Background
Thomas Coryat was born at Odcombe, Somersetshire, where his father, the Rev. George Coryate, prebendary of York Cathedral, was rector.
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Thomas Coryat was born at Odcombe, Somersetshire, where his father, the Rev. George Coryate, prebendary of York Cathedral, was rector.
Thomas Coryat was educated at Westminster school and at Oxford, he became a kind of court fool, eventually entering the household of Prince Henry, the eldest son of James I.
In 1611 Thomas Coryat published a curious account of a prolonged walking tour undertaken in 1608, under the title of Coryate's Crudities hastily gobbled up in Five Months Travels in France, Italy, &c.
These commendatory verses, written in a number of languages, and some in a mixture of languages, by Ben Jonson, Donne, Chapman, Drayton and others, were afterwards published (1611) by themselves as the Odcombian Banquet.
In the same year was published a second volume of a similar kind, Coryats Crambe, or his Coleworte twice Sodden.
In 1612 he set out on another journey, which also was mostly performed on foot.
He visited Greece, the Holy Land, Persia and India; from Agra and Ajmere he sent home an account of his adventures.
Some of his letters were published in 1616 under the title of Letters from Asmere, the Court of the Great Mogul, to several Persons of Quality in England, and some fragments of his writings were included in Purchas his Pilgrimes in 1625.
His journeys were performed at small expense, for he says that he spent only three pounds between Aleppo and Agra, and often lived " competently " for a penny a day.
Coryate's Crudities, with his letters from India, was reprinted from the edition of 1611 in 1776, and at the Glasgow University Press (2 vols. , 1905).
The Odcombian Banquet was ridiculed by John Taylor, the Water Poet, in his Laugh and be Fat, or a Commentary on the Odcombian Banket (1613) and two other satires.
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