Fixed Stars.’ He was, with Sir Henry Rawlinson and Dr. Hincks, one of the first to decipher the cuneiform inscriptions brought from Nineveh, and he made numerous contributions in literature and archæology to the Royal Society of Literature and to the Society of Biblical Archæology.
He was elected a member of the Royal Astronomical Society on 13 Dec. 1822, and a fellow of the Royal Society on 17 March 1831, receiving the royal medal in 1838 and the Rumford medal in 1842. He sat in the first reformed parliament for Chippenham from 1833 to 1834, and then retired from politics. He died at Lacock Abbey on 17 Sept. 1877, having married, on 20 Dec. 1832, Constance, youngest daughter of Francis Mundy of Markeaton, Derbyshire.
Of his writings the most interesting is ‘The Pencil of Nature,’ which was issued in six parts in 1844–6. It is the first book ever illustrated by photographs produced without any aid from the artist's pencil; it is now very rare. His other works were: 1. ‘Legendary Tales, in verse and prose,’ collected, 1830. 2. ‘Hermes, or Classical and Antiquarian Researches,’ 1838–9, two numbers only. 3. ‘The Antiquity of the Book of Genesis,’ 1839. 4. ‘English Etymologies,’ 1847. 5. ‘Assyrian Texts translated,’ 1856. He also contributed an appendix to the second edition of the English translation of G. Tissandier's ‘History and Handbook of Photography,’ 1878, and in the catalogue of scientific papers he is credited with fifty-nine contributions.
A portrait of Talbot is in the South Kensington Museum in the collection of ‘fathers of photography.’
[Proc. of Royal Soc. of London, 1878, xxvi. 427, 428; Proc. of Royal Soc. of Edinburgh, 1878, ix. 512–14; Monthly Notices of Royal Astronomical Soc. February 1878, pp. 148–51; Times, 25 Sept. 1877, p. 4; Encyclopædia Britannica, 9th edit. 1888, xxiii. 27; W. J. Harrison's History of Photography, 1888; Brothers's Manual of Photography, 1892; Werge's Evolution of Photography, 1890; Ville's Introduction to Blanquart Evrard's Traité de Photographie, 1851; Photographic News, 5, 19, 26 Oct. 1897; cf. arts. Herschel, Sir John, Ponton, Mungo, and Taylor, Alfred Swaine.]
TALBOYS, DAVID ALPHONSO (1790?–1840), bookseller, born about 1790, established himself as a bookseller in Bedford. He subsequently removed his business to Oxford, where he became known for his intimate acquaintance with the value and merits of books generally. He also materially aided the study of history in England by his excellent translations of Heeren's ‘Researches into the Politics, Intercourse, and Trade of the Carthaginians, Ethiopians, and Egyptians’ (1832), and of the same author's ‘Manual of the Political System of Europe’ (1834). On 1 Dec. 1827 he was admitted to the privileges of a member of the university. He took a leading part in the affairs of the city of Oxford, was a councillor of the east ward, and served the office of sheriff. He died at Oxford on 23 May 1840, leaving a widow and seven children. He was the author of ‘Oxford Chronological Tables of Universal History,’ 1835, fol.; 1840, fol.; and, besides the works of Heeren mentioned, translated Adelung's ‘Historical Sketch of Sanscrit Literature,’ Oxford, 1832, 8vo, making numerous additions and corrections.
[Gent. Mag. 1840, ii. 220; Oxford Chronicle, 30 May 1840; Foster's Alumni Oxon. 1715–1886; Saunder's Salad for the Social, 1856, p. 27; Recollections of Oxford by an Old Freeman, 1899.]
TALBOYS or TAILBOYS, Sir WILLIAM, styled Earl of Kyme (d. 1464), born before 1417, was son and heir of Walter Tailboys of Kyme in Lincolnshire. Through the families of Barradon and Umfraville he represented the Kymes, lords of Kyme, and was in the male line a descendant of Ivo de Taillebois, a Norman invader, who received large grants in Lincolnshire from William I, and figures as a principal character in Kingsley's ‘Hereward the Wake’ (Freeman, Norman Conquest; cf. arts. Randulf, Earl of Chester, d. 1129? and Roumare, William de, Earl of Lincoln).
William Tailboys was born before 1417, and succeeded to the Kyme estates on the death of his cousin, Gilbert Umfraville, titular ear of Kyme, on 20 March 1421. When he came to manhood, William was a supporter of the party of William de la Pole, duke of Suffolk [q. v.] In a letter which he addressed to Viscount Beaumont, probably before 1450, he complains of his treatment at the hands of the Lords Cromwell, Welles, and Willoughby (Paston Letters, i. 96–8). It may have been in pursuit of his private quarrel that on 28 Nov. 1449 Tailboys hustled Cromwell, who was Suffolk's chief adversary in the council, as he was entering the Star-chamber at Westminster. Cromwell, however, accused both Tailboys and Suffolk of intending his death. Tailboys, supported by Suffolk, denied the charge, but was committed to the Tower. There were other charges of violence against Tailboys, and in these also it was alleged that he had profited by Suffolk's patronage. The protection which he had afforded to Tailboys
