Thomas Stanley

Sir Thomas Stanley (1625 – 12 April 1678) was an English writer and translator.

He was baptised on 3 September 1625 in the parish of Clothall, Hertfordshire, the son of Sir Thomas Stanley and his wife, Mary Hammond. Thomas senior owned Cumberlow Manor, which stood at the south-eastern end of Clothall parish. Mary was the cousin of Richard Lovelace, and Stanley was educated in company with the son of Edward Fairfax, the translator of Tasso. He proceeded to Cambridge in 1637, in his thirteenth year, as a gentleman commoner of Pembroke Hall. In 1641, he took his M.A. degree, but seems by that time to have proceeded to Oxford. He subsequently embarked on a legal career, entering the Middle Temple in 1664 to study law.

He was wealthy, married early, and travelled much in Europe. He was the friend and companion, and at need the helper, of many poets, and was himself both a writer and a translator of verse. His portrait was painted by Sir Peter Lely and by Sir Godfrey Kneller; in all he was painted at least fifteen times.