Barclay, Alexander (c. 1475–1552)

British poet, probably born in Scotland, although most of his life was spent in England. His The Shyp of Folys (1509) is a verse adaptation of Sebastian Brant's Das Narrenschiff/The Ship of Fools (1494), satirizing the social vices of the age.

His other works are five Egloges (written about 1514), the earliest English pastorals; The Myrrour of Good Maners (1523); and a translation of the Roman historian Sallust's Jugurtha, together with other translations.

Barclay became chaplain of the college of Ottery St Mary, Devon, later a monk at Ely and Canterbury, and then the rector of All Hallows, Lombard Street, London.