Edward Daniel Clarke (5 June 17699 March 1822) was an English clergyman, naturalist, mineralogist, and traveller.

Life

Edward Daniel Clarke was born at Willingdon, Sussex, and educated first at Uckfield School and then at Tonbridge.

In 1786 he obtained the office of chapel clerk at Jesus College, Cambridge, but the loss of his father at this time involved him in difficulties. In 1790 he took his degree, and soon after became private tutor to Henry Tufton, nephew of the Duke of Dorset. In 1792 he obtained an engagement to travel with Lord Berwick through Germany, Switzerland and Italy. After crossing the Alps, and visiting a few of the principal cities of Italy, including Rome, he went to Naples, where he remained nearly two years. While in Naples, Clarke climbed Vesuvius on numerous occasions, to take guests to the summit and observe the state of activity of the volcano. He also constructed a model of Vesuvius, which Sir William Hamilton declared to be the 'best ever produced'. This model was later transported to Lord Berwick's seat at Attingham Park. were sold to the Bodleian Library for £1000; and by the publication of his travels he realized altogether a clear profit of £6595.

Besides lecturing on mineralogy and discharging his clerical duties, made several discoveries in chemistry, principally by means of the gas blow-pipe, which he had brought to a high degree of perfection. He was also appointed university librarian in 1817, and was one of the founders of the Cambridge Philosophical Society in 1819. He died in London on 9 March 1822.

Greek artefacts

In 1801, Clarke and his assistant John Marten Cripps, obtained an authorisation from the governor of Athens for the removal of a statue of the goddess Demeter at Eleusis, with the intervention of Italian artist Giovanni Battista Lusieri who was Elgin's assistant at the time. The statue had been discovered in 1676 by the traveller George Wheler, and several ambassadors had submitted unsuccessful applications for its removal. Clarke was the one to remove the statue by force, after bribing the waiwode of Athens and obtaining an edict, of the local population who unofficially, and against the traditions of the iconoclastic Church, worshipped the statue as the uncanonised Saint Demetra (Greek: Αγία Δήμητρα). Clarke also removed other marbles from Greece including a statue of Pan, a figure of Eros, a comic mask and various reliefs and funerary steles. Clarke donated these to the University of Cambridge and in 1803 the statue of Demeter was displayed at the university library. The collection was later moved to the Fitzwilliam Museum in Cambridge where it formed one of the two main collections of the institution. Fourth edition. Volume the first. London, MDCCCXVI. xi + ? + 533 pages. <br/> 1839. Part I (26 chapters + appendices). Travels in Russia, Tartary and Turkey by Edward Daniel Clarke. 140 pages / PIBN 10027007. ISBN 978-1-330-32300-7 (pdf), ISBN 978-0-266-70888-9 (Hardcover) // Forgotten Books <br/> 1848. Part I (26 chapters). Travels in Russia, Tartary and Turkey. 383 pages.

  • Part II. Greece, Egypt and Palestyne
  • Part III.Travels in Various Countries of Scandinavia Including Denmark, Sweden, Norway, Lapland and Finland (Travels in various Countries of Europe, Asia and Africa. Part The Third, Scandinavia, Section The Second) MDCCCXXIII (1823) / 611 pages. PIBN 10531518, ISBN 978-1-333-65393-4, ISBN 978-0-265-57029-6 (Hardcover) // Forgotten Books

Family

In 1806, Clarke married Angelica, fifth daughter of Sir William Beaumaris Rush. She was the younger sister of Charlotte Rush, whom John Marten Cripps had married on 1 January 1806.

See also

  • Timeline of hydrogen technologies

References

Attribution:

  • Excerpt from Clarke's Travels giving his account of the removal of the Parthenon sculptures