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{{Short description|Anglo-Indian official, naturalist, and writer (1832–1917)}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=October 2024}}
{{Infobox officeholder
| name = Sir George Birdwood
| image = [[File:George Christopher Molesworth Birdwood.jpg|250px]]
| honorific_suffix = [[Order of the Indian Empire|KCIE]] [[Order of the Star of India|CSI]] [[Legion of Honour|LH]]
| birth_name = George Christopher Molesworth Birdwood
| birth_date = 8 December 1832
| birth_place = [[Belgavi|Belgaum]], [[Bombay Presidency]], [[British India]]
| death_date = 28 June 1917 (aged 85)
| death_place = [[Ealing]], [[London]], [[United Kingdom]]
| alma_mater = [[Plymouth Grammar School]]<br/> [[Edinburgh University]]
| parents = Christopher Birdwood (father)<br/> Lydia Juliana Taylor (mother)
| partner = Frances Anne Tolcher
| children =
| occupation = Naturalist, writer
| awards = [[Order of the Indian Empire]]<br/> [[Order of the Star of India]]<br/> [[Legion of Honour]]
| office1 = [[Sheriff of Mumbai|1st Sheriff of Bombay]]
| term1 = 1846–1858
| predecessor1 = ''Position established''
| successor1 = Bomonji Hormusji Wadia
| relatives = [[Herbert Mills Birdwood]]
}}

'''Sir George Christopher Molesworth Birdwood''' (8 December 1832 – 28 June 1917) was an [[Anglo-Indian]] official, [[naturalist]], and writer. He served as the first [[Sheriff of Bombay]] from 1846 to 1858.

==Life==
The son of General Christopher Birdwood, he was born at [[Belgaum]], then in the [[Bombay Presidency]], on 8 December 1832. The botanist and judge [[Herbert Mills Birdwood]] was his brother.<ref name=Head1988>{{cite journal |last1=Head |first1=Raymond |title=Indian Crafts and Western Design from the Seventeenth Century to the Present |journal=RSA Journal |date=1988 |volume=136 |issue=5378 |pages=121–122 |jstor=41374508 |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/41374508 |issn=0958-0433|url-access=subscription}}</ref>{{sfn|Chisholm|1911}} He was educated at [[Plymouth Grammar School]] and [[Edinburgh University]], where he took his MD degree presenting the thesis ''"The origin of ideas"''.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Birdwood |first=George Christopher Molesworth |date=1854 |title=The origin of ideas |url=https://era.ed.ac.uk/handle/1842/32836 |language=en}}</ref> Entering the Bombay Medical Service in 1854, he served in the [[Anglo-Persian War|Persian War of 1856–1857]], and subsequently became professor at the [[Grant Medical College and Sir Jamshedjee Jeejebhoy Group of Hospitals|Grant Medical College]], registrar of the university, curator of the museum, and sheriff at Bombay, besides acting as secretary of the Asiatic and Horticultural societies.{{sfn|Chisholm|1911}}

Birdwood interested himself also in the municipal life of Bombay, where he acquired influence and popularity. He was obliged by ill-health in 1868 to return to England, where he entered the revenue and statistics department of the India Office (1871–1902).{{sfn|Chisholm|1911}}

In the dedication to his English translation of [[Garcia de Orta]]'s book, Clements Markham calls Birdwood the "Garcia da Orta of British India".<ref>{{cite book |url=https://archive.org/stream/colloquiesonsimp00orta#page/n9/mode/2up |year=1913 |author=Clements R. Markham |title=Colloquies on the simples and drugs of India by Garcia da Orta |publisher=Henry Sotheran and Co. |place=London}}</ref> He kept up his connection to India with contributions to the Indian press; and established longterm friendships with Indian princes and educated Indians. In 1846 he was selected [[Sheriff of Bombay]]<ref>{{cite book |title=Dictionary of Indian Biography |page=43}}</ref> In 1887 he was created a [[Knight Commander of the Order of the Indian Empire]]; and, besides being given his [[Doctor of Laws]] degree by the [[University of Cambridge]], he was also made an officer of the [[Légion d'Honneur]] and a laureate of the [[Académie française|French Academy]].{{sfn|Chisholm|1911}}

Birdwood redesigned the [[Brookwood Cemetery#Parsee (Zoroastrian) burial ground|Brockwood Cemetery Parsee and Zoroastrian burial ground]] in 1901.

While chairing the Indian Section of the annual meeting of the [[Royal Society for the encouragement of Arts, Manufactures & Commerce|Royal Society of Arts]] in 1910, Birdwood declared that there was no "fine art" in India. When a particular [[Buddharupa|statue of the Buddha]] was adduced as counter-example, Birdwood is said to have responded: "This senseless similitude, in its immemorial fixed pose, is nothing more than an uninspired brazen image. . . . A boiled suet pudding would serve equally well as a symbol of passionless purity and serenity of soul."<ref>Mark Sedgwick, ''Against the Modern World: Traditionalism and the Secret Intellectual History of the Twentieth Century'', Oxford University Press, 2004, page 52. {{ISBN|978-0-19-515297-5}}.</ref>

Birdwood died in Ealing on 28 June 1917.<ref>{{Cite EB1922 |title=Birdwood, Sir George Christopher Molesworth |pages=456–457 |volume=30 |url=https://archive.org/details/encyclopaediabri30chisrich/page/456/mode/2up?view=theater}}</ref>

{{botanist|Birdw.|Birdwood}}

===Works===
* ''The Economic Vegetable Products of the Bombay Presidency'' (12th edition, 1868){{sfn|Chisholm|1911}}
* ''On the Genus Boswellia'' [Frankincense Trees] (1870), Transactions of the Linnean Society of London, 27: 111-148.
* ''The Industrial Arts of India'' (1888)
* ''Reports on the Old Records of the India Office'' (1891)
* ''The Register of Letters and of the Governor and Company of Merchants of London Trading into the East Indies 1600-1619'' (1893) with [[William Foster (historiographer)|Sir William Foster]]
* ''First Letter Book of the East India Company'' (1895)

Birdwood published on the industrial arts of India, the ancient [[India Office Records|records of the India Office]], and the first letter-book of the [[British East India Company|East India Company]]. He encouraged Indian arts, on various aspects of which he wrote monographs, and his name was identified with the representation of India at the major [[International Exhibition]]s from 1857 to 1901.{{sfn|Chisholm|1911}}<ref>''Journal of Indian Art'', vol. viii. ''The Life and Work of Sir George Birdwood''</ref> His researches on the subject of [[incense]],<ref>Trans. Liun. Soc. xxvii., 1871; Ency. Brit. 9th ed., ''Incense'', 1881; revised</ref> became a classic.{{sfn|Chisholm|1911}}

When still young, Birdwood contributed to magazines and newspapers; in India he helped to convert the ''Standard'' into ''[[The Times of India]]'', and edited the Bombay ''Saturday Review''; and after his return to London he wrote for the ''[[Pall Mall Gazette|Pall Mall]]'', ''[[Athenaeum (British magazine)|Athenaeum]]'', ''[[The Academy (periodical)|Academy]]'', and ''[[The Times]]''; and with [[Thomas Chenery]], the editor of ''The Times'', and others he took the initiative (1882) in celebrating the anniversary of [[Benjamin Disraeli, 1st Earl of Beaconsfield|Lord Beaconsfield]]'s death as [[Primrose Day]] (19 April).{{sfn|Chisholm|1911}}

==Notes==
{{Reflist}}

===References===
* {{EB1911|wstitle=Birdwood, Sir George Christopher Molesworth|volume=3|page=979}}

==Further reading==
{{wikisource|works=or}}
* {{Cite journal |editor-first=C. Hayavadana |editor-last=Rao |date=1915 |title=Birdwood, Sir George Christopher Molesworth |journal=The Indian Biographical Dictionary}}
* {{Cite journal |editor-first=Thompson |editor-last=Cooper |title=Birdwood, George Christopher Molesworth |journal=Men of the Time |edition=11th |date=1884}}

{{Authority control}}
{{Use British English|date=October 2024}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Birdwood, George}}
[[Category:1832 births]]
[[Category:1917 deaths]]
[[Category:People educated at Dollar Academy]]
[[Category:Indian Medical Service officers]]
[[Category:Knights Commander of the Order of the Indian Empire]]
[[Category:British military personnel of the Anglo-Persian War]]
[[Category:Officers of the Legion of Honour]]
[[Category:19th-century English medical doctors]]
[[Category:Sheriffs of Mumbai]]
[[Category:Alumni of the University of Edinburgh Medical School]]
[[Category:Birdwood family|George]]
[[Category:People associated with the University of Edinburgh]]
[[Category:People educated at Plymouth Grammar School]]
[[Category:British recipients of the Legion of Honour]]

George Birdwood - Revision history

जाट at 22:07, 5 April 2026