Henry Clark Barlow  Henry Clark Barlow, M.D. (12 May 1806 – 8 November 1876) was an English writer on Dante. Barlow was born in Churchyard Row, Newington Butts, Surrey, 12 May 1806. He was the only child of Henry Barlow, who, after spending the years 1799–1804 in the naval service of the East India Company, settled at Newington; passed fourteen years (1808–1822) at Gravesend as a revenue officer; and died at Newington, in his seventy-fifth year, 12 January 1858. Barlow's mother, who lived till 14 January 1864, was Sophia, youngest daughter of Thomas Clark, a solicitor. Barlow was educated at Gravesend and Hall Place, Bexley; and in 1822 was articled to George Smith, an architect and surveyor, of Mercers' Hall. He soon became a student of the Royal Academy. In 1827, after an accident to his right thumb, he gave up his profession, and spent two years in private study. In 1829 he was in Paris attending the public lectures in the Jardin des Plantes and at the Collège de France. He matriculated at Edinburgh University, after a preliminary course of classical study at Dollar, as a medical student, in November 1831, and took the degree of M.D. on 3 August 1837. After a time he moved to Paris, where he worked on medical and scientific studies, but also on art criticism. From Paris in 1840, he travelled to Belgium, the River Rhine, and Holland. In the course of these and other journeys, Barlow filled sketch-books and journals with drawings and descriptions, and a cabinet with geological specimens. He returned home to study Italian, and in the spring of 1841 again went to the continent. He spent the summer in Switzerland, in the autumn crossed the St. Gothard Pass to Milan, and remained in Italy nearly five years. It was at Pisa, during the winter of 1844–5, that Barlow became acquainted with the works of Dante. In 1846, after revisiting England, he returned to Florence. In October 1847 he made ‘a pilgrimage' to Ravenna, the Mecca of all Dantophilists.’ In 1848 to 1850 he extended his travels. He published in 1850, from Newington Butts, a short paper, and Barlow's whole subsequent life seems to have been consecrated to further study of Dante.