ASKEW

askew, or ascue, anne (1521?-1546), english protestant martyr, born at stallingborough about 1521, was the second daughter of sir william askew (d. 1540) of south kelsey, lincoln, by his first wife elizabeth, daughter of thomas wrottesley. her elder sister, martha, was betrothed by her parents to thomas kyme, a lincolnshire justice of the peace, but she died before marriage, and anne was induced or compelled to take her place. she is said to have had two children by kyme, but religious differences and incompatibility of temperament soon estranged the couple. kyme was apparently an unimaginative man of the world, while anne took to bible-reading with zeal, became convinced of the falsity of the doctrine of transubstantiation, and created some stir in lincoln by her disputations. according to bale and foxe her husband turned her out of doors, but in the privy council register she is said to have "refused kyme to be her husband without any honest allegation." she had as good a reason for repudiating her husband as henry viii. for repudiating anne of cleves. in any case, she came to london and made friends with joan bocher, who was already known for heterodoxy, and other protestants. she was examined for heresy in march 1545 by the lord mayor, and was committed to the counter prison. then she was examined by bonner, the bishop of london, who drew up a form of recantation which he entered in his register. this fact led parsons and other catholic historians to state that she actually recanted but she refused to sign bonner's form without qualification. two months later, on the 24th of may, the privy council ordered her arrest. on the 13th of june 1545, she was arraigned as a sacramentarian under the six articles at the guildhall; but no witness appeared against her; she was declared not guilty by the jury and discharged after paying her fees. the reactionary party, which, owing to the absence of hertford and lisle and to the presence of gardiner, gained the upper hand in the council in the summer of 1546, were not satisfied with this repulse; they probably aimed at the leaders of the reforming party, such as hertford and possibly queen catherine parr, who were suspected of favouring anne, and on the 18th of june 1546 anne was again arraigned before a commission including the lord mayor, the duke of norfolk, st john, bonner and heath. no jury was empanelled and no witnesses were called; she was condemned, simply on her confession, to be burnt. on the same day she was called before the privy council with her husband. kyme was sent home into lincolnshire, but anne was committed to newgate, "for that she was very obstinate and heady in reasoning of matters of religion." on the following day she was taken to the tower and racked; according to anne's own statement, as recorded by bale, the lord chancellor, wriothesley, and the solicitor-general, rich, worked the rack themselves; but she "would not convert for all the pain" (wriothesley, _chronicle_ i. 168). her torture, disputed by jardine, lingard and others, is substantiated not only by her own narrative, but by two contemporary chronicles, and by a contemporary letter (_ibid._; _narratives of the reformation_, p. 305; ellis, _original letters_, 2nd ser. ii. 177). for four weeks she was left in prison, and at length on the 16th of july, she was burnt at smithfield in the presence of the same persecuting dignitaries who had condemned her to death. authorities.--bale's two tracts, printed at marburg in november 1546 and january 1547, are the basis of foxe's account. see also _acts of the privy council_ (1542-1547), pp. 424-462; wriothesley's _chron._ i. 155, 167-169; _narratives of the reformation_, passim; gough's _index to parker soc. publications_; burnet's _hist. of the reformation_; dixon's _hist. of the church of england; dict. nat. biogr._ (a. f. p.) asma'i [abu sa'id 'abd ul-malik ibn quraib] (c. 739-831), arabian scholar, was born of pure arab stock in basra and was a pupil there of abu 'amr ibn ul-'ala. he seems to have been a poor man until by the influence of the governor of basra he was brought to the notice of harun al-rashid, who enjoyed his conversation at court and made him tutor of his son. he became wealthy and acquired property in basra, where he again settled for a time; but returned later to bagdad, where he died in 831. asma'i was one of the greatest scholars of his age. from his youth he stored up in his memory the sacred words of the koran, the traditions of the prophet, the verses of the old poets and the stories of the ancient wars of the arabs. he was also a student of language and a critic. it was as a critic that he was the great rival of abu 'ubaida (q.v.). while the latter followed (or led) the shu'ubite movement and declared for the excellence of all things not arabian, asma'i was the pious moslem and avowed supporter of the superiority of the arabs over all peoples, and of the freedom of their language and literature from all foreign influence. some of his scholars attained high rank as literary men. of asma'i's many works mentioned in the catalogue known as the _fihrist_, only about half a dozen are extant. of these the _book of distinction_ has been edited by d.h. muller (vienna, 1876); the _book of the wild animals_ by r. geyer (vienna, 1887); the _book of the horse_, by a. haffner (vienna, 1895); the _book of the sheep_, by a. haffner (vienna, 1896). for life of asma'i, see ibn khallikan, _biographical dictionary_, translated from the arabic by mcg. de slane (paris and london, 1842), vol. ii. pp. 123-127. for his work as a grammarian, g. flugel, _die grammatischen schulen der araber_ (leipzig, 1862), pp. 72-80. (g. w. t.)