Background

Camden was born in London. His father Sampson Camden was a member of The Worshipful Company of Painter-Stainers.

Education

Camden attended Christ's Hospital and St Paul's School, and in 1566 entered Oxford (Magdalen College, Broadgates Hall, and finally Christ Church). At Christ Church, he became acquainted with Philip Sidney, who encouraged Camden's antiquarian interests. He returned to London in 1571 without a degree.

Career

From 1597 Camden's position as Clarenceux king-of-arms gave him more time to devote to his passion for history. Worcestershire perry he dismissed as cold and flatulent, the ruggedness of Northumberl and seems to have hardened the very carcases of its inhabitants. Britain is certainly the masterpiece of Nature, performed when she was in her best and gayest humour; which she placed as a little world in itself, by the side of the greater, for the diversion of mankind. He endowed the Camden chair of history in his University of Oxford. In 1622 he founded the Camden Chair of Ancient History at Oxford.

Published in Latin in 1586, this survey of British antiquities went into six continuously revised editions during the author's lifetime, and in 1610 was first translated into English.

In 1695 the Britannia was edited and augmented by Edmund Gibson; a final, much enlarged edition was produced by Richard Gough in 1789. The first volume of his famous Annales rerum Anglicarum et Hibernicarum regnante Elizabetha, a history of the reign of Queen Elizabeth down to 1588, appeared in 1615; the second volume, bringing the account down to the accession of James I in 1603, was published posthumously in 1625.

English editions of the two volumes of the Annales appeared respectively in 1625 and 1629. Throughout his work Camden shows a balanced and judicious viewpoint, and the long history of the successive editions of the Britannia is an indication of the sound planning of the original work.

Achievements

• Camden was one of the finest of schoolmaster-historians.