Walter Burley was born in a village of Burley (today part of greater Leeds) in Yorkshire between 1274 and 1276. Nothing is known about his life before 1301, when he had already been a graduate in Philosophy at Oxford University. As a Master of Arts Burley became a fellow of Merton College and was a Regent Master in the Faculty of Liberal Arts until 1306 or 1307. His earliest works (questions to book III of De anima, probably the only surviving work from his student times, early versions of commentaries on Ars vetus, Posterior Analytics, De sophisticis elenchis, logical Treatises, commentary on De generatione et corruptione, and the early version of commentary on Physics) come from that period. In 1308, Burley went to Paris to study theology. While studying theology he continued his interest in logic and philosophy of nature: the first version of De puritate artis logicae, his comprehensive treatise on the subject, as well some commentaries on logical works of Aristotle testify to his intellectual maturity as much as three treatises on accidental change, known as Tractatus primus, Tractatus secundus, and De formis, and the questions to Physics. Ironically, his main theological work, the commentary on the Sentences, is now lost. still as a student of theology, before 1319, he disputed de quolibet in Toulouse: the topic was the first and last instant of change (Deprimo et ultimo instanti).
In 1324, Burley received the title of Master of Theology (he had already been a priest since 1321) and remained in Paris as a professor and fellow of College de Sorbonne for three more years. In late 1326 he started a diplomatic career: over a period of almost 20 years he served as an envoy for the king of England Edward III. He visited the papal curia in Avignon several times; he also traveled to Germany and Italy. His diplomatic and ecclesiastical career was supported by Richard de Bury, later bishop of Durham and Chancellor of England. At bishop’s court Burley met a group of learned men, some of whom (John Maudit, Thomas Bradwardine) he had known from Oxford. The intellectual atmosphere inspired him to return to philosophy: he completed the final versions of his commentaries on Physics (started in Paris) and Ars vetus, revised De puritate artis logicae to respond to Ockham’s arguments from Summa logicae, and composed commentaries to Aristotle’s Ethics and Politics as well as a new treatise De universalibus. His last work was probably a quodlibetal question in philosophy of nature he discussed in Bologna in 1341. The date of his death is unknown: last information about him comes from 1344 but he may have lived until the Black Death reached England in 1348.
World History
