Background
He was born at Totnes, Devon, the son of Thomas Lye, vicar of Broadhempston and a schoolmaster at Totnes, by his wife Catherine (née Johnson). He was educated at his father"s school and at Crewkerne school, Somerset.
He was born at Totnes, Devon, the son of Thomas Lye, vicar of Broadhempston and a schoolmaster at Totnes, by his wife Catherine (née Johnson). He was educated at his father"s school and at Crewkerne school, Somerset.
He went to Hart Hall, Oxford, where he entered 28 March 1713, and graduated Bachelor of Arts 19 October 1716, Master of Arts
His Dictionarium Saxonico-et Gothico-Latinum, published posthumously in 1772, was a milestone in the development of Old English lexicography, surpassed only by, and substantially contributing to Joseph Bosworth"s Dictionary of the Anglo-Saxon language of 1838. 6 July 1722. He was ordained in 1717, and in 1721 was admitted vicar of Houghton Parva, Northamptonshire. On 4 January 1750,he was elected Fellow of the Society of Antiquaries.
He resigned Houghton Parva about 1750, on being presented by James Compton, 5th Earl of Northampton to the rectory of Yardley Hastings.
Lye died, aged 73, on 19 August 1767 of gout, from which he had long suffered, at Yardley Hastings, where he was buried. His library was sold in 1773.