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Edward Maunde Thompson (1840–1929), Knight Grand Cross of the Order of the Bath, was a British palaeographer, best remembered today for his study of William Shakespeare's handwriting in the manuscript of the play Sir Thomas More.

Thompson's father was Edward Thompson, Custos of Clarendon, Jamaica. His mother was Eliza Hayhurst Poole, also of Clarendon. He was educated at Rugby and at University College of Oxford University. In 1864 he married Georgiana Susanna McKenzie from an old Scots-Jamaican family. They had one daughter and three sons.

He served as Director and Principal Librarian of the British Museum from 1888 to 1909. He set high standards for the staff of the museum, and worked hard to improve the accessiblity of public to the collections. He secured premises at Hendon to house the museum's newspaper collection.

He was a founding member of the British Academy in 1901, and served as its second President (1907-09). He was knighted in 1895. He received honorary degrees from Oxford, Durham, St. Andrews and Manchester Universities, and was an honorary fellow of University College, Oxford.

In 1916 he published his paleographic study of the three-page addition to the manuscript of Sir Thomas More, arguing that the three pages in "Hand D" were in Shakespeare's autograph. In 1923 he contributed to the definitive study Shakespeare's Hand in the Play of Sir Thomas More, with Alfred W. Pollard, W. W. Greg, John Dover Wilson, and R. W. Chambers.

• An Introduction to Greek and Latin Palaeography, Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1912.
• Facsimiles of Ancient Manuscripts, London, Oxford University Press, 1913-30.
• Shakespeare's Handwriting: A Study, Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1916.

• Kenyon, Sir Frederic G. Sir Edward Maunde Thompson, 1840-1929. London, H. Milford, 1929.
• Jamaican Historical Society Bulletin, Vol.11, No.1, April 1998

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