Nora K. Chadwick

Nora Kershaw Chadwick CBE FSA FBA (28 January 1891 – 24 April 1972)[1] was an English medievalist.

Early life and education

Nora Kershaw was born in Lancashire in 1891, the first daughter of James Kershaw and Emma Clara Booth, married in 1888. Her sister Mabel was born in 1895.

She received her undergraduate degree from Newnham College at the University of Cambridge (where she was later an Honorary Life Fellow) and lectured at St Andrews during World War I. She returned to Cambridge in 1919 to study Anglo-Saxon and Old Norse under Professor Hector Munro Chadwick. They were married in 1922.[2]

The Chadwicks turned their home into a literary salon, a tradition which Mrs. Chadwick maintained after the death of her husband in 1947.[2]

Career

Most of her life was spent on research, in her later years primarily on the Celts.[2] She was University Lecturer in the Early History and Culture of the British Isles at the University of Cambridge from 1950 to 1958. She received honorary degrees from the University of Wales, the National University of Ireland and the University of St Andrews, and was made Commander of the Order of the British Empire in 1961.[2]

The Chadwicks took an interdisciplinary approach and wrote on many topics; they demonstrated influentially the study of multiple "early cultures of north-west Europe" and brought comparative evidence to bear on heroic literature. Nora Chadwick is best known for her work on the Celts, particularly on the earliest period.[3]

Bequest

Nora Chadwick died in Cambridge; she left a sum to the University of Cambridge to endow a readership in Celtic Studies.[4]

Publications

With her husband, she published The Growth of Literature in 1932–40.

I: The Ancient Literatures of Europe (1932)
II: Russian Oral Literature, Yugoslav Oral Poetry, Early Indian Literature, Early Hebrew Literature (1936)
III: The Oral Literature of the Tatars and Polynesia, etc. (1940)[3]

She also wrote The Beginnings of Russian History, an enquiry into sources (1946).

Chadwick collaborated with V. M. Zhirmunsky on a revision of the part of volume III that deals with epic poetry in Central Asian languages. The revised text was published separately in 1969 as Oral Epics of Central Asia.

In 1955 she published Poetry and Letters in early Christian Gaul.

Chadwick wrote about Celtic Britain and Breton history, and collaborated with Myles Dillon and Kenneth H. Jackson.

On Anglo-Saxon language and literature:

A list of the publications of Hector and Nora Chadwick was printed for her 80th birthday in 1971.

References

  1. ↑ CHADWICK, Nora Kershaw, Who Was Who, A & C Black, 1920–2015; online edn, Oxford University Press, 2014
  2. 1 2 3 4 Davidson, H. R. Ellis (1972). "Nora Kershaw Chadwick". Folklore. 83 (3): 254–55. ISSN 0015-587X. JSTOR 1259552.
  3. 1 2 Löffler, Marion (2006). "Chadwick, H.M. and Nora K.". In Koch, John T. Celtic Culture: A Historical Encyclopedia. 2. Santa Barbara, California: ABC-CLIO. pp. 397–98. ISBN 9781851094400.
  4. ↑ Statutes and Ordinances of the University of Cambridge. University of Cambridge. 2008. p. 747.
  5. ↑ Magoun, F. P., Jr. (October 1955). "Review: Studies in Early British History by Several Authors by Nora Kershaw Chadwick". Speculum. 30 (4): 628–31. doi:10.2307/2849623. JSTOR 2849623.
  6. ↑ Ó Fiaich, Tomás (1966). "Reviews: The Age of the Saints in the Early Celtic Church by Nora Kershaw Chadwick; Irish Monks in the Golden Age by J. Ryan". Studia Hibernica. 6: 195. JSTOR 20495860.
  7. ↑ Turner, Ralph V. (October 1966). "Review: The Druids by Nora K. Chadwick". The American Historical Review. 72 (1): 136–37. doi:10.2307/1848194. JSTOR 1848194.
  8. ↑ Thomson, Derick S. (October 1969). "Review: The Celtic Realms by Myles Dillon, Nora K. Chadwick". The Scottish Historical Review. 48 (146, Part 2): 174–76. JSTOR 25528803.
  9. ↑ Powell, T.G.E. (June 1971). "Review: Nora Chadwick: The Celts. With an introductory chapter by J. X. W. P. Corcoran". Antiquity. 45 (178): 152. doi:10.1017/S0003598X00069350.
  10. ↑ Eliason, Norman E. (April 1961). "Review: The Anglo-Saxons. Studies in Some Aspects of Their History and Culture Presented to Bruce Dickins by Peter Clemoes". The Modern Language Review. 56 (2): 238–39. doi:10.2307/3721913. JSTOR 3721913.
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