Thomas Edward Lawrence (16 August 1888 – 19 May 1935) was a British Army officer, archaeologist, diplomat and writer known for his role during the Arab Revolt and Sinai and Palestine campaign against the Ottoman Empire in the First World War. The breadth and variety of his activities and associations, and Lawrence's ability to describe them vividly in writing, earned him international fame as Lawrence of Arabia, a title used for the 1962 film based on his wartime activities.
Lawrence was born in Tremadog, Carnarvonshire, Wales, the illegitimate son of Sir Thomas Chapman, an Anglo-Irish landowner, and Sarah Lawrence, a governess in the employ of Chapman. In 1896, Lawrence moved to Oxford, attending the City of Oxford High School for Boys, and read history at Jesus College, Oxford, from 1907 to 1910. Between 1910 and 1914, he worked as an archaeologist for the British Museum, chiefly at Carchemish in Ottoman Syria.
After the outbreak of war in 1914, Lawrence joined the British Army and was stationed at the Arab Bureau, a military intelligence unit in Egypt.