Cornelius Clarkson Vermeule III (August 10, 1925 – November 27, 2008) was an

American American(s) may refer to: * American, something of, from, or related to the United States of America, commonly known as the "United States" or "America" ** Americans, citizens and nationals of the United States of America ** American ancestry, pe ...

scholar of ancient art and curator of classical art at the

Museum of Fine Arts, Boston The Museum of Fine Arts (often abbreviated as MFA Boston or MFA) is an art museum in Boston, Massachusetts. It is the 20th-largest art museum in the world, measured by public gallery area. It contains 8,161 paintings and more than 450,000 works ...

, from 1957 to 1996. He was also well known as a numismatist. He also used the pseudonyms Wentworth Bunsen, Isao Tsukinabe and Northwold Nuffler.

Biography

He was born in Orange, New Jersey, on August 10, 1925, to

Cornelius Clarkson Vermeule II Major Cornelius Clarkson Vermeule II (September 26, 1895 – August 7, 1943) was the director of the Public Works Administration in New Jersey, United States. He also succeeded his father, Cornelius Clarkson Vermeule Sr., as Engineer in Charge ...

. Vermeule entered Harvard University in 1943, in the same year as his father's suicide and the continued escalation of World War II prompted him to join the United States Army. Vermeule married the archaeologist Emily Dickinson Townsend in 1957. Emily Vermeule was a classical scholar and the Doris Zemurray Stone Professor at Harvard University. He is the father of Emily Dickinson Blake "Blakey" Vermeule, a professor of English at

Stanford University Stanford University, officially Leland Stanford Junior University, is a private research university in Stanford, California. The campus occupies , among the largest in the United States, and enrolls over 17,000 students. Stanford is consider ...

and

Adrian Vermeule Cornelius Adrian Comstock Vermeule (, born May 2, 1968) is an American legal scholar who is currently the Ralph S. Tyler Professor of Constitutional Law at Harvard Law School. He is best known for his contributions to constitutional law and admin ...

, a law professor at

Harvard Law School Harvard Law School (Harvard Law or HLS) is the law school of Harvard University, a private research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1817, it is the oldest continuously operating law school in the United States. Each class ...

. In the Army he studied Japanese and was sent to the Pacific Theater, where he stayed in Japan after the war as a language expert, attaining the rank of captain. He completed his A.B. at Harvard University in 1947 and his A.M. in 1951 under

George M.A. Hanfmann George Maxim Anossov Hanfmann (born November 1911, in St. Petersburg, Russia; died March 13, 1986, in Watertown, Massachusetts) was a famous archaeologist and scholar of ancient Mediterranean art. Biography He studied at the University of Jena und ...

. He earned his Ph.D. at the University of London in 1953. From 1953 to 1955 he taught fine arts at the University of Michigan. From there he shifted to Bryn Mawr College as Professor of archaeology until 1957 when was appointed curator of classical collections for the

. He married a Bryn Mawr student, Emily Townsend that same year. While at the Museum, Vermeule was also a Lecturer in fine arts at

Smith College Smith College is a Private university, private Liberal arts colleges in the United States, liberal arts Women's colleges in the United States, women's college in Northampton, Massachusetts. It was chartered in 1871 by Sophia Smith (Smith College ...

. He was awarded a

Guggenheim Fellowship Guggenheim Fellowships are grants that have been awarded annually since by the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation to those "who have demonstrated exceptional capacity for productive scholarship or exceptional creative ability in the ar ...

in 1969. Vermeule assumed the directorship of the Museum of Fine Arts in the 1970s. His term as curator was marked by the purchase of two large vases portraying the fall of Troy and the death of Agamemnon, a Roman portrait of an old man, and a Minoan gold double ax. He trained several curators, including

Marion True Marion True (born November 5, 1948) was the former curator of antiquities for the J. Paul Getty Museum in Los Angeles, California. True was indicted on April 1, 2005 by an Italian court, on criminal charges accusing her of participating in a consp ...

of the J. Paul Getty Museum and

Carlos Picon Carlos may refer to: Places ;Canada * Carlos, Alberta, a locality ;United States * Carlos, Indiana, an unincorporated community * Carlos, Maryland, a place in Allegany County * Carlos, Minnesota, a small city * Carlos, West Virginia ;Elsewhere ...

. He died at age 83 in Cambridge, Massachusetts, on November 27, 2008, of the complications from a stroke.

References

Works

*(with Norman Jacobs) ''Japanese Coinage'', Numismatic Review, New York, 1953. *'Modern Japanese and Chinese coins in the British Museum (part I)', ''Numismatic Chronicle'', 1954, 186-96. 'Part II', ''Numismatic Chronicle'', 1955, 215-221. *''A Bibliography of Applied Numismatics in the Fields of Greek and Roman Archaeology and the Fine Arts''. (London, 1956). * s Isao Tsukinabe''Old Bodrum''. Somerset Society, 1964. *''European Art and the Classical Past''. (Cambridge, 1964). *''Numismatic Art in America''. (Cambridge, 1971). * with Neuerburg, Norman, and Helen Lattimore. ''Catalogue of the Ancient Art in the J. Paul Getty Museum: the Larger Statuary, Wall Paintings and Mosaics''. (Malibu, 1973). *''Greek Sculpture and Roman Taste: the Purpose and Setting of Graeco-Roman Art in Italy and the Greek Imperial East''. (Ann Arbor, 1977). *''The Cult Images of Imperial Rome''. (Rome, 1987). *''Art and Archaeology of Antiquity''. 4 vols. London: Pindar Press, 2001-2003. {{DEFAULTSORT:Vermeule, Cornelius Clarkson, III American art curators Bryn Mawr College faculty Harvard University alumni People from Orange, New Jersey Military personnel from New Jersey United States Army officers University of Michigan faculty 1925 births 2008 deaths Vermeule family American numismatists 20th-century American archaeologists Alumni of the University of London Historians from New Jersey

Biography

References

Further reading

Works