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John Earle Raven (13 December 1914 – 5 March 1980) was an English classical scholar, notable for his work on pre-Socratic philosophy, and amateur botanist. His wife, Faith, Ardtornish the 35,000 acre Ardtornish Estate in Argyllshire, Scotland; their family continues to run it today as a commercial enterprise.
Raven was educated at St Ronan's School, then situated at Worthing, before proceeding in September 1928 with a scholarship to Marlborough College, where he distinguished himself academically, winning prizes in English poetry, Greek iambics, Greek and Latin prose and Latin verse, culminating in a scholarship to Trinity College, Cambridge. He did not confine himself to the intellectual, playing in the First XV at rugby union and setting new school records in 1934 for the high jump and 440 yards.Raven, Op. cit., Chapter 2
Following the award of a first class degree in classics at Trinity A Rum Affair: How Botany's "Piltdown Man" was Unmasked by Karl Sabbagh, The Penguin Press 1999, Raven became in 1946 a research fellow there. In October 1948 he was elected a fellow of King's College, Cambridge. "John Raven’s report on his visit to the Hebrides", 1948 edited by C. D. Preston, Watsonia; 25: 17–44 (2004)
During the Second World War he was a conscientious objector, Obituary of Andrew Raven, The Daily Telegraph; 5 October 2005 basing his case on arguments by Plato (and no doubt influenced by his father's pacifist views). He undertook unsalaried social work for Guy Clutton-Brock at Oxford House in Bethnal Green. King's College Archive: Papers relating to John Earle Raven This included running an experiment in education for Bethnal Green children evacuated to North Wales, which impressed Archbishop William Temple, who recommended the experiment to Rab Butler and James Chuter Ede at the Board of Education. p 121 (Temple's letter is in file ED12/518 at the Public Record Office)
As Senior Tutor at King's in the 1960s he turned the college to the left, telling public schools that their boys could no longer expect to "swan in", as previously.
Raven was the undergraduate tutor of Myles Burnyeat, who subsequently became the fifth Laurence Professor of Ancient Philosophy at Cambridge University. Book review by M.F. Burnyeat, London Review of Books, 22 February 2007
From the mid-1930s John Heslop-Harrison, Professor of Botany at Kings College, Newcastle-upon-Tyne, had reported significant new plant discoveries on expeditions to the Inner Hebrides and Outer Hebrides. The sheer scale of the discoveries aroused scepticism, and in 1948 Raven secured a grant from Trinity College to fund a trip to Harris and Rùm in July and August of that year to investigate the claims of Heslop-Harrison.
Raven's conclusions about two of the notable species were published, briefly, in Nature. He suggested that both Carex bicolor and Polycarpon tetraphyllum were introductions to Rùm, but did not comment on the possible means of introduction. His full report of the expedition and fraud was deposited in the library of King's College, Cambridge on 5 May 1960, to attack Prof. Jack Heslop-Harrison's electron microscope research into plant genetics (DNA) and only published in full in 1999 after the deaths of both Heslop-Harrison, his son Jack Heslop-Harrison and Raven himself. In the report Raven alleged that at some time in the 1940s Heslop Harrison transported alien plants to the Isle of Rum and planted them in the soil; he then "discovered" the plants, claimed they were indigenous to the area and that he was the first to find them. Raven's report to the council of Trinity College states: "In the interests not only of truth but also of the reputation of British science it is essential somehow to discover what plants and what insects he (Heslop Harrison) has either completely fabricated or else deliberately introduced into the Hebrides."
Raven's classical and botanical interests were brought together in four J. H. Gray Lectures given at Cambridge in 1976, published after his death as Plants and Plant Lore in Ancient Greece. Review by John M. McMahon, Scholia Reviews ns 11 (2002) 3
He died on 5 March 1980 in Shepreth, near Cambridge, aged 65. Following his death a group of friends contributed to a collection of essays to commemorate his life, published in 1981 as John Raven by his Friends.
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