Sir Thomas Browne ( "brown"; 19 October 1605 – 19 October 1682) was an English polymath and author of varied works which reveal his wide learning in diverse fields including science, medicine, religion and the esoteric. His writings display a deep curiosity towards the natural world, influenced by the Scientific Revolution of Baconian enquiry and are permeated by references to Classical and Biblical sources as well as the idiosyncrasies of his own personality. Although often described as suffused with melancholia, Browne's writings are also characterised by wit and subtle humour, while his literary style is varied, according to genre, resulting in a rich, unique prose which ranges from rough notebook observations to polished Baroque eloquence.
Biography
Early life Thomas Browne was born in the parish of St Michael, Cheapside, in London on 19 October 1605. He was the youngest child of Thomas Browne, a silk merchant from Upton, Cheshire, and Anne Browne, the daughter of Paul Garraway of Lewes, Sussex. He had an elder brother and two elder sisters. The family, who had lived at Upton for several generations, were "evidently people of some importance" who "intermarried with families of position in that neighbourhood", and were armigerous. Browne's paternal grandmother, Elizabeth, was the daughter of Henry Birkenhead, Clerk of the Green Cloth to Elizabeth I of England and Clerk of the Crown for the counties of Cheshire and Flintshire. Browne's father died while he was young, and his mother married Sir Thomas Dutton of Gloucester and Isleworth, Middlesex, by whom she had two daughters.
Browne was educated at Winchester College. In 1623, he went to Broadgates Hall of Oxford University. Browne was chosen to deliver the undergraduate oration when the hall was incorporated as Pembroke College in August 1624. He graduated from Oxford in January 1627, after which he studied medicine at Padua and Montpellier universities, completing his studies at Leiden, where he received a medical degree in 1633. He settled in Norwich in 1637 and practised medicine there until he died in 1682. In 1641, Browne married Dorothy Mileham of Burlingham St Peter, Norfolk. They had 10 children, six of whom died before their parents.
Literary career Browne's first literary work was Religio Medici (The Religion of a Physician). It surprised him when an unauthorised edition appeared in 1642, which included unorthodox religious speculations. An authorised text appeared in 1643, with some of the more controversial views removed. The expurgation did not end the controversy. The Scottish writer Alexander Ross attacked Religio Medici in his Medicus Medicatus (1645). Browne's book was placed upon the Papal Index Librorum Prohibitorum in the same year.
In 1646, Browne published his encyclopaedia, Pseudodoxia Epidemica, or, Enquiries into Very many Received Tenents, and commonly Presumed Truths, the title of which refers to the prevalence of false beliefs and "vulgar errors". A sceptical work that debunks in a methodical and witty manner several legends circulating at the time, it displays the Baconian side of Browne—the side that was unafraid of what at the time was still called the "New Learning". The book is significant in the history of science because it promoted an awareness of scientific journalism. The last works published by Browne were two philosophical Discourses. They are closely related to each other in concept. The first, Hydriotaphia, Urn Burial, or a Brief Discourse of the Sepulchral Urns lately found in Norfolk (1658), was inspired by the discovery in Norfolk of some 40 to 50 Anglo-Saxon burial urns. It is a literary meditation upon death, the funerary customs of the world and the ephemerality of fame. The other discourse in the diptych is antithetical in style, subject matter and imagery. The Garden of Cyrus, or The Quincuncial Lozenge, or Network Plantations of the Ancients, Artificially, Naturally, and Mystically Considered (1658) features the quincunx that Browne used to demonstrate evidence of the Platonic forms in art and nature.
Later life and knighthood
Browne believed in the existence of angels and witchcraft. He attended the 1662 Bury St Edmunds witch trial, where his citation of a similar trial in Denmark may have influenced the jury's minds concerning two accused women, who were later found guilty of witchcraft. In November 1671, King Charles II, accompanied by his Court, visited Norwich. The courtier John Evelyn, who had occasionally corresponded with Browne, made good use of the royal visit to call upon "the learned doctor" of European fame and wrote of his visit, recording that "his whole house and garden is a paradise and Cabinet of rarities and that of the best collection, amongst Medails, books, Plants, natural things". During his visit, Charles visited Browne's home. A banquet was held in St Andrew's Hall for the royal visit. Obliged to honour a notable local, the name of the Mayor of Norwich was proposed to the King for knighthood. The Mayor, however, declined the honour and proposed Browne's name instead.
Death and aftermath
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