New England clergyman John Cotton
E486365
New England clergyman John Cotton was a prominent 17th-century Puritan minister and theologian who played a leading role in the religious and civic life of the Massachusetts Bay Colony.
All labels observed (1)
| Label | Occurrences |
|---|---|
| New England clergyman John Cotton canonical | 1 |
How this entity was disambiguated
This entity first appeared as the object of triple T5011678 — resolving that mention is where its identity was fixed. The disambiguator weighed these candidate entities and picked the highlighted one (or “None”, minting a new entity). This is how homonymy is resolved: the same surface form can point to different entities.
NED1
Entity disambiguation (via context triple)
gpt-5-mini-2025-08-07
Target entity: New England clergyman John Cotton Context triple: [Sarah Hawkred, spouseOf, New England clergyman John Cotton]
-
A.
John Williams (Puritan minister)
John Williams was a Puritan minister from Deerfield, Massachusetts, best known for his captivity narrative recounting his abduction during the 1704 raid on Deerfield in Queen Anne’s War.
-
B.
John Eliot
John Eliot was a 17th-century Puritan missionary best known for translating the Bible into the Massachusett (Algonquian) language for Indigenous peoples in New England.
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C.
Stephen Sewall
Stephen Sewall was an 18th-century American jurist who served as Chief Justice of the Massachusetts Superior Court of Judicature.
-
D.
Increase Mather
Increase Mather was a prominent 17th-century New England Puritan minister and political leader who played a major role in colonial religious life and governance, including efforts to curb the excesses of the Salem witch trials.
-
E.
Eleazar Mather
Eleazar Mather was a 17th-century Puritan minister in New England and the older brother of prominent clergyman Increase Mather.
- F. None of above. chosen
- G. Unsure - the case is ambiguous/there is not enough information to decide.
NED2
Entity disambiguation (via description)
gpt-5-mini-2025-08-07
Target entity: New England clergyman John Cotton Target entity description: New England clergyman John Cotton was a prominent 17th-century Puritan minister and theologian who played a leading role in the religious and civic life of the Massachusetts Bay Colony.
-
A.
John Williams (Puritan minister)
John Williams was a Puritan minister from Deerfield, Massachusetts, best known for his captivity narrative recounting his abduction during the 1704 raid on Deerfield in Queen Anne’s War.
-
B.
John Eliot
John Eliot was a 17th-century Puritan missionary best known for translating the Bible into the Massachusett (Algonquian) language for Indigenous peoples in New England.
-
C.
Stephen Sewall
Stephen Sewall was an 18th-century American jurist who served as Chief Justice of the Massachusetts Superior Court of Judicature.
-
D.
Increase Mather
Increase Mather was a prominent 17th-century New England Puritan minister and political leader who played a major role in colonial religious life and governance, including efforts to curb the excesses of the Salem witch trials.
-
E.
Eleazar Mather
Eleazar Mather was a 17th-century Puritan minister in New England and the older brother of prominent clergyman Increase Mather.
- F. None of above. chosen
Statements (49)
| Predicate | Object |
|---|---|
| instanceOf |
New England Puritan
ⓘ
Puritan minister ⓘ clergyman ⓘ person ⓘ theologian ⓘ |
| associatedWith |
First Church in Boston
ⓘ
Massachusetts Bay Colony leadership ⓘ
linked to:
Massachusetts Bay Colony
|
| birthDate | 1585-12-04 ⓘ |
| birthPlace | Derby, Derbyshire, England ⓘ |
| burialPlace |
King's Chapel Burying Ground, Boston
ⓘ
linked to:
King's Chapel Burying Ground
|
| child |
John Cotton Jr.
ⓘ
linked to:
John Cotton
Seaborn Cotton ⓘ |
| citizenship |
Kingdom of England
ⓘ
Massachusetts Bay Colony ⓘ |
| contributedTo | development of New England town–church relations ⓘ |
| deathDate | 1652-12-23 ⓘ |
| deathPlace |
Boston, Massachusetts Bay Colony
ⓘ
linked to:
Boston, Massachusetts
|
| denomination | Congregationalism ⓘ |
| education |
Emmanuel College, Cambridge
ⓘ
Trinity College, Cambridge ⓘ |
| era | 17th century ⓘ |
| gender | male ⓘ |
| influenced |
Massachusetts Bay civil and religious policy
ⓘ
New England Congregationalism ⓘ
linked to:
Congregationalism
|
| knownFor |
influence on Congregational church polity
ⓘ
leading Puritan minister in Massachusetts Bay Colony ⓘ opposition to Antinomianism ⓘ role in shaping religious life of Massachusetts Bay Colony ⓘ writings on church government ⓘ |
| language | English ⓘ |
| movedFrom | Boston, Lincolnshire, England ⓘ |
| movedTo | Massachusetts Bay Colony ⓘ |
| name | John Cotton ⓘ |
| notableStudentOf |
William Perkins (indirectly, via Cambridge Puritan tradition)
ⓘ
linked to:
William Perkins
|
| occupation |
clergyman
ⓘ
minister ⓘ theologian ⓘ |
| participatedIn |
Antinomian Controversy
ⓘ
linked to:
Antinomian Controversy in Massachusetts
|
| positionHeld |
teacher of the First Church in Boston, Massachusetts
ⓘ
vicar of St. Botolph's Church, Boston, Lincolnshire ⓘ |
| religion | Puritanism ⓘ |
| spouse |
Sarah Hawkred
ⓘ
Sarah Story ⓘ |
| theologicalTradition | Reformed theology ⓘ |
| wrote |
Milk for Babes
ⓘ
Spiritual Milk for Boston Babes ⓘ The Keyes of the Kingdom of Heaven ⓘ The Way of the Churches of Christ in New England ⓘ |
| yearOfMigration | 1633 ⓘ |
How these facts were elicited
The pipeline generated the facts above by prompting gpt-5.1 with this entity's name + description and the instruction below.
Instruction
You are a knowledge base construction expert. Given a subject entity and a description of it, return factual statements that you know for the subject as a JSON list of dictionaries(triples), where keys must be "subject", "predicate" and "object". The number of facts may be very high, between 25 to 50 or more, for very popular subjects. For less popular subjects, the number of facts can be very low, like 5 or 10. # Requirements - If you don't know the subject at all, return an empty list. - If the subject is not a named entity, return an empty list. - Include at least one triple where predicate is "instanceOf". - Do not get too wordy. - Separate several objects into multiple triples with one object.
Input
Subject: New England clergyman John Cotton Description of subject: New England clergyman John Cotton was a prominent 17th-century Puritan minister and theologian who played a leading role in the religious and civic life of the Massachusetts Bay Colony.
Referenced by (1)
Full triples — surface form annotated when it differs from this entity's canonical label.