Edward Browne (physician)

Edward Browne, FRS (1644 – 28 August 1708) was a British physician, and president of the College of Physicians.

He was the eldest son of Sir Thomas Browne of Norwich, and was born in that city in 1644. He was educated at Norwich School and at Trinity College, Cambridge. He graduated M.B. at Cambridge in 1663, and then returned to Norwich.

He wrote a journal of his early life, which survives and gives an amusing picture of his activities, and of life in Norwich. Browne often went to dances at the duke's palace, admired the gems preserved there, and learnt to play ombre from the duke's brother. He dissected nearly every day: sometimes a dog, sometimes a monkey, a calf's leg, a turkey's heart. He studied botany, read medicine and literature and theology in his father's library, and saw at least one patient. "16 Feb. Mrs. Anne Ward gave me my first fee, ten shillings."

A week after this significant event, Browne went to London. He attended the lectures of Dr. Christopher Terne, physician to St. Bartholomew's Hospital, and married Terne's daughter Henrietta in 1672. His notes of Dr. Teme's lectures exist in manuscript in the British Museum. When the lectures were ended, Browne returned to Norwich, and soon after started on his travels.

He went to Italy and came home through France, and it is by his description of this and of several subsequent journeys that he is best known. In 1668, he sailed to Rotterdam from Yarmouth and went to Leyden, Amsterdam, and Utrecht, visiting museums, libraries, and churches, attending lectures, and conversing with the learned. He went on to Antwerp, and ended his journey at Cologne on 10 October 1668. His next journey was to Vienna, where he made friends with the imperial librarian Lambecius, and enjoyed many excursions and much learned conversation. He seems to have studied Greek colloquially, and brought back letters from a learned Greek in his own tongue to Dr. Pearson, the bishop of Chester, and to Dr. Isaac Barrow, the master of Trinity.

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