Delphi Collected Works of John Aubrey

by John Aubrey, Delphi Classics (Editor)

The antiquarian and biographer John Aubrey is best known for vivid, intimate and at times acerbic sketches of his famous seventeenth century contemporaries. His celebrated ‘Brief Lives’ are not biographies in the strict sense, being based on observation and gossip, offering engaging portraits that are graced by picturesque and revealing detail. Winning great acclaim with later generations, they include revealing stories of such figures as Francis Bacon, Thomas Browne, Sir Walter Raleigh, Edmund Halley, Ben Jonson, Thomas Hobbes and William Shakespeare. This eBook presents Aubrey’s collected works, with numerous illustrations, rare texts, informative introductions and the usual Delphi bonus material. (Version 1)

* Beautifully illustrated with images relating to Aubrey’s life and works
* Concise introductions to the texts
* All the major works, with individual contents tables
* Andrew Clark’s celebrated 1898 edition of the ‘Brief Lives’, with Clark’s original hyperlinked footnotes
* Images of how the books were first published, giving your eReader a taste of the original texts
* Excellent formatting of the texts
* Features a brief biography



The Works
The Natural History of Wiltshire (1691)
Miscellanies (1696)
Brief Lives (1697)

The Biography
John Aubrey (1900) by Richard Garnett

1789 pages, Kindle Edition

Published August 27, 2025

About the author

Brief Lives , published posthumously, of English antiquarian John Aubrey contains character sketches of notable thinkers and writers of 17th century.

People perhaps best know John Aubrey, fellow of royal society and a natural philosopher, as the author of his collection of short biographical pieces. This pioneer archaeologist for the first time often recorded numerous megalithic and other field monuments in south and particularly discovered the Avebury henge. He observed the holes at Stonehenge despite considerable doubt whether they currently bear his name. He, also a pioneer folklorist, collected together a miscellany of material on customs, traditions and beliefs under the title Remaines of Gentilisme and Judaisme . He set to compile county histories of Wiltshire and Surrey but finished neither project. His Interpretation of Villare Anglicanum , also unfinished, first attempted to compile a full-length study of placenames. Applied mathematics and astronomy widely interested him, friend with many of the greatest scientists of the day.