Robert Cyril Layton Perkins
| Robert Cyril Layton Perkins | |
|---|---|
| Born | 15 November 1866 |
| Died | 29 September 1955 (aged 88) |
| Fields | Entomology |
| Institutions | University of Cambridge |
| Alma mater | Jesus College, Oxford |
| Known for | Fauna Hawaiiensis |
| Notable awards |
Linnean Medal (1912) FRS (1920) |
| Children | John Frederick Perkins |
Robert Cyril Layton Perkins FRS (15 November 1866 – 29 September 1955) was a distinguished British entomologist, ornithologist, and naturalist noted for his work on the fauna of the islands of Hawaii and on Hymenoptera. He is not to be confused with his son John Frederick Perkins also a hymenopterist.
Perkins was born on 15 November 1866 at Badminton, Gloucestershire and was educated at King Edward VI Grammar School, St. Albans – his father, Rev Charles Perkins, was the headmaster – and at Merchant Taylors' School before obtaining a scholarship in classics to Jesus College, Oxford in 1885. After two years of studying classics, he switched to reading Natural History, notwithstanding that he had not studied science at school, having been inspired to make the change by the lectures of Edward Poulton on the colour of insects. His first publications in natural history journals came when he was still studying classics. He obtained a fourth-class degree in the Animal Morphology specialism of the Natural Sciences course in 1889. In 1891, a committee appointed by the Royal Society and the British Association for the Advancement of Science asked Perkins to investigate the land fauna of the Hawaiian islands, and he was engaged in this for almost ten years, conducting research on the islands and carrying out studies at the University of Cambridge on his trips back home. The fruits of this research first began to be published in 1899, in Fauna Hawaiiensis (edited by David Sharp), and he completed his work in 1913 with a general introduction to the series. For this work, he was awarded the Linnean Society's gold medal for eminent services to zoology.
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