author
Archibald Bower
1686–1766
A Scottish historian with a turbulent religious life, he became known as much for his dramatic changes of allegiance as for his sweeping histories of Rome and the popes. His story gives his books an extra layer of tension, mixing scholarship with personal controversy.
1 Audiobook
About the author
Born near Dundee on 17 January 1686, he was educated at the Scots College in Douai and later became a Jesuit in Rome. Over the course of his life, he moved between Catholic and Protestant circles, and those shifts made him a deeply controversial figure in 18th-century Britain.
He built his reputation as a historian, publishing works including The History of Rome and the multi-volume History of the Popes. These books brought him a wide readership, but his own changing accounts of his beliefs and experiences also drew suspicion, and later scholars have often treated parts of his self-reported story with caution.
He died in London on 3 September 1766. Today he is remembered as a capable but disputed man of letters whose life was almost as dramatic as the subjects he wrote about.