Lubbock, John, 1st Baron Avebury

From New World Encyclopedia
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His wife Ellen died in 1879. Five years later he married Alice Lane Fox-Pitt, the daughter of [[Augustus Pitt Rivers|Lieutenant-General Augustus Henry Lane Fox Pitt Rivers]]. They had five more children: three sons and two daughters.  
 
His wife Ellen died in 1879. Five years later he married Alice Lane Fox-Pitt, the daughter of [[Augustus Pitt Rivers|Lieutenant-General Augustus Henry Lane Fox Pitt Rivers]]. They had five more children: three sons and two daughters.  
  
In recognition of his contributions to the sciences, Lubbock received honorary degrees from the universities of [[University of Oxford|Oxford]], [[University of Cambridge|Cambridge]] (where he was [[Rede lecturer]] in 1886), [[University of Edinburgh|Edinburgh]], [[University of Dublin|Dublin]] and [[University of St Andrews|St Andrews]]; and in 1878 was appointed a trustee of the [[British Museum]].
+
Lubbock received honorary Doctor of Law degrees from the universities of [[University of Oxford|Oxford]], [[University of Cambridge|Cambridge]] (where he was [[Rede lecturer]] in 1886), [[University of Edinburgh|Edinburgh]], [[University of Dublin|Dublin]], and [[University of St Andrews|St Andrews]].  
  
 
In January 1900 he was raised to the [[peerage]], under the title of Baron Avebury in recognition of his work to preserve the [[Avebury]] archaeological site.
 
In January 1900 he was raised to the [[peerage]], under the title of Baron Avebury in recognition of his work to preserve the [[Avebury]] archaeological site.

Revision as of 23:12, 21 September 2011

John Lubbock

File:John Lubbock.jpg
John Lubbock
Born

April 30, 1834

Died May 28, 1913
Nationality English
Field Finance, Biology, Archaeology, Politics
Known for Bank holidays
Influences Charles Darwin

Sir John Lubbock, 4th Baronet, 1st Baron Avebury, PC FRS (April 30, 1834 – May 28, 1913), English banker, politician, biologist and archaeologist was born the son of Sir John William Lubbock, Bart. Known as Sir John Lubbock, 4th Baronet from 1865 until 1900, he was a polymath and Liberal Member of Parliament. He was also a banker and worked with his family's company, but was also involved with entomology, botany, biology, archaeology, and ethnography. He helped establish archaeology as a scientific discipline, and contributed to the preservation of the Avebury site. He was also influential in nineteenth-century debates concerning evolutionary theory.

Life

John Lubbock was born on April 30, 1834, the son of Sir John Lubbock, 3rd Baronet, a wealthy London banker, and Harriet Hotham. He was brought up in the family home of High Elms Estate, near Downe in Kent.

Lubbock was one of eight brothers and one sister;[1] three brothers, Alfred,[2] Nevile[3] and Edgar[4] played cricket for Kent. Edgar and Alfred also played football and played together for Old Etonians in the 1875 FA Cup Final.

During 1842 his father brought home a "great piece of news": the young Lubbock said later that he initially thought that the news might be of a new pony, and was disappointed to learn it was only that Charles Darwin was moving to Down House in the village.[5] The young Lubbock was soon a frequent visitor to Down House, and became the closest of Darwin's younger friends.[6] Their relationship stimulated young Lubbock's passion for science and evolutionary theory.[7] Both father and son were influenced by Darwin's scientific interest in nature and developed the grounds of the High Elms estate, including planting trees from all over the world as well as constructing terraced gardens which remain to this day.

In 1845, Lubbock began studies at Eton College, and after graduation was employed by his father's bank (which later amalgamated with Coutts & Co), where he became a partner at the age of twenty-two.

In 1956, he married Ellen Frances Horden. They had six children: three sons, the eldest of whom, John, became the Second Baron Avebury, and three daughters.

In 1865, upon his father's death, he succeeded to the baronetcy, becoming Sir John Lubbock, 4th Baronet.

Kingsgate Castle in Kent was rebuilt by Lord Avebury.

In 1870, and again in 1874, Lubbock was elected as a Liberal Party Member of Parliament (MP) for Maidstone. He lost the seat at the election of 1880, but was at once elected member for the University of London, of which he had been vice-chancellor since 1872. He carried numerous enactments in parliament, including the Bank Holidays Act of 1871 and the Ancient Monuments Act of 1882. When the Liberals split in 1886 over Irish Home Rule, Lubbock joined the breakaway Liberal Unionist Party.

His wife Ellen died in 1879. Five years later he married Alice Lane Fox-Pitt, the daughter of Lieutenant-General Augustus Henry Lane Fox Pitt Rivers. They had five more children: three sons and two daughters.

Lubbock received honorary Doctor of Law degrees from the universities of Oxford, Cambridge (where he was Rede lecturer in 1886), Edinburgh, Dublin, and St Andrews.

In January 1900 he was raised to the peerage, under the title of Baron Avebury in recognition of his work to preserve the Avebury archaeological site.

Lubbock died at Kingsgate Castle, Kent, on May 28, 1913 at age 79, from heart failure.

Work

Banking

Lubbock began his banking career on completion of his studies at Eton being employed by his father's bank. He became a partner there at the age of twenty-two. He was elected the first president of the Institute of Bankers in 1879; and from 1881 to 1886 served as president of the Linnean Society of London.

In March 1883 he joined with other bankers to found the Bank Clerks Orphanage for the children of bank clerks who were deceased or ill, which developed into the Bank Workers Charity for bank employees, past and present and their dependents.[8]

As a Member of Parliament and as a banker had taken a close interest in gold coinage, Lubbock was appointed chairman of the committee on the design of new coinage in 1891.[9]

Politics

After the early 1870s, Lubbock became increasingly interested in political advocacy, business, and natural science. As liberal MP for Maidstone, Kent, Lubbock had a distinguished political career, with four main political agendas: promotion of the study of science in primary and secondary schools; the national debt, free trade, and related economic issues; protection of ancient monuments; securing of additional holidays and shorter working hours for the working classes.[7] He was successful with numerous enactments in parliament, including the Bank Holidays Act 1871 and the Ancient Monuments Act of 1882, along with another 28 acts of Parliament.

Prior to 1834, the Bank of England observed about thirty-three saints' days and religious festivals as holidays, but in 1834, this was reduced to just four: May Day, All Saints Day, Good Friday, and Christmas Day. In 1871, the first legislation relating to bank holidays was passed when Lubbock introduced the Bank Holidays Act to specify the days for Bank Holidays. In gratitude and bringing "a sense of medieval merriment," the English people called those first Bank Holidays St Lubbock's Days for a while.[10] The Act designated four Bank Holidays in England, Wales, and Ireland (Easter Monday; Whit Monday; First Monday in August; Boxing Day in England and Wales and St Stephen's Day in Ireland), and five in Scotland (New Year's Day; Good Friday; First Monday in May; First Monday in August; Christmas Day). In England, Wales, and Ireland, Good Friday and Christmas Day were considered traditional days of rest (as were Sundays) and therefore it was felt unnecessary to include them in the Act. The 1871 Act was repealed 100 years later and its provisions incorporated into the Banking and Financial Dealings Act 1971.[11]

In January 1884 Lubbock founded the Proportional Representation Society, later to become the Electoral Reform Society.

From 1888 to 1892 he was president of the London Chamber of Commerce; from 1889 to 1890 vice-chairman and from 1890 to 1892 chairman of the London County Council.

Science

In addition to his work at his father's bank, Lubbock took a keen interest in archaeology and evolutionary theory. He had extensive correspondence with Charles Darwin, who lived nearby in Downe. Lubbock stayed in Downe except for a brief period from 1861–1865, when he relocated to Chislehurst. Darwin rented ground, originally from Lubbock's father, for the Sandwalk wood where he performed his daily exercise, and in 1874 agreed with Lubbock to exchange the land for a piece of pasture in Darwin's property.[12] When Darwin died in 1882, Lubbock suggested the honor of burial in Westminster Abbey, organizing a letter to the Dean to arrange this, and was one of the pallbearers.[6]

Lubbock spoke in support of the evolutionist Thomas Henry Huxley at the famous 1860 Oxford evolution debate. During the 1860s, he published many articles in which he used archaeological evidence to support Darwin's theory.[7] In 1864, he became one of the founding members (along with Thomas Henry Huxley and others) of the elite X Club, a dining club composed of nine gentlemen to promote the theories of natural selection and academic liberalism. In 1865 he succeeded to the baronetcy. During the 1860s he held a number of influential academic positions, including President of the Ethnological Society from 1864-5, Vice-President of Linnean Society in 1865, and President of the International Association for Prehistoric Archaeology in 1868.

Woodburytype print of
John Lubbock in middle age
Caricature from Punch, 1882



In 1865 Lubbock published what was possibly the most influential archaeological text book of the nineteenth century, Pre-historic times, as illustrated by ancient remains, and the manners and customs of modern savages. This became a standard archaeology textbook for the remainder of the century, with the seventh and final edition published in 1913.[7] He invented the terms Palaeolithic and Neolithic to denote the Old and New Stone Ages respectively. More notably, he introduced a Darwinian-type theory of human nature and development. "What was new was Lubbock's... insistence that, as a result of natural selection, human groups had become different from each other, not only culturally, but also in their biological capacities to utilize culture."[13]

Lubbock complained in the preface about Charles Lyell:

"Note.—In his celebrated work on the Antiquity of Man, Sir Charles Lyell has made much use of my earlier articles in the Natural History Review, frequently, indeed, extracting whole sentences verbatim, or nearly so. But as he has in these cases omitted to mention the source from which his quotations were derived, my readers might naturally think that I had taken very unjustifiable liberties with the work of the eminent geologist. A reference to the respective dates will, however, protect me from any such inference. The statement made by Sir Charles Lyell, in a note to page 11 of his work, that my article on the Danish Shell-mounds was published after Ms sheets were written, is an inadvertence, regretted, I have reason to believe, as much by its author as it is by me." Preface to Pre-historic times.

His second book, On the Origin of Civilization, was published in 1870. During 1871, he purchased part of the Avebury estate to protect its prehistoric stone monuments from impending destruction. During the early 1870s, he held the position of President of the Royal Anthropological Society from 1871–73, as well as the position of Vice President of the Royal Society in 1871. During this period he worked with John Evans, the other key figure in the establishment of the discipline of archaeology.[7]

Lubbock was also an amateur biologist of some distinction, writing books on hymenoptera (Ants, Bees and Wasps: a record of observations on the habits of the social hymenoptera. Kegan Paul, London; New York: Appleton, 1884.), on insect sense organs and development, on the intelligence of animals, and on other natural history topics. He discovered that ants were sensitive to the ultraviolet range of the electromagnetic spectrum.[14][15] The Punch verse of 1882 captured him perfectly:

How doth the Banking Busy Bee
Improve his shining Hours?
By studying on Bank Holidays
Strange insects and Wild Flowers!
Lord Avebury speaking during the presentation of the first replica of Diplodocus carnegii to the trustees of the British Museum of Natural History, 12 May 1905

In 1881 he was president of the British Association for the Advancement of Science, and from 1881 to 1886 president of the Linnean Society of London. He was President of the Royal Statistical Society from 1900 to 1902.[16] He rebuilt Kingsgate Castle, in Kent near Broadstairs.

In January 1900 he was promoted to the peerage as Baron Avebury, his title commemorating the largest Stone Age site in Britain, which he had helped to preserve (he had purchased it in 1871 when the site was threatened with destruction).

Legacy

The quotation, "We may sit in our library and yet be in all quarters of the earth," is widely attributed to Lubbock. This variation appears in his book The Pleasures of Life: "Not only does a library contain 'infinite riches in a little room,' but we may sit at home and yet be in all quarters of the earth."

Major works

  • The Origin of Civilisation and the Primitive Condition of Man: Mental and social condition of savages. British Library, Historical Print Editions, 2011 (original 1870). ISBN 978-1240907083
  • Observations on Bees and Wasps (Pt.1-10). Cornell University Library, 2009 (original 1876-1884). ISBN 978-1112568282
  • On the Senses, Instincts, and Intelligence of Animals. Adamant Media Corporation, 2005 (original 1888). ISBN 978-1421266855
  • The Pleasures of Life: Volume 1. Adamant Media Corporation, 2001 (original 1888). ISBN 978-1421267876
  • The Pleasures of Life: Volume 2. Adamant Media Corporation, 2001 (original 1889). ISBN 978-1421265575
  • Pre-Historic Times, as Illustrated by Ancient Remains and the Manners and Customs of Modern Savages. Cornell University Library, 2009 (original 1890). ISBN 978-1112194245
  • The Beauties of Nature and the Wonders of the World We Live In. Adamant Media Corporation, 2005 (original 1892). ISBN 978-1421271033
  • The Use of Life. Adamant Media Corporation, 2005 (original 1895). ISBN 978-1421265698
  • Ants, Bees, And Wasps: A Record Of Observations On The Habits Of The Social Hymenoptera. Kessinger Publishing, LLC, 2009 (original 1911). ISBN 978-1104712983

Notes

  1. Sir John William Lubbock, 3rd Bt. The Peerage.com Retrieved September 20, 2011.
  2. Alfred Lubbock. Cricket Archive. Retrieved September 20, 2011.
  3. Nevile Lubbock. Cricket Archive. Retrieved September 20, 2011.
  4. Edgar Lubbock. Cricket Archive. Retrieved September 20, 2011.
  5. O.J.R. Howarth and E.K. Howarth, A history of Darwin's parish: Downe, Kent (1933), 72–73. Retrieved September 20, 2011.
  6. 6.0 6.1 R.B. Freeman, Charles Darwin: A Companion (Dawson Publishing, 1979, ISBN 978-0712909013), 192. Retrieved September 20, 2011.
  7. 7.0 7.1 7.2 7.3 7.4 Steven Mithen, After the Ice: A Global Human History 20,000-5000 B.C.E. (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2006, ISBN 978-0674019997).
  8. Our history The Bank Workers Charity. Retrieved September 21, 2011.
  9. Christopher Edgar Challis (ed.), A New history of the Royal Mint (Cambridge University Press, 1992, ISBN 978-0521240260), 536.
  10. Michael Olmert, Milton's Teeth and Ovid's Umbrella: Curiouser & Curiouser Adventures in History (New York, NY: Touchstone, 1996, ISBN 978-0684801643), 170.
  11. Bank Holiday Fact File Trades Union Congress, May 22, 2007. Retrieved September 21, 2011.
  12. Charles Darwin: A Companion (Dawson Publishing, 1979, ISBN 978-0712909013), 125. Retrieved September 20, 2011.
  13. Bruce G. Trigger, A History of Archaeological Thought (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2006, ISBN 978-0521840767), 173.
  14. Lubbock, J. (1881). Observations on ants, bees, and wasps. IX. Color of flowers as an attraction to bees: Experiments and considerations thereon.. J. Linn. Soc. Lond. (Zool.) 16: 110–112.
  15. Kevan, Peter G. and Chittka, Lars & Dyer, Adrian G. (2001). Limits to the salience of ultraviolet: lessons from colour vision in bees and birds. J. Exp. Biol. 204 (Pt 14): 2571–2580.
  16. Royal Statistical Society Presidents. Royal Statistical Society. Retrieved 6 August 2010.

References
ISBN links support NWE through referral fees

  • Challis, Christopher Edgar (ed.). A New history of the Royal Mint. Cambridge University Press, 1992. ISBN 978-0521240260
  • Freeman, R.B. Charles Darwin: A Companion. Dawson Publishing, 1979. ISBN 978-0712909013
  • Hutchinson, Horace G. Life of Sir John Lubbock, Lord Avebury. Nabu Press, 2010 (original 1914). ISBN 978-1177727488
  • Mithen, Steven. After the Ice: A Global Human History 20,000-5000 B.C.E.. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2006. ISBN 978-0674019997
  • Olmert, Michael. Milton's Teeth and Ovid's Umbrella: Curiouser & Curiouser Adventures in History. New York, NY: Touchstone, 1996. ISBN 978-0684801643
  • Patton, Mark. Science, Politics and Business in the Work of Sir John Lubbock. London: Ashgate Publishing, 2007. ISBN 978-0754653219
  • Thompson, Michael. Darwin's Pupil: The Place of Sir John Lubbock, Lord Avebury, 1834-1913, in late Victorian and Edwardian England. Melrose Books, 2009. ISBN 978-1906561444
  • Trigger, Bruce G. A History of Archaeological Thought . Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2006. ISBN 978-0521840767
  • This article incorporates text from the Encyclopædia Britannica Eleventh Edition, a publication now in the public domain.

External links

All links retrieved September 15, 2011.

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