Robert plot

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Robert plot

Robert Plot (born December 13, 1640 in Borden , Kent , England , † April 30, 1696 in Sutton Barne , Borden), also Robert Plott , was an English naturalist, professor of chemistry at Oxford University and the first curator of the Ashmolean Museum .

Live and act

Robert Plot was the son of the same name Robert Plot of Sutton Baron (or Barne) and his wife Rebecca, who was a daughter of Thomas Platenden (or Pedenden) of Borden. He was born in 1640. and attended Free School in Wye, Kent. Plot studied at Magdalen Hall in Oxford; he received the BA in 1661, the MA in 1664 and the BCL and the DCL in 1671.

Best known as a curiosity researcher, he wrote a natural history of Oxfordshire and a natural history of Staffordshire . In December 1677 he became a member of the Royal Society for his research on minerals ; from 1682 to 1684 he was its secretary and from 1682 co-editor of the Philosophical Transactions of this society. His Natural History of Oxfordshire (1677) contains the first known illustrations of dinosaur bones, which he believed to be the bones of a giant.

Plot was First Keeper of the Ashmolean Museum from 1683 to 1690 . From 1683 he was professor of chemistry at Oxford University. In 1687 he became secretary to the Earl Marshal, Henry Howard, 7th Duke of Norfolk; in the same year he became Registrar of the Court of Chivalry . In 1688 he became Historiographer Royal , in 1694 Mowbray Herald Extraordinary .

In the field of chemistry, he researched a universal solvent that he wanted to make from alcohol and believed that medicine was dependent on alchemy . From 1686 he turned to archeology , but interpreted finds from Roman times as of Saxon origin. He was mainly interested in the extraordinary; He researched the properties of the air on the basis of echoes , examined mineral water sources and recognized the stratification of layers of the earth. He explained finds of fossil shells and other fossils as accidental accumulations of mineral crystals , and he believed that springs can also be fed with seawater through underground channels.

Plot married Rebecca, Henry Burton's widow and daughter of Ralph Sherwood, a London grocer. He died of concretions on April 30, 1696 and was buried at Borden Church.

Works (selection)

  • The natural history of Oxford-shire. Being an essay towards the Natural History of England. Oxford 1677, doi: 10.5962 / bhl.title.23488 (digitized, Biodiversity Heritage Library)
  • The natural history of Stafford-shire. Oxford 1686, digitized version ( GoogleBooks), HTML version (Early English Books)
  • De Origine Fontium, Tentamen Philosophicum. In praelectione habita coram Societate Philosophica nuper Oxonii instituta ad Scientiam naturalem doctorate. , Sheldon, Oxford, 1685

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Individual evidence

  1. ^ The entry with the Royal Society says "before 13 December 1640".
  2. ^ Oxford Geology Group, Notable Local Geologists

Web links

Commons : Robert Plot  - album with pictures, videos and audio files
personal data
SURNAME Plot, Robert
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Plott, Robert
BRIEF DESCRIPTION English naturalist and university professor
DATE OF BIRTH December 13, 1640
PLACE OF BIRTH Borden , Kent , England
DATE OF DEATH April 30, 1696
Place of death Sutton Barne , Borden , Kent , England