Robert Dover

Who was Robert Dover?

Robert Dover was an English attorney, author and wit, best known as the founder and for many years the director of the Cotswold Olimpick Games.

He was probably born between 1575 and 1582 in Norfolk, one of four children sired by a John Dover, but as the parish registers in Great Ellingham did not begin until 1630 it is impossible to be certain. Dover was a scholar at the University of Cambridge in 1595, possibly as a sizar at Queens' College: during his time at Cambridge the "Gog Magog Games" were held on the Gog Magog Hills outside Cambridge, although it is not known whether these were already being termed "Olympik" as was the case by 1620. Dover left university early to avoid swearing the Oath of Supremacy, and a Robert Dover was among those questioned by Lord Burghley's officers looking for recusants in Norfolk. On 27 February 1605 Dover was admitted to Gray's Inn, and was probably called to the bar in 1611. Dover was known as a wit, and author of a lost poem The Wandering Jew: according to Peter Heylin, a pageant put on at Gray's Inn. In 1611 he moved to Saintbury, near Chipping Campden.