Nothing is known of Adam de Brome's life before 1315, when he appears in the records as rector of Hanworth, Middlesex. In subsequent years he held other church offices, some of them lucrative, and served as a clerk in King Edward II's chancery. In the 14th century many royal officials were not directly paid, but instead were given the incomes of distant ecclesiastical properties that they rarely visited. Adam de Brome may have been one of these. In 1324, he founded the institution in Oxford afterwards known as Oriel College, and was named its first provost a year later. He died in June, 1332 and was buried in St Mary's Church, Oxford.