- Also known as
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John George Taylor
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primary name: Taylor, John George
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other name: Taylor, J E
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other name: Taylor, J G
- Details
- individual; official; British; Male
- Other dates
- 1851-1861 (active)
- Biography
- Political Agent of the East India Company; son of Captain [later Colonel] R. Taylor, who was Assistant Political Agent in Basra from 1818-1822. John Taylor was appointed the Hon. East India Company's Agent and H.M. Vice-Consul at Basra from 8 August 1851 to 30 September 1858, and from 1859 H.M. Consul-General for Kurdistan at Diyarbekir and Erzerum. He excavated at Ur (1854) as a direct result of an earlier visit by William Kennett Loftus (q.v.), and at Abu Shahrain and Tell al-Lahm (1855). In 1861 he recovered stelae of Ashurnasirpal II (ME 118883) and Shalmaneser III (118884) at Kurkh near Diyarbekir, and offered to excavate in this region on behalf of the British Museum (Minutes of the Trustees Standing Committee, 25 July 1868). His first publication of his excavations in southern Iraq in the 'Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society' for 1855 appears under the incorrect name of J.E. Taylor and by whuch initials he was also referred to by Herbert Weld ("Persepolis", in E. Delmar Morgan (ed.) 'Transactions of the Ninth International Congress of Orientalists' (held in London, 5th to 12th September 1892), vol. II, 537-59, London 1892, cf. p. 547) as having explored "some of the burial mounds in the immediate neighbourhood of the Persian Gulf".
- Bibliography
- J.G. Lorimer, 'Gazetteer of the Persian Gulf, 'Oman, and Central Arabia' (Calcutta: Government Printing House, 1915), p. 2686; E. Sollberger, "Mr. Taylor in Chaldaea", 'Anatolian Studies' 22 (1972), pp. 129-139; T.C. Mitchell, "The Fourth Man in Baghdad", 'Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society' (in press in 2003).
