Add MS 78172-78185

SIR RICHARD BROWNE (d. 1604), M.P.

78172-78185. EVELYN PAPERS. Vols. V-XVIII. Papers of Sir Richard Browne (circa 1538-1604), M.P., as servant to the Earl of Leicester and Elizabeth I, etc.; 1552-1601, n.d. In the 1570s Browne entered the service of Robert Dudley (d. 1588), Earl of Leicester, Steward of the Household to Elizabeth I. On the death of his patron he obtained the post of Clerk of the Green Cloth and subsequently of Clerk Comptroller of the Household (1596). Between 1584 and his death in May 1604 he sat as Member of Parliament for several boroughs successively. His wife was Joanna Vigorus of Langham, co. Essex, who died in Nov. 1618, aged 74. The present papers came into his possession by virtue of his offices, though none appears to be copied by him or to include his annotations (cf. his letter to Burghley of 5 Oct. 1595 in Landsdowne MS 78, f. 145). For an account of his career see P. W. Hasler (ed.), The History of Parliament. The House of Commons 1558-1603 (1981), I, pp. 503-4, and for the history of his collections see Simon Adams, ‘The Papers of Robert Dudley, Earl of Leicester. 1. The Browne-Evelyn Collection’, Archives, XX (1992), pp. 63-85, esp. pp. 65, 67.

Fourteen volumes.