Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Browne, Lancelot
BROWNE, LANCELOT (d. 1605), physician, was a native of York. He matriculated at St. John's College, Cambridge, in May 1559, graduated B.A. in 1562-3, and M.A. in 1566. In 1567 he was elected fellow of Pembroke Hall; in 1570 received the license of the university to practise physic. He took a leading part in the opposition to the new statutes of the university promulgated in 1572, and in 1573 was made proctor. He was created M.D. in 1576, and after this would appear to have moved to London, as on 10 June 1584 he was elected fellow of the College of Physicians. He was censor in 1587, and several times afterwards; an elect in 1599; and a member of the council of the college in 1604-5; but died in 1605, probably shortly before 11 Dec. Browne was physician to Queen Elizabeth, to James I, and to his queen. He is not known to have written anything except a commendatory letter in Latin prefixed to Gerarde's 'Herbal' (first edition, 1597). He was one of those entrusted by the College of Physicians in 1589 with the preparation of a pharmacopoeia, and in 1594 was on a committee appointed for the same object, but for some reason the work was stopped, and not resumed till twenty years afterwards, when Browne was no longer living.
[Cooper's Athenæ Cantabrigienses, ii. 421; Munk's Coll. of Phys. (2nd ed.) ii. 86.]