Kenyon was born in London, the son of John Robert Kenyon, Vinerian Professor of English Law at Oxford. Educated at Magdalen College, Oxford, he joined the British Museum in 1889 and rose to be its Director and Head Librarian by 1909. He was knighted for his services in 1912.

In 1891, Kenyon edited the editio princeps of the Aristotelian Constitution of Athens. In 1920, he was appointed president of the British School of Archaeology in Jerusalem. He spent most of his retirement researching and publishing ancient papyri. He died on 23 August 1952.

Kenyon was a noted scholar of ancient languages, and made a life-long study of the Bible, especially the New Testament as an historical text. His book Our Bible and the Ancient Manuscripts (1895) showed how Egyptian papyri and other evidence from archeology can corroborate the narrative of historical events in the Gospel.

Kenyon's eldest daughter was the British archaeologist Dame Kathleen Kenyon.

Works

• Recent Developments in the Textual Criticism of the Greek Bible (Schweich Lectures for 1932)

References

• Biography of Frederic G. Kenyon in German.
• Works by Frederic G. Kenyon at Project Gutenberg
• The Master's Seminary Journal 1:10 (Spring 1999), 42