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Edward Blyth
Edward Blyth (23 December 1810 – 27 December 1873) was an English zoologist who worked for most of his life in India as a curator of zoology at the Royal Asiatic Society of Bengal in Calcutta.
He set about updating the museum's catalogues, publishing a Catalogue of the Birds of the Asiatic Society in 1849. He was prevented from doing much fieldwork himself, but received and described bird specimens from A.O. Hume, Samuel Tickell, Robert Swinhoe among others. His Natural History of the Cranes was published posthumously in 1881.
On 23 December 1810, Blyth was born in London. His father, a clothier, died in 1820 and his mother sent him to Dr. Fennell's school in Wimbledon. He took an interest in reading, but was often to be found spending time in the woods nearby. Leaving school in 1825, he went to study chemistry, at the suggestion of Dr. Fennell, in London under Dr. Keating at St. Paul's Churchyard. He did not find the teaching satisfactory and began to work as a pharmacist in Tooting, but quit in 1837 to try his luck as an author and editor. In 1836, he produced an annotated edition of Gilbert White's Natural History of Selborne which was reprinted in 1858.
He was offered the position of curator at the museum of the Asiatic Society of Bengal in 1841. He was so poor that he needed an advance of 100 pounds to make the trip to Calcutta. In India, Blyth was poorly paid (the Asiatic Society did not expect to find a European curator for the salary that they could offer), with a salary of 300 pounds per year (which was unchanged for twenty years), and a house allowance of 4 pounds per month. He married in 1854, and tried to supplement his income by writing under a pseudonym (Zoophilus) for the Indian Sporting Review, and traded live animals between India and Britain to wealthy collectors in both countries. In this venture he sought the collaboration of eminent people such as Charles Darwin and John Gould, both of whom declined these offers.
Although a curator of a museum with many responsibilities, he contributed mainly to ornithology, often ignoring the rest of his work. In 1847, his employers were unhappy at his failure to produce a catalogue of the museum. Some Asiatic Society factions opposed Blyth, and he complained to Richard Owen in 1848:
They intrigue in every way to get rid of me; accuse me of being an Ornithologist, and that the society did not want an ornithologist...I could astonish you by various statements of what I have to put up with but forbear.
— quoted in Brandon-Jones, 1997
He also found the ornithologist George Robert Gray, keeper at the British Museum, uncooperative in helping him with his ornithological research far away in India. He complained to the trustees of the museum but it was dismissed with several character references in favour of Gray including Charles Darwin.
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Edward Blyth
Edward Blyth (23 December 1810 – 27 December 1873) was an English zoologist who worked for most of his life in India as a curator of zoology at the Royal Asiatic Society of Bengal in Calcutta.
He set about updating the museum's catalogues, publishing a Catalogue of the Birds of the Asiatic Society in 1849. He was prevented from doing much fieldwork himself, but received and described bird specimens from A.O. Hume, Samuel Tickell, Robert Swinhoe among others. His Natural History of the Cranes was published posthumously in 1881.
On 23 December 1810, Blyth was born in London. His father, a clothier, died in 1820 and his mother sent him to Dr. Fennell's school in Wimbledon. He took an interest in reading, but was often to be found spending time in the woods nearby. Leaving school in 1825, he went to study chemistry, at the suggestion of Dr. Fennell, in London under Dr. Keating at St. Paul's Churchyard. He did not find the teaching satisfactory and began to work as a pharmacist in Tooting, but quit in 1837 to try his luck as an author and editor. In 1836, he produced an annotated edition of Gilbert White's Natural History of Selborne which was reprinted in 1858.
He was offered the position of curator at the museum of the Asiatic Society of Bengal in 1841. He was so poor that he needed an advance of 100 pounds to make the trip to Calcutta. In India, Blyth was poorly paid (the Asiatic Society did not expect to find a European curator for the salary that they could offer), with a salary of 300 pounds per year (which was unchanged for twenty years), and a house allowance of 4 pounds per month. He married in 1854, and tried to supplement his income by writing under a pseudonym (Zoophilus) for the Indian Sporting Review, and traded live animals between India and Britain to wealthy collectors in both countries. In this venture he sought the collaboration of eminent people such as Charles Darwin and John Gould, both of whom declined these offers.
Although a curator of a museum with many responsibilities, he contributed mainly to ornithology, often ignoring the rest of his work. In 1847, his employers were unhappy at his failure to produce a catalogue of the museum. Some Asiatic Society factions opposed Blyth, and he complained to Richard Owen in 1848:
They intrigue in every way to get rid of me; accuse me of being an Ornithologist, and that the society did not want an ornithologist...I could astonish you by various statements of what I have to put up with but forbear.
— quoted in Brandon-Jones, 1997
He also found the ornithologist George Robert Gray, keeper at the British Museum, uncooperative in helping him with his ornithological research far away in India. He complained to the trustees of the museum but it was dismissed with several character references in favour of Gray including Charles Darwin.