William Camden

William Camden , 1551-1623, English scholar, chief historian and antiquary of Elizabethan times. His two chief works are Britannia (1586) and Annales rerum Anglicarum et Hibernicarum regnante Elizabetha [annals of affairs in England and Ireland in the reign of Elizabeth]. He was a conscientious scholar in editing old manuscripts and in collecting materials of antiquarian interest. He was also a teacher (1575-97) and headmaster (1593-97) at Westminster School and helped to revive the study of Anglo-Saxon. He wrote a Greek grammar long popular in English secondary schools and aided Sir Robert Cotton in collecting materials.

Camden, William (1551–1623). Camden was one of the finest of schoolmaster‐historians. Born in London, he was educated at St Paul's and then at Oxford. From 1575 until 1597 he taught at Westminster School, where he became headmaster. He produced two major works—Britannia (1586), a survey of the antiquities of Britain, and Annals of Queen Elizabeth (1615), which established the view of her reign as a via media.

Camden, William (1551–1623), antiquary and historian, was appointed headmaster of Westminster School in 1593; one of his pupils was Jonson, who said that he owed Camden ‘All that I am in arts, all that I know’. He made tours of antiquarian research up and down England. He published his Britannia (1586) and his Annales…Regnante Elizabetha…ad Annum 1589 (1615; Pt. ii, 1627), a civic history, and founded a chair of ancient history in Oxford. Camden wrote principally in Latin.