Reginald Innes Pocock

{{Short description|British zoologist (1863–1947)}}

{{Use dmy dates|date=January 2022}}

{{Use British English|date=May 2012}}

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| image = R. I. Pocock.jpg

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| birth_date = {{Birth date|df=yes|1863|03|04}}

| birth_place = Clifton, Bristol

| death_date = {{Death date and age|df=yes|1947|08|09|1863|03|04}}

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| nationality = British

| fields = Zoology

| workplaces = Natural History Museum, London, London Zoo

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Reginald Innes Pocock, {{post-nominals|country=GBR|size=100%|post-noms=F.R.S.}}{{Cite journal | last1 = Hindle | first1 = Edward| title = Reginald Innes Pocock. 1863-1947 | doi = 10.1098/rsbm.1948.0025 | journal = Obituary Notices of Fellows of the Royal Society | volume = 6 | issue = 17 | pages = 189–211| year = 1948 | jstor = 768917| s2cid = 161865216| doi-access = free }} (4 March 1863 – 9 August 1947) was a British zoologist.{{Cite journal | last1 = Schwarz | first1 = Ernest | title = Reginald Innes Pocock, F. R. S | journal = Journal of Mammalogy | volume = 29 | issue = 1 | pages = 93 | doi = 10.2307/1375287 | year = 1948 | jstor = 1375287| url = https://www.biodiversitylibrary.org/part/153667 }}

Pocock was born in Clifton, Bristol, the fourth son of Rev. Nicholas Pocock and Edith Prichard. He began showing interest in natural history at St. Edward's School, Oxford. He received tutoring in zoology from Sir Edward Poulton, and was allowed to explore comparative anatomy at the Oxford Museum. He studied biology and geology at University College, Bristol, under Conwy Lloyd Morgan and William Johnson Sollas. In 1885, he became an assistant at the Natural History Museum, and worked in the section of entomology for a year. He was put in charge of the collections of Arachnida and Myriapoda. He was also given the task to arrange the British birds collections, in the course of which he developed a lasting interest in ornithology. The 200 papers he published in his 18 years at the museum soon brought him recognition as an authority on Arachnida and Myriapoda; he described between 300 and 400 species of millipedes alone,{{cite journal|last=Sierwald|first=Petra|author2=Bond, Jason E. |title=Current Status of the Myriapod Class Diplopoda (Millipedes): Taxonomic Diversity and Phylogeny|journal=Annual Review of Entomology|date=1 January 2007|volume=52|issue=1|pages=401–420|doi=10.1146/annurev.ento.52.111805.090210|pmid=17163800}} and also described the scorpion genus Brachistosternus.{{Cite web|author=Jan Ove Rein|year=2012|title=Bothriuridae Simon, 1880|work=The Scorpion Files|publisher=Norges teknisk-naturvitenskapelige universitet|access-date=3 March 2012|url=http://www.ntnu.no/ub/scorpion-files/bothriuridae.php}} In 1929, he proposed the family Nandiniidae, with the genus Nandinia as its sole member. He argued that it differs from the Aeluroidea by the structure and shape of its ear canal and mastoid part of the temporal bone.{{cite web | url=https://archive.org/details/in.ernet.dli.2015.211444/page/n1001/mode/2up?view=theater | title=The Encyclopaedia Britannica Vol-iv | year=1768 }}

In 1904, he left to become superintendent of the London Zoo, remaining so until his retirement in 1923. He then worked, as a voluntary researcher, in the British Museum, in the mammals department.

He described the leopon in a 1912 letter to The Field, based on examination of a skin sent to him by W. S. Millard, the secretary of the Bombay Natural History Society.

His brother Edward Innes Pocock played international rugby for Scotland and was part of Cecil Rhodes' Pioneer Column. His great grandfather was marine artist Captain Nicholas Pocock.