Beaumont, Francis, dramatic poet, born in Leicestershire, of a family of good standing; bred for the bar, but devoted to literature; was a friend of Ben Jonson; in conjunction with his friend Fletcher, the composer of a number of plays, about the separate authorship of which there has been much discussion, the dramatic power of which comes far short of that so conspicuous in the plays of their great contemporary Shakespeare, though it is said contemporary criticism gave them the preference (1585‒1615).
Definition taken from The Nuttall Encyclopædia, edited by the Reverend James Wood (1907)
Beaumont, Christophe de * Beaumont, Jean Baptiste Élie de