Nathaniel Davison

Nathaniel Davison (c.1736–1809) was an English diplomat, known for his writings on Egyptian archaeology. He discovered a space in the Great Pyramid, now known as "Davison's Chamber", or "first relieving chamber".

He was the fourth son of George Davison of Little Mill, Longhoughton, Northumberland; his sister Jane was mother of John Yelloly the physician. He was British consul at Nice, where he had consular privileges from September 1769, and then from 1778 in Algiers, leaving in 1783. He had been hoping for Naples, asking Thomas Percy for the influence of the Duke of Northumberland in support. He received a government pension in 1786.

Davison rented a house in Twickenham, where his son Nicholas Francis was born, from the merchant Daniel Twining, father of Thomas Twining. He died in Alnwick on 23 February 1809, aged 72 or 73, and was buried at Longhoughton. Sir Henry Taylor, brought up in County Durham where his father was a friend of Davison, recollected that he wore a pigtail (queue), one of the last men of his generation to do so. He sold the home farm Little Mill to Lord Grey.

In 1763 Davison travelled to Egypt with Wortley Montagu, whom he knew through the London bookseller Thomas Becket. Acting as Montagu's secretary, he documented their journeys for the Royal Society. Montagu and Davison set off from Livorno in April 1763, for Alexandria. Montague spent time in Rosetta in the spring of 1764. Davison himself spent 18 months at Alexandria, and then the same length of time at Cairo, and visited the pyramids.

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