Origins and Early Career
Portman was the son of John Portman, who was buried in the Temple Church on 5 June 1521, by Alice, daughter of William Knoell of Dorset. His family was long established in Somerset, having given its name to the former manor and present village of Orchard Portman, and he served as Justice of the Peace for that county from time to time. He was a barrister who was successful enough to be personally known to King Henry VIII. In 1532 he acquired 270 acres adjacent to the NW of the City of London, which estate stretching from today's Oxford Street to the Regents Canal, known as the Portman Estate, is still held by his descendants the Viscounts Portman. In 1533 Henry VIII gave him a wardship, and he was one of the administrators of the will of Catherine of Aragon.
Read more about this topic: William Portman
Famous quotes containing the words origins and, origins, early and/or career:
“Lucretius
Sings his great theory of natural origins and of wise conduct; Plato
smiling carves dreams, bright cells
Of incorruptible wax to hive the Greek honey.”
—Robinson Jeffers (1887–1962)
“The origins of clothing are not practical. They are mystical and erotic. The primitive man in the wolf-pelt was not keeping dry; he was saying: “Look what I killed. Aren’t I the best?””
—Katharine Hamnett (b. 1948)
“We can slide it
Rapidly backwards and forwards: we call this
Easing the spring. And rapidly backwards and forwards
The early bees are assaulting and fumbling the flowers:
They call it easing the Spring.”
—Henry Reed (1914–1986)
“From a hasty glance through the various tests I figure it out that I would be classified in Group B, indicating “Low Average Ability,” reserved usually for those just learning to speak the English Language and preparing for a career of holding a spike while another man hits it.”
—Robert Benchley (1889–1945)