Jack Mavrogordato

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John George "Jack" Mavrogordato (born May 9, 1905 in London , † June 14, 1987 in Ogwr , Mid Glamorgan , Wales ) was a British lawyer , falconer and author . With his books A Hawk for the Bush and A Falcon in the Field he published two standard works in modern falconry literature .

Live and act

Jack Mavrogordato was the son of the banker George Michael Mavrogordato from the Greek noble dynasty Mavrokordatos and his wife Irene Miltiades, nee. Manuel. He was educated at Charterhouse School , Christ Church College , Oxford and the Gray's Inn Bar Association . From 1932 to 1939 he worked as a barrister . In 1943 he was an employee in the Ministry of Aircraft Design , led by Richard Stafford Cripps . In 1946 he was advocate general in Sudan. In 1952 he was legal advisor to the Governor General in Sudan . In the same year he was named Companion of the Order of St. Michael and St. George (CMG). In 1953 he was legal advisor to the Sudanese government. From 1958 to 1961 he was Senior Counsel in the Sudanese Ministry of Justice. Mavrogordato was considered one of the architects of the legal structure of Anglo-Egyptian Sudan and one of the main authors of the constitution that led Sudan from the British colony to independence. In 1961 he retired.

In the 1960s, Mavrogordato made a name for himself primarily as a falconer. His main interests were sparrowhawks , hawks and falcons . In 1960 he published the work A Hawk for the Bush (German: Ein Beizvogel fürs Gebüsch: A treatise on the removal of the sparrow and other short-winged birds of prey , 1968, translated by Klaus Müller), a large treatise on the training of sparrows.

Mavrogordato's book was extremely practical and addressed a new generation of falconers, who usually worked with the previously frowned upon sparrowhawk rather than the falcon.

It is also aimed at experienced hawk-keepers (falconers who hunt with hawks) and includes sections on bird picking, nestling rearing and chopping, etching, bird recall, birds in old age, health and disease.

The book reaffirmed Mavrogordato's reputation as one of the world's most famous falconers of his time. In 1966 the work A Falcon in the Field followed , which deals with the training of hawks or falcons and pays special attention to the flight during the pickling hunt. Mavrogordato was able to win over the draftsmen George Edward Lodge and David Morrison Reid Henry for his work , who made vivid illustrations for it. Mavrogordato hunted for many years in the Salisbury Plains of Scotland and used birds of prey to hunt partridges in Lincolnshire. In 1964 he was elected President of the British Falconers Club, an office he held for many years. He was also a member of the British Ornithologists' Union . In 1982 his autobiography Behind the Scenes was published .

literature

  • Obituary Mr. JG Mavrogordato In: The Times (London, England) Tuesday June 16, 1987; P. 18; Issue No. 62796.
  • Jack Mavrogordato: Behind the Scenes: An Autobiography , 1982. ISBN 978-1888357219
  • Tim Gallagher : Falcon Fever: A Falconer in the Twenty-first Century , Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2009. ISBN 978-0547526119

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Obituary Mr. JG Mavrogordato In: The Times (London, England), Tuesday June 16, 1987; P. 18; Issue No. 62796.
personal data
SURNAME Mavrogordato, Jack
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Mavrogordato, John George
BRIEF DESCRIPTION British lawyer, falconer and author
DATE OF BIRTH May 9, 1905
PLACE OF BIRTH London
DATE OF DEATH June 14, 1987
Place of death Ogwr , Mid Glamorgan , Wales