Thomas Staveley  Thomas Staveley ( 26 November 1626 – 2 January 1684) was a Stuart antiquary, magistrate, anti-Papist, and Church historian. He spent most of his life researching the antiquities of his home county, Leicestershire. Born in East Langton, Staveley attended Cambridge University from 1644 to 1654. Here he studied law, that being the profession he would later take on, serving as a Lancashire Justice of the peace. He was described by contemporaries as a just and even-tempered magistrate, but was most renowned for his manuscripts of Leicestershire history, which were instrumental in the later histories of John Nichols. Staveley published only one work in his lifetime, "The Romish Horseleech" (1674), a political tract protesting James II's Catholicism, later held up as a "no-Popery classic". Staveley died on 8 January 1684 in Friar Lane. Posthumously, two lesser-known historical treatises of Staveley were published, on the English monarchy and Church history, respectively. Thomas Staveley was born to William Staveley (1596–1652), rector of Cossington, Leicestershire, and Anne (1605–1680), daughter of Thomas Babington of Rothley. He was born in East Langton, Leicestershire, sometime in November 1626, and was baptised on 26 November, in the parish church, Church Langton. He was brought up as the eldest of twelve siblings and was admitted to Emmanuel College, at Cambridge University, on 14 April 1644. Here he was admitted to the Inner Temple on 2 July 1647, and called to the bar on 12 June 1654. Professionally, Staveley practised law, serving as part of the Leicester Quorum of Justices of the peace, even through the changes of Charles II's reign. In 1662, he succeeded his father-in-law, as steward to Leicester Corporation. Samuel Carte favourably records his jurisprudence, recalling he "was strictly just, abhorring all manner of fraud or bribery in his practice of the law, was very rarely observed to be in a passion". Staveley's main interest was the antiquarian research of the history of his home county. Much of his research survives in manuscript form (BL, Add. MS 15917; 'History of Leicester', ), and was incorporated into John Nichols' histories, "The History and Antiquities of the County of Leicester" (1795-1811; 8 vols.) and "Bibliotheca Topographica Britannica" (1780–90; 8 vols.).