Life

Evelyn was the third but eldest surviving son of John Evelyn

John Evelyn

John Evelyn was an English writer, gardener and diarist.Evelyn's diaries or Memoirs are largely contemporaneous with those of the other noted diarist of the time, Samuel Pepys, and cast considerable light on the art, culture and politics of the time John Evelyn (31 October 1620 – 27 February...

, born 19 January 1655. On 13 December 1660 his father presented him to the queen mother, who made much of him. Until 1662 he was ‘brought up amongst Mr. Howard's children at Arundel House

Arundel House

Arundel House was a town-house or palace located between the Strand and the Thames, near St Clement Danes.It was originally the town house of the Bishops of Bath and Wells, during the Middle Ages. In 1539 it was given to William Fitzwilliam, Earl of Southampton...

.’ In 1665 Edmund Bohun

Edmund Bohun

Edmund Bohun was an English writer on history and politics, a publicist in the Tory interest.-Life:In the late 1660s he associated with William Sancroft, Samuel Parker and Leoline Jenkins, in a group of High Church proto-Tory thinkers. He began to write against the Whigs after the Exclusion Crisis...

 became his tutor. Early in 1667, he was sent still young to Trinity College, Oxford

Trinity College, Oxford

The College of the Holy and Undivided Trinity in the University of Oxford, of the foundation of Sir Thomas Pope , or Trinity College for short, is one of the constituent colleges of the University of Oxford in England. It stands on Broad Street, next door to Balliol College and Blackwells bookshop,...

, under Ralph Bathurst

Ralph Bathurst

Ralph Bathurst was an English theologian and physician.-Early life:He was born in Hothorpe, Northamptonshire in 1620 and educated at King Henry VIII School, Coventry.He graduated with a B.A...

.

He left Oxford in March 1669, and was admitted of the Middle Temple

Middle Temple

The Honourable Society of the Middle Temple, commonly known as Middle Temple, is one of the four Inns of Court exclusively entitled to call their members to the English Bar as barristers; the others being the Inner Temple, Gray's Inn and Lincoln's Inn...

 2 May 1672. On 29 March 1673 his father took him to see Peter Gunning

Peter Gunning

Peter Gunning was an English Royalist church leader, Bishop of Chichester and later of Ely.-Life:He was born at Hoo St Werburgh, in Kent, and educated at The King's School, Canterbury, and Clare College, Cambridge, where he became a fellow in 1633. Having taken orders, he advocated the Royalist...

, bishop of Chichester, who gave him instruction and advice ‘before he received the Holy Sacrament.’ On 25 May of the same year he became a younger brother of Trinity House

Trinity House

The Corporation of Trinity House of Deptford Strond is the official General Lighthouse Authority for England, Wales and other British territorial waters...

, and on 10 November 1675 he went to France in the suite of the ambassador Lord Berkeley

George Berkeley, 1st Earl of Berkeley

George Berkeley, 1st Earl of Berkeley PC FRS was an English merchant and politician who sat in the House of Commons from 1654 until 1658 when he succeeded to the peerage.-Life:...

, returning in May of the next year.

In December 1687 Evelyn was employed in Devon

Devon

Devon is a large county in southwestern England. The county is sometimes referred to as Devonshire, although the term is rarely used inside the county itself as the county has never been officially "shired", it often indicates a traditional or historical context.The county shares borders with...

 by the treasury, as a commissioner respecting ‘concealment of land.’ Just a year later he was presented to William, Prince of Orange

William III of England

William III & II was a sovereign Prince of Orange of the House of Orange-Nassau by birth. From 1672 he governed as Stadtholder William III of Orange over Holland, Zeeland, Utrecht, Guelders, and Overijssel of the Dutch Republic. From 1689 he reigned as William III over England and Ireland...

 at Abingdon

Abingdon

Abingdon may refer to the following places:In Australia :* Abingdon, Queensland, a place in Northern QueenslandIn Britain:*Abingdon, Oxfordshire**Abingdon School**Abingdon Abbey**Abingdon Lock**Abingdon Bridge**Abingdon Air & Country Show...

 by Colonel Sidney and Colonel Berkeley. As a volunteer in John Lovelace, 3rd Baron Lovelace

John Lovelace, 3rd Baron Lovelace

John Lovelace, 3rd Baron Lovelace was an English peer and MP.He was born at Hurley, Buckinghanshire, the son of John Lovelace, 2nd Baron Lovelace and Lady Anne, 7th Baroness Wentworth and Baroness Le Despenser...

's troop he helped to secure Oxford for William.

In 1690 he purchased the chief clerkship of the treasury, but was removed within a year. He acted as a commissioner of revenue in Ireland from 1692 to 1696. He returned home seriously ill, and died in Berkeley Street, London, 24 March 1699, in his father's lifetime.

Works

Evelyn translated the following works:

• ‘Of Gardens. Four books. First written in Latin verse by Renatus Rapinus, and now made English,’ London, 1673, dedicated to Henry Bennet, 1st Earl of Arlington
  Henry Bennet, 1st Earl of Arlington
  Henry Bennet, 1st Earl of Arlington KG, PC was an English statesman.- Background and early life :He was the son of Sir John Bennet of Dawley, Middlesex, and of Dorothy Crofts. He was the younger brother of John Bennet, 1st Baron Ossulston; his sister was Elizabeth Bennet who married Robert Kerr,...
  
  .
• ‘The History of the Grand Visiers,’ London, 1677, from the French of François de Chassepol.
• Plutarch
  Plutarch
  Plutarch then named, on his becoming a Roman citizen, Lucius Mestrius Plutarchus , c. 46 – 120 AD, was a Greek historian, biographer, essayist, and Middle Platonist known primarily for his Parallel Lives and Moralia...
  
  's ‘Life of Alexander the Great,’ for the ‘Plutarch's Lives by Several Hands’ (1683-6).

To the third edition of his father's Sylva

Sylva, or A Discourse of Forest-Trees and the Propagation of Timber

Sylva, or A Discourse on Forest-Trees and the Propagation of Timber in His Majesty's Dominions by the English writer John Evelyn was first published in 1662 as a paper to the Royal Society...

(1678) Evelyn contributed some prefatory Greek hexameters, written at the age of fifteen; and in the last chapter the second book of his version of René Rapin

René Rapin

René Rapin was a French Jesuit and writer.He was born at Tours and entered the Society of Jesus in 1639. He taught rhetoric, and wrote extensively both in verse and prose.-Works:...

's Hortorum Liber was reprinted. Several poems by him are printed in John Dryden

John Dryden

John Dryden was an influential English poet, literary critic, translator, and playwright who dominated the literary life of Restoration England to such a point that the period came to be known in literary circles as the Age of Dryden.Walter Scott called him "Glorious John." He was made Poet...

's ‘Miscellanies’ and in John Nichols

John Nichols (printer)

John Nichols was an English printer, author and antiquary.-Early life and apprenticeship:He was born in Islington, London to Edward Nichols and Anne Wilmot. On 22 June 1766 he married Anne Cradock daughter of William Cradock...

's ‘Collection of Poems.’

Family

Evelyn married, in 1679, Martha, daughter and coheiress of Richard Spenser, a Turkey merchant. She died 13 September 1726. By her he had two sons and three daughters, but only a son, John, and a daughter, Elizabeth (wife of Simon Harcourt, son of Simon Harcourt, 1st Viscount Harcourt

Simon Harcourt, 1st Viscount Harcourt

Simon Harcourt, 1st Viscount Harcourt, of Stanton Harcourt, Oxfordshire, PC was Queen Anne's Lord Chancellor of Great Britain. He was her solicitor-general and her commissioner for arranging the union with Scotland...

), survived infancy.

The son John

Sir John Evelyn, 1st Baronet of Wotton

-Biography:He was born in Deptford, Kent, the son of John Evelyn the Younger, Barrister of the Middle Temple and Commissioner of the Revenue, and his wife, Martha, daughter of Richard Spencer. He was the grandson of the famous diarist John Evelyn...

, born 1 March 1682, married, 18 September 1750, Anne, daughter of Edward Boscawen of Cornwall, was made a baronet 30 July 1713, built a library at the family seat of Wotton House

Wotton House, Surrey

Wotton House is in Wotton near Dorking, Surrey, England. It is a grade II listed building. Originally a country house and the seat of the Evelyn family, it is now a training and conference centre.-Construction:...

, was a fellow of the Royal Society

Royal Society

The Royal Society of London for Improving Natural Knowledge, known simply as the Royal Society, is a learned society for science, and is possibly the oldest such society in existence. Founded in November 1660, it was granted a Royal Charter by King Charles II as the "Royal Society of London"...

, and commissioner of customs, and died 18 July 1763. His grandson Sir Frederick Evelyn, a soldier, died without issue in 1812, and his estates fell to his widow, Mary, daughter of William Turton of Staffordshire, who bequeathed them on her death in 1817 to John Evelyn, a direct descendant of George Evelyn (1530–1603), and grandfather of William John Evelyn. Sir John, a first cousin of Sir Frederick, was fourth baronet, and with the death of this Sir John's brother Hugh, in 1848, the baronetcy became extinct.