Elias Ashmole FRS was an English antiquary, politician, officer of arms, astrologer and student of alchemy. He supported the royalist side during the English Civil War, and at the restoration of Charles II he was rewarded with several lucrative offices. He donated most of his collection, his antiquarian library and priceless manuscripts to the University of Oxford to create the Ashmolean Museum. He died of the plague three years later in Cheshire, and was buried at Lichfield Cathedral in 1655.
About Elias Ashmole in brief
Elias Ashmole FRS was an English antiquary, politician, officer of arms, astrologer and student of alchemy. He supported the royalist side during the English Civil War, and at the restoration of Charles II he was rewarded with several lucrative offices. He was one of the founding Fellows of the Royal Society, a key institution in the development of experimental science. His interests were antiquarian and mystical as well as scientific. He donated most of his collection, his antiquarian library and priceless manuscripts to the University of Oxford to create the Ashmolean Museum. He is buried in Lichfield, Staffordshire, with his wife, Eleanor Mainwaring, who died in 1641 while pregnant with their second child, Mary Ashmoles, in 1644. He died of the plague three years later in Cheshire, and was buried at Lichfield Cathedral in 1655. His family had been prominent, but its fortunes had declined by the time of his birth. His mother, Anne, was the daughter of a wealthy Coventry draper, Anthony Bowyer, and a relative of James Paget, a Baron of the Exchequer. His father, Simon, was a saddler, who had served as a soldier in Ireland and Europe. He attended Lichfield Grammar School and became a chorister. He went to live in London as mentor to Paget’s sons, and in 1633, he qualified as a solicitor.
In 1645, he left Oxford to accept the position of Commissioner of Excise at Worcester. He seems never to have participated in any actual fighting. After the surrender of Worcester to the Parliamentary Forces in July 1646, he retired to Cheshire. During this period, he was admitted as a freemason. His diary entry for 16 October 1646 reads in part: \”I was made a Free Mason at Warrington in Lancashire, with Collashire: Henry Main waring of Karincham in Chesire. Although there is other mention of masonic activity in his diary he seems to have remained in good standing with the fraternity as he was still good and well-connected. On 10 March 1682, he wrote: I received a M.S. Sumons at a Noble Dinner at a New-accepted Masons Hall in London. We all at the Moonee Taverne in the Cheeses are half dyned… I was the Senior Fellow among them.. I went to the New- Accepted Mason’s Dinner at M Hall, London, on the day of the New Year.’’ ‘According to the earliest references, I am a member of the Masons’,’ he wrote in 1682. ‘‘According to the records, I. am a Senior Fellow of the Moonese Tapes, at the Noble Dinner, at a. Noble Dinner in London, in charge of the Noble Men in charge at the Tapes’.
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