Robert Huntington

Robert Huntington (1637–1701) was an English churchman, orientalist and manuscript collector. He was Provost of Trinity College, Dublin and Bishop of Raphoe.

He was second son of the Rev. Robert Huntington, curate of Deerhurst in Gloucestershire, born in February 1636-7. His father was vicar of the adjoining parish of Leigh from 1648 till his death in 1664. Robert was educated at Bristol Grammar School, and in 1652 was admitted portionist at Merton College, Oxford, graduating B.A. on 9 March 1658, and M.A. on 21 Jan. 1662-3. As soon as the statutes of the college would allow, he was elected to a fellowship; he signed the decree of 1660, condemning all the proceedings of convocation under the commonwealth, and his possession of its emoluments was undisturbed.

At Oxford he applied himself to the study of oriental languages, and on the return of Robert Frampton he applied for his post of chaplain to the Levant Company at Aleppo, and was elected on 1 August 1670. In the following month he sailed, and arrived there in January 1671. Huntington remained in the Eastern Mediterranean for more than ten years, paying visits to Palestine, Cyprus, and Egypt, and acquiring rare manuscripts. His chief correspondents in England were Narcissus Marsh, John Fell, Edward Pocock, and Edward Bernard, and he made many purchases for Marsh and Fell. With the Samaritans of Nablus he began in 1671 a correspondence which was kept up between English and Samaritan scholars for many years. Henry Teonge visited Aleppo in 1676 and recorded Huntington's life there in his diary.

On 14 July 1681 he resigned his chaplaincy, returning through Italy and France, and settling once more at Merton College. He took the degrees of B.D. and D.D. (15 June 1683). Humphry Prideaux, himself eager for the Hebrew professorship, mentions Huntington as a probable competitor. Through the recommendation of Fell to Marsh he was offered the provostship of Trinity College, Dublin (1683), and accepted it. An Irish translation of the New Testament had already been printed, but Marsh and Huntington superintended a translation into the same language of the canonical books of the Old Testament, which was printed at the expense of Robert Boyle. In 1688 he fled from Ireland, but returned for a short time after the battle of the Boyne.

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