Sharrock, Robert

1. Dates

Born: Adstock (in some accounts Drayton Parslow), Buckinghamshire, c.June 1630 He was baptized on 29 June.

Died: Bishop's Waltham, Hampshire, 11 July 1684

Dateinfo: Dates Certain

Lifespan: 54

2. Father

Occupation: Cleric

Also Robert Sharrock, the father was Rector of Adstock and of Drayton Parslow.

No information on financial status.

3. Nationality

Birth: English

Career: English

Death: English

4. Education

Schooling: Oxford, L.D.

Winchester College.

Oxford University, New College, 1649-61; B.C.L., 1654; D.C.L., 1661. I count the B.C.L. as equivalent to a B.A.

5. Religion

Affiliation: Calvinist, Anglican

The Puritan authorities made him perpetual fellow of New College. He was an ordained minister in the Anglican Church after the Restoration.

6. Scientific Disciplines

Primary: Botany

History of the Propagation and Improvement of Vegetables, 1660. The book indicates an experimental approach to botany and shows extensive knowledge of the cultivation of plants.

Sharrock was not primarily a scientist. He wrote as well on religion, law, and political philosophy.

7. Means of Support

Primary: Academia, Church Life

Perpertual Fellow of New College, Oxford, from 1649.

Ordained 1661.

The college rectory of Horwood Magna in Buckinghamshire, 1665-8.

Installed as prebendary of Winchester, 1665.

Rectory of East Woodhay in Hampshire, 1668.

Rector of Bishop's Waltham in Hampshire, 1669.

Archdeacon of Winchester, 1684.

8. Patronage

Types: Government Official, Unknown

He owed his Fellowship at Oxford initially to Parliamentary visitors.

He owed those ecclesiastical appointments to someone. To be sure, the intial one was a college advowson. I did not see any evidence that the other two were, and I think that the prebend and archdeaconry could not have been.

He dedicated his book (History of the Propagation) to Boyle, but in this case, where Sharrock also wrote prefaces to Boyle's books, I will count this as pure friendship rather than patronage. It is relevant as well that Boyle had desired that Sharrock write the book.

9. Technological Involvement

Type: Agriculture

Note the word "Improvement" in the title of the book, a word which the extended continuing title emphasized. The final edition of it, after Sharrock's death, bore the title An Improvement to the Art of Gardening. Arber calls it a practical handbook for husbandmen and gardiners.

10. Scientific Societies

Memberships: None

Informal Connections: Friendship with Boyle. He wrote prefaces to three of Boyle's physical treatises and dedicated his own book to Boyle.

Sources

1. Dictionary of National Biography (repr., London: Oxford University Press, 1949-50), 17, 1368-9. J. Britten and G.S. Boulger, A Biographical Index of Deceased British and Irish Botanists, (London, 1931), p. 272.
2. J.R. Green, A History of Botany, (London, 1914), pp. 52, 125.
3. Agnes Arber, "Robert Sharrock (1630-1684): a Precursor of Nehemiah Grew (1641-1712) and an Exponent of "Natural Law" in the Plant World," Isis, 51 (1960), 3-8.

Compiled by:

Richard S. Westfall

Department of History and Philosophy of Science

Indiana University

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