John Bagford was a British antiquarian

Antiquarian

An antiquarian or antiquary is an aficionado or student of antiquities or things of the past. More specifically, the term is used for those who study history with particular attention to ancient objects of art or science, archaeological and historic sites, or historic archives and manuscripts...

, writer, bibliographer

Bibliographer

"A bibliographer is a person who describes and lists books and other publications, with particular attention to such characteristics as authorship, publication date, edition, typography, etc. The result of this endeavor is a bibliography...

, ballad

Ballad

A ballad is a form of verse, often a narrative set to music. Ballads were particularly characteristic of British and Irish popular poetry and song from the later medieval period until the 19th century and used extensively across Europe and later the Americas, Australia and North Africa. Many...

-collector and bookseller.

Life

Originally a shoemaker by trade, he was active on the book-trading market from 1680 in and around Holborn

Holborn

Holborn is an area of Central London. Holborn is also the name of the area's principal east-west street, running as High Holborn from St Giles's High Street to Gray's Inn Road and then on to Holborn Viaduct...

, travelling to Haarlem

Haarlem

Haarlem is a municipality and a city in the Netherlands. It is the capital of the province of North Holland, the northern half of Holland, which at one time was the most powerful of the seven provinces of the Dutch Republic...

, Leiden, and Amsterdam

Amsterdam

Amsterdam is the largest city and the capital of the Netherlands. The current position of Amsterdam as capital city of the Kingdom of the Netherlands is governed by the constitution of August 24, 1815 and its successors. Amsterdam has a population of 783,364 within city limits, an urban population...

 on this business and aiding such collectors as John Moore

John Moore (Bishop of Ely)

John Moore was an English cleric, scholar, and book collector. He was bishop of Norwich and bishop of Ely ....

, Robert and Edward Harley

Edward Harley, 2nd Earl of Oxford and Earl Mortimer

Edward Harley, 2nd Earl of Oxford and Earl Mortimer , styled Lord Harley between 1711 and 1724, was a British politician, bibliophile, collector and patron of the arts.-Background:...

, Sir Hans Sloane

Hans Sloane

Sir Hans Sloane, 1st Baronet, PRS was an Ulster-Scot physician and collector, notable for bequeathing his collection to the British nation which became the foundation of the British Museum...

, Samuel Pepys

Samuel Pepys

Samuel Pepys FRS, MP, JP, was an English naval administrator and Member of Parliament who is now most famous for the diary he kept for a decade while still a relatively young man...

 and John Woodward

John Woodward (naturalist)

John Woodward was an English naturalist, antiquarian and geologist, and founder by bequest of the Woodwardian Professorship of Geology at Cambridge University...

. Becoming friends with fellow antiquarians such as Thomas Hearne

Thomas Hearne

Thomas Hearne or Hearn , English antiquary, was born at Littlefield Green in the parish of White Waltham, Berkshire.-Life:...

, Humfrey Wanley

Humfrey Wanley

Humfrey Wanley was a librarian, palaeographer and scholar of Old English, employed by manuscript collectors such as Robert and Edward Harley. He was the first keeper of the Harlein Library, now the Harleian Collection.-Life:...

 and Thomas Baker

Thomas Baker (antiquarian)

Thomas Baker , English antiquarian, was the grandson of Colonel Baker of Crook, Durham, who won fame in the English Civil War by his defence of Newcastle upon Tyne against the Scots. Thomas was educated at the free school at Durham, and went on to St John's College, Cambridge, where he later...

, he published antiquarian tracts, contributed to others, and edited an edition of Geoffrey Chaucer

Geoffrey Chaucer

Geoffrey Chaucer , known as the Father of English literature, is widely considered the greatest English poet of the Middle Ages and was the first poet to have been buried in Poet's Corner of Westminster Abbey...

 published by John Urry

John Urry (literary editor)

John Urry was a noted literary editor and medieval scholar of Scottish family.-Life:Matriculating from Christ Church, Oxford on June 30, 1682, he was elected to a studentship. He graduated B.A. in 1686...

.

Bagford, together with Humfrey Wanley and John Talman

John Talman

John Talman was a British antiquary and art collector. He was the eldest son of William Talman and his wife Hannah. From 1709 to 1717 he toured in Italy, collecting antiquities, becoming friends with the antiquarian pope Clement IX and enjoying the freedom to practice his Catholicism...

, was one of three ‘founder members of the reconstituted ‘Society of Antiquaries’

Society of Antiquaries of London

The Society of Antiquaries of London is a learned society "charged by its Royal Charter of 1751 with 'the encouragement, advancement and furtherance of the study and knowledge of the antiquities and history of this and other countries'." It is based at Burlington House, Piccadilly, London , and is...

, which first met at the Bear Tavern on the Strand

Strand, London

Strand is a street in the City of Westminster, London, England. The street is just over three-quarters of a mile long. It currently starts at Trafalgar Square and runs east to join Fleet Street at Temple Bar, which marks the boundary of the City of London at this point, though its historical length...

 on December 5, 1707.

The Gray's Inn elephant tooth and stone tool

In 1715 Bagford wrote about the Gray's Inn Lane hand axe

Gray's Inn Lane Hand Axe

The Gray's Inn Lane Hand Axe is a pointed flint hand axe, found buried in gravel under Gray's Inn Lane, London, England, by pioneering archaeologist John Conyers in 1679, and now in the British Museum...

 and the elephant tooth which had been found together by John Conyers

John Conyers (apothecary)

John Conyers was an English apothecary and pioneering archaeologist.Conyers had a shop in Fleet Street, near St Paul's Cathedral during the period of construction of Sir Christopher Wren's new cathedral to replace Old St Paul's after the Great Fire of London, and collected the medieval and Roman...

 opposite "Black Mary's". He asserted that the elephant was probably introduced by Claudius

Claudius

Claudius , was Roman Emperor from 41 to 54. A member of the Julio-Claudian dynasty, he was the son of Drusus and Antonia Minor. He was born at Lugdunum in Gaul and was the first Roman Emperor to be born outside Italy...

 but that the tool had been made by human workmanship. He described this as a "British weapon" and as such he was one of the first to suggest that stone age tools were human-made, rather than produced by other causes (such as lightning).

External links

• John Bagford in the Dictionary of National Biography
  Dictionary of National Biography
  The Dictionary of National Biography is a standard work of reference on notable figures from British history, published from 1885...
  
   (requires subscription)
• Portraits of Bagford at the National Portrait Gallery, London
• Article on Bagford (giving an erroneous birth year)