J. C. Davis | |
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| Born | James Colin Davis (1940-05-28)28 May 1940 Yorkshire, England |
| Died | 25 July 2021(2021-07-25) (aged 81) Glasgow, Scotland |
| Academic background | |
| Alma mater | University of Manchester |
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| Discipline | Historian |
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James Colin Davis (28 May 1940 – 25 July 2021) was a British historian, whose work often focused on the Utopian thinkers of the 17th century. He has been described as a "historian of political and religious thought and a brilliant and provocative iconoclast".[1] The bookLiberty, Authority, Formality: Political Ideas and Culture, 1600-1900 was written in honour of Davis at the time of his retirement as professor.[2]
Professor Colin Davis was born in Hesse, Yorkshire into a fisherman's family.[3] He received his education at theUniversity of Manchester and after a brief period at theForeign and Commonwealth Office he moved to New Zealand to teach at theUniversity of Waikato.[3] He worked and studied at a number of universities in New Zealand before setting up the School of History at theUniversity of East Anglia, Norwich.[4] Davis retired in 2004. He subsequently moved to Glasgow where he died in July 2021.[5]
Published in 2001, Davis' comprehensive studyOliver Cromwell was described as "the best analysis we have of Cromwell's religion and its politics" by the Journal of Modern History.[6] Davis' 1986 workFear, Myth and History: The Ranters and the Historians was particularly noted for questioning whether the radical, nonconformists known as theRanters ever existed per se, being rather a myth created by conservatives to endorse traditional values by comparison with an unimaginably radical other.[7] Other works by J. C. Davis includeUtopia and the Ideal Society: A Study of English Utopian Writing, 1516-1700 (1983),[8] and a biography ofGerrard Winstanley co-authored with J. D. Alsop for the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography.[9]
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