Concept

Daines Barrington

Summary
Daines Barrington, FRS, FSA (1727/28 - 14 March 1800) was an English lawyer, antiquary and naturalist. He was one of the correspondents to whom Gilbert White wrote extensively on natural history topics. Barrington served as a Vice President of the Royal Society and wrote on a range of topics related to the natural sciences including early ideas and scientific experimentation on the learning of songs by young birds. He designed a standard format for the collection of information about weather, the flowering of plants, the singing of birds and other annual changes that was also used by Gilbert White. He also wrote on child geniuses including Mozart, who at the age of nine had visited England. Barrington was the fourth son of John Barrington, 1st Viscount Barrington. He matriculated at The Queen's College, Oxford, in 1745, but never graduated. In the same year he was admitted to the Inner Temple, and was called to the bar in 1750. He subsequently held various legal offices, including marshal of the High Court of Admiralty, 1751–3; a judge of Great Sessions for North Wales (Anglesey, Caernarfonshire and Merionethshire) from 1757; Recorder of Bristol and King's Counsel from 1764; and second justice of Chester from 1778. Though considered by some (including Jeremy Bentham) to be an indifferent judge, his Observations on the Statutes, chiefly the more ancient, from Magna Charta to 21st James I (1766), had a high reputation among historians and constitutional antiquaries, and ran through five editions down to 1796. He resigned all his legal offices in 1785, retaining only that of Commissary General of the stores at Gibraltar, which continued to provide him with a substantial income until his death. In 1773 Barrington published an edition of Orosius, with King Alfred's Saxon version, and an English translation with original notes. His Tracts on the Probability of reaching the North Pole (1775) were written in consequence of the northern voyage of discovery undertaken by Captain Constantine John Phipps, afterwards Lord Mulgrave (1744–1792).
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