Robert Clavell (born in or before 1633 – died before 8 August 1711), was a bookseller of

London London is the capital and largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary down to the North Sea, and has been a majo ...

. He was born in

Steeple, Dorset Steeple is a hamlet and former civil parish, now in the civil parish of Steeple with Tyneham, in the Purbeck district of the English county of Dorset. It is situated west of the coastal resort town of Swanage at the foot of Ridgeway Hill. In 2 ...

, of a branch of an old

Dorset Dorset ( ; archaically: Dorsetshire , ) is a county in South West England on the English Channel coast. The ceremonial county comprises the unitary authority areas of Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole and Dorset (unitary authority), Dors ...

shire family, being baptised there on 18 September 1632. Clavell was the author of a curious little treatise entitled ''His Majesties Propriety and Dominion on the British Seas asserted: together with a true Account of the Neatherlanders' Insupportable Insolencies, and Injuries they have committed; and the Inestimable Benefits they have gained in their Fishing on the English Seas: as also their Prodigious and Horrid Cruelties in the East and West Indies, and other Places. To which is added an exact Mapp, &c.'', octavo, London, 1665 (another edition, octavo, London, 1672). He is better known, however, as the central organiser of the term catalogues that appeared in London between 1668 and 1711.

John Dunton John Dunton (4 May 1659 – 1733) was an English bookseller and author. In 1691 he founded The Athenian Society to publish ''The Athenian Mercury'', the first major popular periodical and first miscellaneous periodical in England. In 1693, for fo ...

describes Clavell as "a great dealer, who has deservedly gained himself the reputation of a just man. Dr. Barlow, bishop of Lincoln, used to call him 'the honest bookseller'. He has been master of the Company of Stationers 698 and 1699 and perhaps the greatest unhappiness of his life was his being one of Alderman Cornish's jury" (''Life and Errors'', ed. 1818, i. 207). He died at

Islington Islington () is a district in the north of Greater London, England, and part of the London Borough of Islington. It is a mainly residential district of Inner London, extending from Islington's High Street to Highbury Fields, encompassing the ar ...

in 1711 (Probate Act Book, P.C.C., August 1711). His will, as "citizen and stationer of London", dated 17 April 1711, was proved on the following 8 August by Catherine Clavell, his widow (registered in P.C.C. 161, Young). Mrs. Clavell survived her husband until the close of 1717, dying in the parish of St. Margaret, Westminster (will registered in P.C.C. 227, Whitfield; Probate Act Book, P.C.C. December 1717).

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Clavell, Robert 1632 births 1711 deaths 17th-century English writers English booksellers People from Purbeck District Date of birth unknown Date of death unknown