Robert Swinhoe - Definition

Robert Swinhoe (September 1, 1836 - October 28, 1877) was an English naturalist.

Swinhoe was born in Calcutta, India. He was educated at the University of London, and in 1854 joined the China consular corps. He spent his spare time in China collecting natural history specimens, and as the area had not previously been open to westerners many of the items he collected were new to science. As he was primarily an ornithologist many of his new discoveries were birds, but he also found new fish, mammals and insects. He returned to England in 1862 with his collection. Many of the birds were first described in John Gould's Birds of Asia (1863).

A number of birds and other animals were named after Swinhoe, including Swinhoe's Storm-petrel, which he first described himself in 1867.

His brother Colonel Charles Swinhoe was one of the founding members of the Bombay Natural History Society in India.

External References

• The Published Writings of Robert Swinhoe (http://home.gwi.net/~pineking/RS/MAINLIST.htm)
• Biography by Samuel Stephenson (http://academic.reed.edu/formosa/texts/swinhoebio.html)