Humphry Sibthorp

1 portrait

© National Portrait Gallery, London

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Humphry Sibthorp

by Unknown artist
watercolour and bodycolour on ivory, circa 1794
2 3/4 in. x 2 1/8 in. (70 mm x 54 mm) oval
Given by Hon. Evelyn Pelham (née Sibthorp), 1964
Primary Collection
NPG 4408

Sitterback to top

Artistback to top

  • Unknown artist, Artist. Artist or producer associated with 6578 portraits.

Related worksback to top

  • NPG 4409: John Sibthorp (companion portrait)

Linked publicationsback to top

  • Ingamells, John, National Portrait Gallery: Mid-Georgian Portraits 1760-1790, 2004, p. 429
  • Saywell, David; Simon, Jacob, Complete Illustrated Catalogue, 2004, p. 563
  • Walker, Richard, Miniatures: 300 Years of the English Miniature, 1998, p. 73 Read entry

    Humphry Sibthorp, Sherardian Professor of Botany at Oxford, is said to have delivered only one lecture during his thirty-six years in the chair. His son John (see NPG 4409) succeeded him as Sherardian Professor and unsuccessfully bid, on behalf of Oxford and against his friend J. E. Smith, for Linnaeus's botanic collection, now safely housed in the Linnaen Society library at Burlington House. John Sibthorp's Flora Oxoniensis (1794) and Flora Graecia, published posthumously, are models of critical and scholarly botanic literature, the results of his indefatigable travels throughout Europe. The two miniatures appear to be by the same hand but the artist's name is not known at present.

Subject/Themeback to top

Events of 1794back to top

Current affairs

Treason Trials against John Horne Tooke, Thomas Hardy and John Thelwall take place amidst fears of domestic revolution. Their acquittal marks the most dramatic victory of the cause.
Leader of the Opposition, Charles James Fox's Libel Bill secures the landmark right of trial by jury for the accused.
Thomas Muir and the four other Scottish Martyrs who campaigned for parliamentary reform were transported to Australia for sedition.

Art and science

Edward Jenner discovers the smallpox inoculation after realising that those who worked with cattle and caught cowpox developed immunity.
Drury Lane Theatre re-opens under the management of the playwright Richard Brinsley Sheridan. In competition with the Covent Garden Theatre it featured a new pit and boxes designed by architect Henry Holland.

International

Maximilien Robespierre, member of the French dictatorial Committee of Public Safety is arrested and executed as part of a conspiracy by enemies who disliked his anti-extremist stance and zeal for social reform.
Campaign in the Low Countries under the Duke of York. Allies are defeated and French reoccupy Brussels. British troops retreat to Holland.

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