Alastair Cook is now England's leading Test match run-scorer.
The England captain needed 32 runs to surpass mentor Graham Gooch's mark - 8, 900 runs in 118 Tests - going into the second Test against New Zealand at Headingley, Leeds.
A boundary through backward point off Tim Southee, in the 28th over of the England innings, helped the 30-year-old reach the milsetone, in his 114th Test appearance.
Gooch's record had stood for 21 years, nine months and 10 days. Cook has always consider the former England captain, and batting coach, his mentor.
Centuries in his last two Test matches - a workmanlike 105 in the first innings against West Indies at the Kensington Oval in Barbados followed by a magnificent 162 in the second innings of the opening Test against the Kiwis at Lord's - had helped Cook close in on Gooch's mark.
It also took Cook's tally of Test centuries to 27, another English record.
Cook, who averages in excess of 46 in the game's longer format, achieved the milestone in his 203rd innings.
With Jimmy Anderson overhauling Ian Botham's record (383) as England's highest wicket-taker during the recent tour of the West Indies, English cricket's two biggest individual milestones got broken in the space of a few weeks.
In fact, on the opening day of the Headingley Test Anderson built upon his landmark, becoming the first English bowler to take 400 Test wickets.
