The English navigator and explorer William Baffin (ca. 1584-1622) discovered Baffin Bay and was active in the early exploration of the Arctic.

William Baffin's background and his activities prior to 1612 are either unknown or based on conjecture. He was probably born in London and appears to have been of humble birth. Self-educated but remarkably skilled in his profession, he wrote several accounts of voyages which demonstrate some exposure to classical literature. Little is known of his personal life, though Baffin's elderly widow appears in official documents as a somewhat quarrelsome petitioner of the East India Company. There is no evidence of any children surviving Baffin's death.

Baffin first appears in history in 1612, when he served as chief pilot aboard a vessel off the western coast of Greenland. In 1613 and 1614 he was with the Muscovy Company's whaling fleets off Svalbard (Spitsbergen), and in 1615 he explored the Hudson Strait. In...