Adam Murimuth was an English

England

England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...

 ecclesiastic and chronicler.

Life

He was born in 1274 or 1275 and studied civil law

Civil law (common law)

Civil law, as opposed to criminal law, is the branch of law dealing with disputes between individuals or organizations, in which compensation may be awarded to the victim...

 at the University of Oxford

University of Oxford

The University of Oxford is a university located in Oxford, United Kingdom. It is the second-oldest surviving university in the world and the oldest in the English-speaking world. Although its exact date of foundation is unclear, there is evidence of teaching as far back as 1096...

. Between 1312 and 1318 he practised in the papal curia

Curia

A curia in early Roman times was a subdivision of the people, i.e. more or less a tribe, and with a metonymy it came to mean also the meeting place where the tribe discussed its affairs...

 at Avignon

Avignon

Avignon is a French commune in southeastern France in the départment of the Vaucluse bordered by the left bank of the Rhône river. Of the 94,787 inhabitants of the city on 1 January 2010, 12 000 live in the ancient town centre surrounded by its medieval ramparts.Often referred to as the...

. King Edward II of England

Edward II of England

Edward II , called Edward of Caernarfon, was King of England from 1307 until he was deposed by his wife Isabella in January 1327. He was the sixth Plantagenet king, in a line that began with the reign of Henry II...

 and Archbishop Robert Winchelsey

Robert Winchelsey

Robert Winchelsey was an English Christian theologian and Archbishop of Canterbury. He studied at the universities of Paris and Oxford, and later taught at both. Influenced by Thomas Aquinas, he was a scholastic theologian...

 were among his clients, and his legal services secured for him canonries

Canon (priest)

A canon is a priest or minister who is a member of certain bodies of the Christian clergy subject to an ecclesiastical rule ....

 at Hereford

Hereford

Hereford is a cathedral city, civil parish and county town of Herefordshire, England. It lies on the River Wye, approximately east of the border with Wales, southwest of Worcester, and northwest of Gloucester...

 and St Paul's

St Paul's Cathedral

St Paul's Cathedral, London, is a Church of England cathedral and seat of the Bishop of London. Its dedication to Paul the Apostle dates back to the original church on this site, founded in AD 604. St Paul's sits at the top of Ludgate Hill, the highest point in the City of London, and is the mother...

, and the precentor

Precentor

A precentor is a person who helps facilitate worship. The details vary depending on the religion, denomination, and era in question. The Latin derivation is "præcentor", from cantor, meaning "the one who sings before" ....

ship of Exeter Cathedral

Exeter Cathedral

Exeter Cathedral, the Cathedral Church of Saint Peter at Exeter, is an Anglican cathedral, and the seat of the Bishop of Exeter, in the city of Exeter, Devon in South West England....

. In 1331 he retired to country living (in Wraysbury

Wraysbury

Wraysbury, traditionally spelt Wyrardisbury, is a village and civil parish in Berkshire, England. It is located in the very east of the county, in the part that was in Buckinghamshire until 1974...

, Buckinghamshire

Buckinghamshire

Buckinghamshire is a ceremonial and non-metropolitan home county in South East England. The county town is Aylesbury, the largest town in the ceremonial county is Milton Keynes and largest town in the non-metropolitan county is High Wycombe....

), and devoted himself to writing the history of his own times.

Works

The chronicle he wrote of his times is entitled "Chronicon, sive res gestae sui temporis quibus ipse interfuit, res Romanas et Gallicas Anglicanis intertexens, 1302-1343" (Cottonian Library MSS). His Continuatio chronicarum, begun not earlier than 1325, starts from the year 1303, and continues up to 1347, the year of his death. Meagre at first, it becomes fuller about 1340 and is specially valuable for the history of the French wars. Murimuth gives a bald narrative of events, incorporating many documents in the latter part of his book. The annals of St. Paul's edited by Bishop William Stubbs

William Stubbs

William Stubbs was an English historian and Bishop of Oxford.The son of William Morley Stubbs, a solicitor, he was born at Knaresborough, Yorkshire, and was educated at Ripon Grammar School and Christ Church, Oxford, where he graduated in 1848, obtaining a first-class in classics and a third in...

 are closely related to the work of Murimuth, but probably not from his pen. The Continuatio was carried on, after his death, by an anonymous writer to the year 1380.

The only complete edition of the Continuatio chronicarum is that by Edward Maunde Thompson

Edward Maunde Thompson

Sir Edward Maunde Thompson, GCB was a British palaeographer and Principal Librarian and first Director of the British Museum. He is also noted for his study of William Shakespeare's handwriting in the manuscript of the play Sir Thomas More.-Biography:Thompson's father was Edward Thompson, Custos...

 (Rolls series

Rolls Series

The Rolls Series, official title The Chronicles and Memorials of Great Britain and Ireland during the Middle Ages, is a major collection of British and Irish historical materials and primary sources, published in the second half of the 19th century. Some 255 volumes, representing 99 separate...

, 1889). The preface to this edition, and to William Stubbs

William Stubbs

William Stubbs was an English historian and Bishop of Oxford.The son of William Morley Stubbs, a solicitor, he was born at Knaresborough, Yorkshire, and was educated at Ripon Grammar School and Christ Church, Oxford, where he graduated in 1848, obtaining a first-class in classics and a third in...

's Chronicles of Edward I and II, vol. i. (Rolls series, 1882), should be consulted. The anonymous continuation is printed in T. Hog's edition of Murimuth (Eng. Hist. Soc., London, 1846).