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Title: Critica Sacra or Observations on All the Radices or Primitive Hebrew Words of the Old Testament in Alphabetical Order.

Philological work of Hebrew Biblical words in Latin and English, comments and notations throughout the book. This lexicon with its dictionary and index of Biblical words became the classic work and basis for future studies of language by experts such as William Gouge and Thomas Fuller. The author, Edward Leigh, wrote a number of works; this is his most significant. Different editions were printed in many languages.

Sir Edward Leigh (1602-1671), was an English lay writer, known particularly for his works on religious topics, and a politician who sat in the House of Commons from 1645 to 1648. Leigh served as a colonel in the Parliamentary Army during the English Civil War. Born at Shawell, Leicestershire, he was the son and heir of Sir Henry Leigh, Sheriff of Staffordshire, who died in 1630. Having matriculated at Magdalen Hall, Oxford, on 24 October 1617, he graduated as B.A. in 1620, before proceeding M.A. in 1623.After Oxford, Leigh entered the Middle Temple and became a painstaking student of divinity, law, and history. During the plague of 1625 he spent six months in France, and busied himself in making a collection of French proverbs. He subsequently moved to Banbury, Oxfordshire, to be near William Whately, whose preaching he admired.

Knighted in 1632 being of Staffordshire landed gentry, he was later noted for his anti-Catholicism. At the outbreak of civil war, Leigh upon being appointed colonel in the Parliamentary Army preferred not to be styled Sir. On 30 September 1644 he presented to parliament a petition from Staffordshire Parliamentarians complaining of Cavalier oppression, and made a speech which was printed. In 1645 he was elected Member of Parliament for Stafford in the Long Parliament to replace those MPs who had been declared 'disabled to sit'. His theological attainments procured him a seat at the Westminster Assembly. His signature is affixed to the letter written in the name of the Parliamentary Committee which granted powers to the Visitors of the University of Oxford in 1647. Having in December 1648 voted that the King's concessions were satisfactory, Sir Edward was expelled from the House under Pride's Purge. From then he appears to have avoided public life.

Leigh died at Rushall Hall, Staffordshire, at the age of 69, where he was lord of the manor, being buried in the church of which he was patron.

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Wikipedia; A Cambridge Alumni Database. University of Cambridge.