Ethna Byrne-Costigan (24 May 1904 – 12 January 1991) was an Irish academic and writer.^[1]

Ethna Byrne-Costigan was born at UpperLeeson Street, Dublin on 24 May 1904. She was the eldest daughter of the chief architect to theOffice of Public Works,Thomas Joseph Byrne and Mary Ellen Byrne (née Scott). In her youth, she was sent to Italy to live with relatives, attending Les Dames de Scion convent inRome. When she returned to Dublin she lived alternately with her grandfather and aunts inDartmouth Square, and inBallyboden and laterRathgar with her parents. She was schooled at Loreto Hall inSt Stephen's Green, going on to attendUniversity College Dublin. In 1925 she graduated with a first class BA in modern languages, and in 1927 a first class MA in French. She went on to study for her doctorate at theSorbonne in Paris with the thesisBourdaloue moraliste, which was published by Beauchesne.^[1]

Byrne-Costigan was appointed professor of Romance languages atUniversity College Cork (UCC) in 1939, after the retirement ofMary Ryan. She stayed in this position until 1969, establishing the Italian department and introducing a refresher course for French teachers. Her academic publications focused on studies ofLe bourgeois gentilhomme byMolière,Athalie byJean Racine, andHorace byPierre Corneille. She translatedLe mie prigioni bySilvio Pellico into Irish, which is held by the Pellico Museum inTurin. Her Irish translation of a collection ofSalvatore Quasimodo's poems was published by the Italian Institute. She founded theDante Alighieri Society in Cork with Dr Piero Calì, serving as the president from 1956 to 1969.^[1][2]

She retired from UCC, taking up part-time lecturing atTrinity College Dublin on Italian philology and medieval texts. Byrne-Costigan was a member of the Irish national committee ofUNESCO, and represented Ireland twice at the biennial UNESCO conference in Paris. She was also the honorary secretary of theCeltic Congress. In 1960 she was made a Grand OfficerOrder of Merit of the Italian Republic for her work on promoting Italian culture and the language in Ireland.^[1][3]

Byrne-Costigan was a talented embroiderer, with her work exhibited as part of theEmbroiderers' Guild in the United States. She married the Egyptologist and linguist George Costigan (died October 1951) in 1941, with whom she had one daughter, Celine (died 2015). She published her memoirs,Ethna Mary twice, under the pseudonym "Ethna Bee Cee" in 1989. She remained an active researcher, delivering a lecture to theOld Dublin Society onSydney, Lady Morgan in 1984. She died at her home in Palmerstown Villas,Rathmines, Dublin on 12 January 1991.^[1]

UCC awards The Ethna Byrne Costigan Memorial Prize in her memory to a student who attains the highest marks in the second year examination in Italian.^[4] A collection of her papers is held in UCC Library's Archives.^[5] Items from her personal library of books are held in UCC Library's Special Collections.^[6]

• Etude sur l'Athalie de Racine. Cork: Cork University Press, 1958.
• Etude sur l'Horace de Corneille. Cork: Cork University Press, 1959.
• Etude sur l'Horace de Corneille, 2nd edition. Cork: Cork University Press, 1968.
• Peg Woffington.Dublin Historical Record 33.1 (1979): 11–21.
• Sydney Lady Morgan (1776-1859).Dublin Historical Record 38.2 (1985): 61–73.
• Ethna Mary twice. New York: Vantage Press, 1989.
• Costigan, E.B. and du Cameroun, F., 1989. Tribute to Doctor Fonlon.Socrates in Cameroon: The Life and Works of Bernard Nsokika Fonlon, 1, p.149.

• 1904 births
• 1991 deaths
• People educated at Loreto College, St Stephen's Green
• 20th-century Irish writers
• 20th-century Irish women writers
• Grand Officers of the Order of Merit of the Italian Republic
• Irish embroiderers
• 20th-century women textile artists
• 20th-century textile artists
• 20th-century Irish artists
• 20th-century Irish women artists
• Irish women memoirists

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