Richard Rawlinson

Richard Rawlinson FRS (3 January 1690 – 6 April 1755) was an English clergyman and antiquarian collector of books and manuscripts, which he bequeathed to the Bodleian Library, Oxford.

He was particularly concerned with collecting the history and archives of the nonjurors, but later squabbled with his fellow bishops in continuing the succession with the consecration of Robert Gordon.

Rawlinson was a friend of the antiquarian Thomas Hearne and, among his voluminous writings, published a Life of the antiquary Anthony Wood.

At his death, Rawlinson left to the Library 5,205 manuscripts bound in volumes that include many rare broadsides and other printed ephemera, his curiosities, and some other property that endowed a professorship of Anglo-Saxon at Oxford University.

Richard Rawlinson is buried at St John's College, Oxford, allegedly holding the skull of Christopher Layer, an executed Jacobite.