Sir Robert Ainslie, 1st Baronet (c. 1730 – 21 July 1812)[1] was a British ambassador to the Ottoman Empire,[2] orientalist, numismatist and Member of Parliament (MP) for the rotten borough of Milborne Port, in Somerset, between 1796 and 1802.
[citation needed] On 8 September 1796, Ainslie received a grant of a pension of £1,000 on the civil list to be held "during the joint lives of his majesty and himself" and was elected a Member of Parliament.
Ainslie took advantage of his position at Constantinople to amass a collection of ancient coins from Eastern Europe, Asia Minor, and the north of Africa.
[3] The most characteristic were described by abbot Domenico Sestini, who dedicated to Ainslie a work which has gone through several editions, entitled Lettere e Dissertazioni Numismatiche sopra alcune Medaglie rare della Collezione Ainslieana, 4 vols.
Sestini continued his exposition of the Ainslie collection in a smaller work, and more special in its scope, entitled Dissertazione sopra alcune Monete Armene del Principi Rupinensi della Collezione Ainslieana, 4to, Leghorn, 1790.
[7] Mayer also drew other places in the Eastern Mediterranean and the Balkans for Ainslie and in his time visited Wallonia, the Ionian Islands and Egypt, all documented in his paintings.
The first of these is entitled Views in Egypt, from the original drawings in possession of Sir Robert Ainslie, taken during his Embassy to Constantinople by Luigi Mayer; engraved by and under the direction of Thomas Milton; with historical Observations and incidental Illustrations of the Manners and Customs of the Natives of that Country, eleph.