Roger Kelke (1524–1576) was an English churchman and academic, a Marian exile and Master of Magdalene College, Cambridge from 1558 and Archdeacon of Stow from 1563.
[1] His father died shortly after Roger was born, and his mother, Isabel Girlington subsequently married William Tyrwhit.
He returned to Cambridge on the accession of Elizabeth I; in August 1558 was nominated Lady Margaret preacher in the university, and on 1 November that year was appointed master of Magdalene College.
He was re-elected to his senior fellowship at St John's a few days later (9 November) The conditions of the Lady Margaret preachership, a post he continued to hold until 1565, required that the preacher should deliver annually six sermons at places in Lincolnshire and Cambridgeshire.
He was not fully accepted there: on 9 July 1565 he was unsuccessfully denounced to a court of the corporation as "a liar" and "a preacher of noe trewe doctrine".
Subsequently he accepted a salary from the corporation, on condition that he became resident, and preached every Sunday, Wednesday, and Friday, and also visited the sick and afflicted.
[3] In 1564, on the occasion of a royal visit to Cambridge, Kelke obtained from the Duke of Norfolk a contribution towards the completion of the buildings of Magdalene College.
Kelke, on his own account, induced the Fellows to agree to the transaction, which also stipulated that the transfer should be void unless, by a given day, the queen regranted it to Benedict Spinola, a Genoese merchant, and his heirs.