This first full-length biography of a leading light of the intellectual world of Restoration England draws together the separate strands of William Dugdale's life. As a herald he played a ceremonial role at the courts of three Stuart kings and met statesmen, aristocrats, bishops and hundreds of gentry families across England. As a historian he profoundly influenced the study of medieval and local history, heraldry and genealogy. Throughout he remained a Warwickshire gentleman, deeply embedded in a provincial society torn apart by the civil war and its aftermath.