Antique Maps by Thomas Shaw (*1692 - †1751)

Thomas Shaw, a divine and traveller, was born about 1692 in Kendal, Westmoreland. From the grammar-school of his native town, he went to Queen's college, Oxford, where he took his master's degree in 1719. On entering into orders, he was appointed chaplain to the factory at Algiers; fellow of his college. On his return, in 1733, he took his doctor's degree, and was elected a member of the Royal Society. The first edition of his Travels in Barbary and the Levant was printed at Oxford, in 1738. Dr. Pocock having animadverted on some part of the work, the author published two supplemental vindications, which were incorporated in the edition of 1757. In 1740 Dr. Shaw was nominated principal of St. Edmund-hall, with which he held the Greek professorship, and the vicarage of Bramley in Hampshire, till his death in 1751. (Watkins, J. The universal biographical dictionary. New ed. 1821.)