• Name: Douce, Francis
• Gender: Male
• Birth Date: 13  July  1757
• Death Date: 30  March  1834
• Occupation: antiquary
• Occupation: collector

Francis Douce was elected to the Society of Antiquaries in 1779 and he became keeper of manuscripts at the British Museum in 1807. He published Illustrations of Shakespeare, and of Ancient Manners in two volumes in 1807 and The dance of death exhibited in elegant engravings on wood, with a dissertation on the several representations of that subject in 1833. He was a remarkable collector as his legacy to the Bodleian Library, Oxford testifies, inclusive of thousands of books and prints, over a thousand drawings, hundreds of manuscripts, and various coins and medals.

Douce’s interests and expertise in the occult were widely known, and he was regularly consulted by researchers and scholars. Godwin wrote to Douce three times in 1801-2, and saw him at least five times in 1833-4. In a series of undated letters, Godwin requested to see a series of manuscripts relating to his book, Lives of the Necromancers, published in 1834.

Godwin recorded his death.

• MS. Abinger c. 7, fols. 74-5: 2 November 1801
• MS. Abinger c. 14, fols. 23-4: 1833
• MS. Abinger c. 14, fol. 86: 4 December
• Bodleian MSS Douce 28, fols. 206-7
• DNB

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