkeley]]).<ref name=LS205 /> He arrived there at the age of six, where he was expected to have already learned the basic declensions in Latin. He had not and thus began his schooling in a lower form. Swift graduated in 1682, when he was 15.<ref>Stubbs (2016), pp. 73–74.</ref>
[[File:Jonathan Swift, by Thomas Pooley.jpg|thumb|Jonathan Swift in 1682, by Thomas Pooley. The artist had married into the Swift family.<ref name="Hourican">{{cite web |last1=Hourican |first1=Bridget |title=Thomas Pooley |url=https://dib.cambridge.org/viewReadPage.do?articleId=a7421&searchClicked=clicked&searchBy=&browsesearch=yes |website=Royal Irish Academy – Dictionary of Irish Biography |publisher=Cambridge University Press |access-date=3 November 2020 |date=2002}}</ref>]]
He attended [[Trinity College Dublin]] in 1682,<ref>''Alumni Dublinenses Supplement'', p. 116: a register of the students, graduates, professors and provosts of Trinity College in the University of Dublin (1593–1860), [[George Dames Burtchaell|Burtchaell, G.D]]/[[Thomas Sadleir|Sadlier, T.U]]: Dublin, Alex Thom and Co., 1935.</ref> financed by Godwin's son Willoughby. The four-year course followed a curriculum largely set in the Middle Ages for the priesthood. The lectures were dominated by [[Aristotelian logic]] and philosophy. The basic skill taught to students was debate, and they were expected to be able to argue both sides of any argument or topic. Swift was an above-average student but not exceptional, and received his B.A. in 1686 "by special grace".<ref>Stubbs (2016), pp. 86–90.</ref>