John Duncan Inverarity

John Duncan Inverarity (7 January 1847, Bombay – 4 December 1923, Bombay[1][2]) was an eminent barrister and naturalist who worked in Bombay.

Commemorative portrait in the Bombay High Court

John Duncan Inverarity was son of Jonathan Duncan Inverarity and was born in Bombay in 1847. He went to study in England and studied at Cheltenham College.[3] He joined as a Barrister in Bombay in 1869. He was called to bar at the Inner Temple in 1870.[4] Apart from being a barrister in the Bombay High Court he was a keen outdoorsman and big game hunter and one of the early members of the Bombay Natural History Society, serving as Vice President of the Society from 1897 till his death.[5] He contributed numerous short notes to the Journal of the BNHS on the tiger, water buffalo, as well as small game as well as entries on tiger hunting in the Encyclopedia of Sport (1898).[6][7][8] He was attacked by a lioness that he was hunting near Berbera and the incident gathered considerable news coverage.[9] He recounted the event in the Journal of the Bombay Natural History Society and wrote about how surprisingly painless the attack was.[10] He married Margaret Eweretta, elder daughter of F.G. Forsyth-Grant of Kincardineshire in 1896.[11]

In James Joyce's book A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, the main character, Stephen Daedalus, owns a copy of Horace's verses owned by the brothers John and William Duncan Inverarity with notes in Latin pencilled on the margin.

References
  1. Anon. (1924). "Obituary: John Duncan Inverarity". Journal of the Bombay Natural History Society. 29: 822–823.
  2. "Rosemount Man Dies in India". Dundee Courier. 7 December 1923. p. 8 – via British Newspaper Archive.
  3. Hunter, Andrew Alexander, ed. (1890). Cheltenham College Register 1841-1889. London: George Bell and Sons. p. 153.
  4. "Calls to the bar". The Law Magazine and Law Review. 29: 886. 1870.
  5. "Something new about the tiger". The Press. 23 August 1888. p. 6.
  6. Inverarity, JD (1888). "Unscientific notes on the tiger". J. Bombay Nat. Hist. Soc. 3 (3): 144–154.
  7. Inverarity, JD (1895). "The Indian Wild Buffalo". J. Bombay Nat. Hist. Soc. 10: 41–52.
  8. "Tiger". The Encyclopaedia of Sport. Volume 2. London: Lawrence and Bullen. 1898. pp. 464–470.
  9. "The Bombay Barrister and the Lioness. A terrible encounter". The Star. 17 December 1889. p. 4 – via British Newspaper Archive.
  10. Ali, Salim (1981). "Bombay Natural History Society- the founders, the builders and the guardians. Part 2". Bombay Natural History Society. 78 (1): 232–239.
  11. Fox-Davies, Arthur Charles, ed. (1929). Armorial Families. A directory of gentlemen of coat-armor (7th ed.). London: Hurst and Blackett. p. 1028.


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