Roger Soame Jenyns (24 April 1904 – 14 October 1976), who usually wrote his name simply as Soame Jenyns was a British art historian, known as an expert on East Asian ceramics.Qing Ceramics
British Museum The eldest son of Roger William Bulwer Jenyns (1858 – 1936), J.P., of Bottisham Hall,

Bottisham Bottisham is a village and civil parish in the East Cambridgeshire district of Cambridgeshire, England, about east of Cambridge, halfway to Newmarket, Suffolk, Newmarket. According to the 2001 census it had a population of 1,983, including Ch ...

Cambridgeshire Cambridgeshire (abbreviated Cambs.) is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in the East of England and East Anglia. It is bordered by Lincolnshire to the north, Norfolk to the north-east, Suffolk to the east, Essex and Hertfor ...

, by his wife Winifred Pike, daughter of Arthur Pease, M.P., of Hummersknott, Darlington, Roger Soame Jenyns was educated at Eton and at

Magdalene College, Cambridge Magdalene College ( ) is a constituent college of the University of Cambridge. The college was founded in 1428 as a Benedictine hostel, in time coming to be known as Buckingham College, before being refounded in 1542 as the College of St Mary ...

(B.A. 1926). In 1926 he joined the

Hong Kong Civil Service The Hong Kong Civil Service is managed by 13 policy bureaux in the Government Secretariat, and 67 departments and agencies, mostly staffed by civil servants. The Secretary for the Civil Service (SCS) is one of the Principal Officials appointed ...

. In Hong Kong, he became one of the valuable contributors to the newly established journal, ''The Hong Kong Naturalist''. His articles would often touch on the cultural role of South China's animals and plants. In 1931, Jenyns left Hong Kong for England, to take up a job at the

British Museum The British Museum is a Museum, public museum dedicated to human history, art and culture located in the Bloomsbury area of London. Its permanent collection of eight million works is the largest in the world. It documents the story of human cu ...

, where he served as the Assistant Keeper of Oriental Antiquities until 1967.thePeerage.com: A genealogical survey of the peerage of Britain as well as the royal families of Europe. Person Page - 27242. They indicate their source as: Hugh Montgomery-Massingberd, editor, ''Burke's Irish Family Records'' (London, U.K.: Burkes Peerage Ltd, 1976), Berridge, page 106.
/ref> In 1935 he published a well-received book on

Chinese painting Chinese painting () is one of the oldest continuous artistic traditions in the world. Painting in the traditional style is known today in Chinese as , meaning "national painting" or "native painting", as opposed to Western styles of art which b ...

; later on, he authored several books on

Chinese ceramics Chinese ceramics are one of the most significant forms of Chinese art and ceramics globally. They range from construction materials such as bricks and tiles, to hand-built pottery vessels fired in bonfires or kilns, to the sophisticated Chinese ...

and jades in which he described many items from the museum's collection. In 1936, Roger Soame Jenyns inherited the Bottisham Hall estate from his father. Two centuries earlier this had been owned by the writer and politician

Soame Jenyns Soame Jenyns (1 January 1704 – 18 December 1787) was an English writer and Member of Parliament. He was an early advocate of the ethical consideration of animals. Life and work He was the eldest son of Sir Roger Jenyns and his second wife El ...

, on whose death it was inherited by his first cousin twice removed, Canon George Leonard Jenyns, great-great-grandfather of Roger Soame Jenyns.

Family

On 24 April 1941, Soame Jenyns married Anne Thomson, dau. of Richard Berridge, D.L., J.P., of Screebe,

County Galway County Galway ( ; ) is a Counties of Ireland, county in Republic of Ireland, Ireland. It is in the Northern and Western Region, taking up the south of the Provinces of Ireland, province of Connacht. The county population was 276,451 at the 20 ...

.Burke's Landed Gentry, 17th edition, 1952, ed. L. G. Pine, pp. 1381-2, 'Jenyns of Bottisham Hall' pedigree They had two sons.

Books by Soame Jenyns

* ''A Background to Chinese Painting'' by Soame Jenyns: with a Preface for Collectors by W. W. Winkworth; London, Sidgwick & Jackson, Ltd., 1935. * * * ''Later Chinese Porcelain: The Ch’ing Dynasty (1644-1912)'' (London, 1954).; later edition: * (First edition appeared in 1950) * *

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Jenyns, S. 1904 births 1976 deaths British art historians British expatriates in Hong Kong British science writers People educated at Eton College Alumni of Magdalene College, Cambridge British antiques experts 20th-century British historians People from Bottisham