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John Aubrey

 Possibly the first English Archaeologist.

Aubrey, 1626-1697,  an antiquary from Wiltshire, is sometimes called the first English Archaeologist. He made the first detailed surveys of surviving field monuments including Stonehenge and Avebury.

Aubrey was commissioned to prepare a history of Surrey by John Ogilby, self-styled ‘King’s Cosmographer and Geographer’. In July 1672, he perambulated Surrey in ‘the pleasantest pilgrimage that any man has had since the Reformation’. The antiquary, Richard Rawlinson, and the bookseller, Edmund Curll, revised Aubrey's papers and printed the first county history of Surrey in 1718, under Aubrey’s name but sadly without his illustrations.

Contributor:Surrey Heritage

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©2007 Surrey County Council. All Rights Reserved. Exploring Surrey's Past