Peter Mundy

He was the first Englishman to record, in his Itinerarium Mundi ('Itinerary of the World'), tasting Chaa (tea) in China and travelled extensively in Asia, Russia and Europe.

He visited Constantinople in 1617, returning to London and overland via Bulgaria, Sarajevo, Split, Venice, Chambéry and Paris with the English Ambassador Paul Pindar, and afterwards made a journey to Spain as a clerk in the employ of Richard Wyche.

Following Wyche's death and a brief spell in the family Pilchard business, he returned to London and obtained employment on account of his language skills, travelling experience and reference from Pindar, with the East India Company on a salary of 25 pounds.

As a fisherman and sailor it is likely that he spoke at least some Cornish of which he makes some account of its relation to Welsh, visiting Wales (and climbing Ysgyryd Fawr) in 1639 where he noted "few of the common or poorer sort understand any English at all".

His journals record his being served "Chaa" or tea by the Chinese and tasting chocolate aboard a Spanish merchant vessel.

His journals end somewhat abruptly, but a manuscript in the Rawlinson collection at the Bodleian Library continues the narrative of his life, spending many years living in the Hansa free city of Danzig - modern Gdańsk - including journeys to Denmark, Prussia, and Russia, which lasted from 1639 to 1648.

But if he was unfeeling, he was by no means insensitive; each strange item in the surprising world he had inherited is described with a spontaneous brilliance seldom to be found in modern writing.