archdeacon richard davies, an 18th-century anglican cleric, wrote of shakespeare: "he dyed a papyst". the "catholic encyclopedia" (1912) states that "davies, an anglican clergyman, could have had no conceivable motive for misrepresenting the matter in these private notes and as he lived in the neighbouring county of gloucestershire he may be echoing a local tradition" but concludes that davies' comment "is by no means incredible, but it would obviously be foolish to build too much upon an unverifiable tradition of this kind".