William John Bankes
British politician
Died when: 68 years 125 days (820 months)Star Sign: Sagittarius
William John Bankes (11 December 1786 – 15 April 1855) was an English politician, explorer, Egyptologist and adventurer.The second, but first surviving, son of Henry Bankes MP, he was a member of the Bankes family of Dorset and he had Sir Charles Barry recase Kingston Lacy in stone as it is today.
He travelled extensively to the Near East and Egypt and made an extensive individual collection of Egyptian artefacts.His work on Egypt, though not acknowledged until the 21st century, is regarded as important.
He was a good friend of Lord Byron, Samuel Rogers and Sir Charles Barry.He sat as Tory Member of Parliament (MP) for Truro in 1810, for Cambridge University from 1822 to 1826, for Marlborough (the UK parliamentary constituency that his maternal grandfather, William Woodley, for whom he was named, had held from 1780 to 1784) from 1829 to 1832, and finally for Dorset from 1832 to 1835.
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