Sir John Beazley | |
|---|---|
 Beazley cataloguing an unidentified vase in 1956 | |
| Born | John Davidson Beazley (1885-09-13)13 September 1885 |
| Died | 6 May 1970(1970-05-06) (aged 84) |
| Title | Lincoln Professor of Classical Archaeology and Art |
| Board member of | British Academy |
| Spouse | |
| Awards | Order of the Companions of Honour |
| Academic background | |
| Alma mater | Balliol College, Oxford (BA) |
| Academic work | |
| Discipline | Archaeology andclassics |
| Sub-discipline | |
| Institutions | |
| Notable works |
|
Sir John Davidson Beazley (/ˈbiːzli/; 13 September 1885 – 6 May 1970) was a Britishclassical archaeologist andart historian, known for his classification ofAttic vases byartistic style. He wasprofessor of classical archaeology and art at theUniversity of Oxford from 1925 to 1956.[1]
Beazley was born inGlasgow, Scotland on 13 September 1885,[2] to Mark John Murray Beazley (died 1940) and Mary Catherine Beazley née Davidson (died 1918).[3] He was educated atKing Edward VI School, Southampton andChrist's Hospital, Sussex.[2] He then attendedBalliol College, Oxford where he readLiterae Humaniores: he receivedfirsts in bothMods andGreats. He won theGaisford Prize in Greek composition for "Herodotus at the Zoo", a parody ofHerodotus in which the historian visitsLondon Zoo.[2] He graduated with aBachelor of Arts (BA) degree in 1907.[3]
While at Oxford, Beazley became a close friend of the poetJames Elroy Flecker.[3] They were perhaps lovers, asA. L. Rowse suggested in an article forThe Spectator;[4] certainly their relationship took place within what one biographer has described as "an aura of bisexuality".[5] The pair founded the "Praxiteles Club" together, a club of which they were the only members. The only rule was that members were to wear a particular blazer, white with gold trimmings.[5] Among Beazley's other friends during this time wereJohn Maynard Keynes,Lytton Strachey, andRupert Brooke.[5]
Beazley was a keen poet in his youth but abandoned it (and ceased even to speak of it) as his scholarly pursuits begun to take up all his time.[2] Flecker addressed a poem to Beazley, an "invitation to a young but learned friend to abandon archaeology for the moment, and play once more with his neglected Muse".[5]T. E. Lawrence once commented of Beazley that "if it hadn't been for that accursed Greek art, he'd have been a very fine poet".[2] Beazley and Flecker drifted apart as Beazley drifted away from poetry.[5]
After graduating, Beazley spent time at theBritish School at Athens. He then returned to theUniversity of Oxford as a student (equivalent tofellow) andtutor inClassics atChrist Church.[3]
DuringWorld War I, Beazley served inmilitary intelligence.[3] For most of the war he worked inRoom 40 (Cryptanalysis) of theAdmiralty'sNaval Intelligence Division,[2] where his colleagues included his fellow-archaeologistWinifred Lamb.[6] He held thetemporary rank ofsecond lieutenant from March[7] to October 1916[8] when he was on secondment to the British Army.
In 1925, he becameLincoln Professor of Classical Archaeology and Art at the University of Oxford,[3] a position he held until 1956.[1] He specialised inGreek decorated pottery (particularlyblack-figure andred-figure), and became a world authority on the subject. He adapted the art-historical method initiated byGiovanni Morelli to attribute the specific "hands" (style) of specific workshops and artists, even where no signed piece offered a name, e.g. theBerlin Painter, whose production he first distinguished.[9] He looked at the sweep of classical pottery—major and minor pieces—to construct a history of workshops and artists in ancient Athens. The first English edition of his book,Attic Red-figure Vase-painters, appeared in 1942 (in German asAttische Vasenmaler des rotfigurigen Stils, 1925).
Beazley retired in 1956, but continued to work until his death inOxford, on 6 May 1970.[2] His personal archive was purchased by theUniversity of Oxford in 1964. It was originally accommodated in theAshmolean Museum, but in 2007 it moved into theIoannou Centre for Classical and Byzantine Studies as part of the new Classical Art Research Centre.[10]
Beazley was elected as aFellow of the British Academy (FBA) in 1927.[2][11] He was elected to theAmerican Philosophical Society in 1943.[12] In 1954, he was elected a Foreign Honorary Member of theAmerican Academy of Arts and Sciences.[13]
Beazley was appointed aKnight Bachelor in 1949, and therefore granted thetitleSir.[3][14] He was appointed to theOrder of the Companions of Honour in the1959 New Year Honours "for services to scholarship".[15]
In 1919, Beazley married awidow, Marie Ezra (née Bloomfield), whose first husband had been killed in World War I.[3] In their early years together, the pair kept a goose in Christ Church, which Marie would take out for exercise inTom Quad. Marie helped Beazley's work by photographing vases for him.[2] Beazley had no children with Marie,[2] but had a stepdaughter from Marie's first marriage, Giovanna Marie Therese Babette "Mary" Ezra. Mary Ezra married Irish poetLouis MacNeice.[16] Marie died in 1967.[2]
The classical scholarMartin Robertson described Beazley as follows:
He had great charm, and could be an amusing and delightful companion; but as he grew older his total deafness and his increasing absorption in his work combined to cut him off to some degree from other people. He was modest, and took immense trouble with the guidance of his pupils, treating them as equals and winning their devoted affection. He was completely generous in communicating his knowledge, not only to these but to all who consulted him, as in increasing numbers scholars, collectors, and dealers constantly did. In appearance he was somewhat under medium height, slight but well made, with striking blue eyes and fair hair (white in age), and fine rather ascetic features which suggested to many a fifteenth-century Flemish portrait, aVan Eyck or aVan der Weyden. He was never professionally painted, but his wife, a talented untaught artist, drew several heads of him in coloured chalks which are preserved in Oxford, atBalliol,Christ Church, andLincoln.[2]
There is a notebook in Beazley's hand in Bodleian Archives & Manuscripts, theBodleian Library, Oxford (MS. Eng. misc. e. 1390), containing his notes on Greek literature and sculpture and on Roman history, and also his illustrations of classical statuary and his sketched caricatures of some contemporaries.
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