| Francis Blomefield |
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| CATEGORIES ABOUT FRANCIS BLOMEFIELD | |
| history of norfolk | |
| alumni of gonville and caius college, cambridge | |
| people from norfolk | |
| deaths by smallpox | |
| blomefield, francis | |
| 1705 births | |
| 1752 deaths | |
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Blomefield was born at Fersfield, Norfolk, the eldest son of Henry and Alice Blomefield, who were yeomen farmers. He was educated at Diss and Thetford Grammar Schools, and in April 1724 he was admitted Caius College Cambridge , where he graduated BA in 1727 and MA in 1728 . On leaving University in 1727 he was ordained, rector of Hargham in 1729, and shortly afterwards rector of Fersfield. , his father's family living. He married 1 September 1732 , Mary Womack, rector they had three daughters, two of whom survived him. As a boy Blomefield began recording monumental inscriptions from churches he visited in Norfolk , Suffolk and later Cambridgeshire . Whilst at College he also kept genealogical and heraldic notes relating to local families. Soon after leaving University he was collecting materials for an account of the antiquities of Cambridgeshire, but in 1732 this project was deferred when hew was given access to Peter Le Neve's collection of materials for the history of Norfolk. In July 1733 he Blomefield published proposals for a history of Norfolk. Soons afterwards, while collecting further information for his book, discovered some of the famous '' Paston Letters ''. By 1736 he was ready to put some of the results of his researches into type. At the end of 1739 the first volume of the ''History of Norfolk'' was completed. It was printed at the author's own press at Fersfield, bought specially for the purpose. The second volume was begun in 1741 and completed by 1745. There is little doubt that in compiling his book Blomefield had frequent recourse to the existing historical collections of Le Neve, John Kirkpatrick and Tanner , his own work being to a large extent one of expansion and addition. To Le Neve in particular a large share of the credit is due. When half-way through his third volume, Blomefield, who had come up to London in connection with a special piece of research, caught Smallpox , of which he died. The remainder of his work was published posthumously, and the whole eleven volumes were republished in London between 1805 and 1810. REFERENCES |
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