, an accomplished English gentleman, and polite writer, the descendant
, an accomplished English gentleman, and polite writer, the descendant of an ancient family, was the son of Nicholas Overbury, of Bourton on the Hill, near Morton in Marsh, in Gloucestershire, esq. by Mary his wife, daughter of Giles Palmer, of ComptonScorfen, in the parish of Ilmington, in Warwickshire. He was born at Compton-Scorfen in the house of his grandfather by the mother’s side, about 1581. In Michaelmas term 1595, he became a gentleman commoner of Queen’s college, in Oxfordshire, where he made great progress in logic and philosophy, and November 15, 1598, took the degree of B. A. which being completed by determination in the Lent following, he left the university for the Middle Temple, where he had been before entered in order to study the municipal law, but it does not appear that he remained here long. We are told that in a little time he set out for France, and on his return was accounted a very finished gentleman, and well qualified to shine at court, which, unhappily, was his ambition.