Editing Joshua Reynolds (section)

==Early life==
[[File:Self-portrait c.1747-9 by Joshua Reynolds (2).jpg|thumb|''Self-portrait'', aged about 24]]
[[File:PlymptonOldGrammarSchool Devon.JPG|thumb|[[Plympton Grammar School|Old Grammar School, Plympton]], founded 1658, built 1664, attended by Joshua Reynolds whose father was headmaster]]
Reynolds was born in [[Plympton]], [[Devon]], on 16 July 1723,<ref name="ODNB" /> as the third son of the Reverend Samuel Reynolds (1681–1745), master of the [[Plympton Grammar School|Plympton Free Grammar School]] in the town. His father had been a fellow of [[Balliol College, Oxford]], but did not send any of his sons to the university.<ref name=penny1>{{cite book|chapter=The Ambitious Man|first=Nicholas|last=Penny|pages=17–18|title=Reynolds|publisher=Royal Academy of Arts|type=Exhibition catalogue|year=1986}}</ref>
One of his sisters, seven years his senior, was [[Mary Palmer]] (1716–1794), author of ''Devonshire Dialogue'', whose fondness for drawing is said to have had much influence on Joshua as a boy. In 1740, she provided £60, half of the premium paid to [[Thomas Hudson (painter)|Thomas Hudson]] the portrait-painter, for Joshua's pupillage, and nine years later advanced money for his expenses in Italy.<ref>Lee, Elizabeth, Biography of Mary Palmer, ''Dictionary of National Biography'', 1885–1900, Vol. 43.</ref> His other siblings included [[Frances Reynolds]] (1729–1807) and [[Elizabeth Johnson (pamphleteer)|Elizabeth Johnson]] (1721–1800).

As a boy, he also came under the influence of [[Zachariah Mudge (clergyman)|Zachariah Mudge]], whose [[Platonism|Platonistic]] philosophy stayed with him all his life. Reynolds made extracts in his [[commonplace book]] from [[Theophrastus]], [[Plutarch]], [[Seneca the Younger|Seneca]], [[Marcus Antonius]], [[Ovid]], [[William Shakespeare]], [[John Milton]], [[Alexander Pope]], [[John Dryden]], [[Joseph Addison]], [[Richard Steele]], and [[Aphra Behn]] and copied passages on art theory by [[Leonardo da Vinci]], [[Charles Alphonse Du Fresnoy]], and [[André Félibien]].<ref name="ODNB">Postle, Martin, [http://www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/23429 "Reynolds, Sir  Joshua  (1723–1792)"], ''Oxford Dictionary of National Biography'', Oxford University Press, 2004; online edn, October 2009. Retrieved 24 September 2010.</ref> The work that came to have the most influence on Reynolds was [[Jonathan Richardson]]'s ''An Essay on the Theory of Painting'' (1715). Reynolds' annotated copy was lost for nearly two hundred years until it appeared in a Cambridge bookshop, inscribed with the signature "J. Reynolds Pictor". It is now in the collection of the Royal Academy of Arts, London.<ref name="ODNB" />