Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Rawdon, Marmaduke
RAWDON, MARMADUKE (1610–1669), traveller and antiquary, was descended from a younger branch of the ancient family of Rawdon, or Rawden, which was seated at a place of that name in the parish of Guiseley, Yorkshire. He was the youngest son of Laurence Rawdon, merchant and alderman of York, by Margery, daughter of William Barton, esq., of Cawton, Yorkshire. He was baptised in the church of St. Crux, York, on 17 March 1609–10, and received his education in the grammar school of St. Peter in that city. On the death of his father in 1624 he was adopted by his uncle, Marmaduke (afterwards Sir Marmaduke) Rawdon, who had risen to eminence as a London merchant. In 1627 he was sent to Holland as supercargo of a small merchant vessel, and during great part of that and the two following years he was stationed at Bordeaux. In 1631 he was entrusted with the management of his uncle's affairs in the island of Teneriffe, and he was absent in the Canary Islands, with brief intervals, for over twenty years. One of his boldest exploits during his long residence at La Laguna in the Grand Canary was his ascent of the Peak of Teneriffe. The route he took to the summit of the volcano was the same as that followed by George Glas [q. v.] a century later, and by Humboldt and other travellers of modern times.
In 1656, in consequence of England's rupture with Spain, Rawdon returned to England, and during most of the remainder of his life he resided with his kinsman, Marmaduke Rawdon, at Hoddesdon, Hertfordshire. He died, unmarried, at Hoddesdon, on 7 Feb. 1668–9, and was buried in the chancel of the church at Broxbourne. By his will he left to the corporation of York the gold ‘poculum caritatis’ or loving-cup, and money to purchase the gold chain which is still worn by every lady mayoress of York.
Rawdon, whose ‘name will take a respectable place in the scanty list of early British tourists who have left any record of their travels,’ made extensive manuscript collections, compiled a ‘brief history of cathedrals,’ and prepared for the press a genealogical memoir of his family. Nearly half a century after his death his manuscripts were in the possession of Samuel Bagnall, esq., of London, whose wife was the granddaughter of Colonel Thomas Rawdon, the eldest son of Sir Marmaduke. In 1712 Ralph Thoresby [q. v.] was permitted to inspect the collection, and his extracts from some of the manuscripts are made use of in the ‘Ducatus Leodiensis,’ and in the notice of Sir George Rawdon which Bishop Gibson introduced into his edition of Camden's ‘Britannia.’ When the editor of Wotton's ‘Baronetage’ (1741) was collecting materials for that work, the Rawdon manuscripts were still in Bagnall's possession, but their subsequent history is unknown.
Mr. Robert Davies, F.S.A., edited for the Camden Society ‘The Life of Marmaduke Rawdon of York, or Marmaduke Rawdon, the second of that name. Now first printed from the original MS. in the possession of Robert Cooke, esq., F.R.G.S.,’ London, 1863, 4to. This memoir presents a series of vivid and truthful sketches of social and domestic life and manners, both in town and country, during the seventeenth century. The original manuscript is now in the British Museum (Addit. MS. 34206). Rawdon's portrait was engraved by R. White.
[Life, cited above; Evans's Cat. of Engraved Portraits; Gent. Mag. 1863, pt. ii. p. 702; Lowndes's Bibl. Man. (Bohn), Suppl. p. 47; Thoresby's Diary, ii. 154.]
Dictionary of National Biography, Errata (1904), p.231
N.B.— f.e. stands for from end and l.l. for last line
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