Francis Willughby (sometimes spelt Willoughby)[1] (22 November 1635 – 3 July 1672) was an English ornithologist and ichthyologist. He was a student, friend and colleague of the naturalist John Ray at Cambridge University, and shared some of his expeditions and interests. Ray saw Willughby's Ornithologia libri tres through the press after Willughby's sudden death.
Willughby was born at Middleton Hall, Warwickshire to Sir Francis Willoughby and Cassandra Ridgway. He studied at Bishop Vesey's Grammar School, Sutton Coldfield and Trinity College, Cambridge.[2] In 1667 he married Emma Barnard, daughter of Sir Henry Barnard of Bridgnorth and London. They had three children. The first child, Francis, died at the age of nineteen, while his daughter Cassandra Willoughby married the Duke Chandos, who was a patron of Mark Catesby. His second son was Thomas, who became Baron Middleton, one of ten peers created by Queen Anne.[3]
At Cambridge Francis Willughby was taught by the naturalist John Ray. In 1662 they travelled to the west coast of England to study the breeding seabirds. Between 1663 and 1666 they toured Europe together, travelling through the Netherlands, Germany, Switzerland and Italy. They separated at Naples and Willoughby returned home via Spain. On returning to England they made plans to publish the results of their studies. Willughby died from pleurisy during the preparation of this work, but Ray published Willughby's Ornithologia libri tres in 1676, with an English edition two years later. This is considered the beginning of scientific ornithology in Europe, revolutionizing ornithological taxonomy by organizing species according to their physical characteristics. Willughby and Ray were among the first to dismiss the older inaccuracies of Aristotle. Aristotle had claimed that swallows hibernated but Willughby and Ray (1678:212, quoted in Raven 1942:328) wrote: “To us it seems more probable that they fly away into hot countries, viz. Egypt, Aethiopia etc.”[4] Ray also published Willughby's De Historia piscium (1686).
The Willughby family seat, Wollaton Hall, now owned by the City of Nottingham, houses Willughby and Ray's natural history collection of stuffed animals and birds. The Willughby papers are amongst the Middleton collection held at the Nottingham University Library.
FRANCIS WILLUGHBY (1635-1672), English ornithologist and ichthyologist, son of Sir Francis Willughby, was born at Middleton, Warwickshire, in 1635. He is memorable as the pupil, friend and patron as well as the active and original co-worker of John Ray, and hence to be reckoned as one of the most important ' precursors of Linnaeus. His connexion with Ray dated from his studies at Trinity College, Cambridge (1653-1659); and, after concluding his academic life by a brief sojourn at Oxford, and acquiring considerable experience of travel in England, he made an extensive Continental tour in his company. The specimens, figures and notes thus accumulated were in great part elaborated on his return into his Ornithologia, which, however, he did not live to publish, having injured a naturally delicate constitution by alternate exposure and over-study. This work was published in 1676, and translated by Ray as the Ornithology of Fr. Willughby (London, 1678, fol.); the same friend published his Historia Piscium (1686, fol.). Willughby died at Middleton Hall on the 3rd of July 1672.
In Ray's preface to the former work he gives Willughby much of the credit usually assigned to himself, both as critic and systematist. Thus, while founding on Gesner and Aldrovandus, he omitted their irrelevancies, being careful to exclude "hieroglyphics, emblems, morals, fables, presages or ought else pertaining to divinity, ethics, grammar, or any sort of humane learning, and present him [the reader] with what properly belongs only to natural history." Again, he not only devised artificial keys to his species and genera, but, "that he might clear up all these obscurities [of former writers] and render the knowledge and distinction of species facile to all that should come after, he bent his endeavours mainly to find out certain characteristic notes of each kind," while finally, in apologizing for his engravings, he yet not unjustly claims that "they are best and truest of any hitherto graven in brass." (See also ORNITHOLOGY.)
Categories: WET-WIL | Biography | Zoologists
   | University of Nottingham - Biography of Francis Willughby (1635-1672) - Family and Estate Resources - Manuscripts & Special Collections- The University of Nottingham |
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