Sir Paul Rycaut FRS (23 December 1629 – 16 November 1700) was an English diplomat and historian, and an authority on the Ottoman Empire.^[1]

Rycaut's Huguenot father was held in the Tower of London, during the English Civil War, for his Cavalier sympathy, but the sequestration of his property was lifted.

Rycaut was born in Aylesford, Kent, and graduated from Trinity College, Cambridge, in 1650.^[2] In 1652, he was admitted to Gray's Inn. While studying at Alcalá de Henares, he learned Spanish and translated the first part of Baltasar Gracián's The Critick. Rycaut was then employed as private secretary to Heneage Finch, 3rd Earl of Winchilsea, ambassador to the Ottoman Empire. He became British Consul and factor^[3] at Smyrna (now İzmir).^[4] From 1689 to 1700, he was Resident at Hamburg.^[5]

On 12 December 1666, Rycaut was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society.^[6]

Knighthood was conferred on him in 1685. He died in Hamburg, aged 70,^{[citation needed]} of a stroke.^[7]

• The Present State of the Ottoman Empire. Printed for C. Brome. 1665.
  • 1670 French translation and Images from the book at National Library of France BnF Gallica
• The Present State of the Greek and Armenian Churches, Anno Christi 1678 Written at the Command of His Majesty by Paul Ricaut, Printed for John Starkey, 1679
• The Turkish History. Vol. 1. 1687.
• The Turkish History. Vol. 2. 1687.
• Lorenzo Gracián (1681). The Critick. Translator Paul Rycaut. Printed by T.N. for Henry Brome.
• Baptista Platina, The lives of the popes, Translator Paul Rycaut, Illustrator Robert White, printed for C. Wilkinson, 1688
• Inca Garcilaso de la Vega (1688). Comentarios Reales de los Incas [The royal commentaries of Peru]. Translated by Paul Rycaut.

His letters to William Blathwayt are held at Princeton University.^[8]