Derek Edward Dawson Beales, FBA (born 12 June 1931,

Felixstowe Felixstowe ( ) is a port town in Suffolk, England. The estimated population in 2017 was 24,521. The Port of Felixstowe is the largest Containerization, container port in the United Kingdom. Felixstowe is approximately 116km (72 miles) northea ...

) is a British historian.''International Who's Who of Authors and Writers 2004'' (London: Routledge, 2003), p. 129. He has written the definitive work on the Holy Roman Emperor

Joseph II Joseph II (German: Josef Benedikt Anton Michael Adam; English: ''Joseph Benedict Anthony Michael Adam''; 13 March 1741 – 20 February 1790) was Holy Roman Emperor from August 1765 and sole ruler of the Habsburg lands from November 29, 1780 un ...

.T. C. W. Blanning, ''Joseph II'' (London: Routledge, 2015), p. vii. He was educated at the

University of Cambridge The University of Cambridge is a public collegiate research university in Cambridge, England. Founded in 1209 and granted a royal charter by Henry III in 1231, Cambridge is the world's third oldest surviving university and one of its most pr ...

, where he gained a BA in 1953, an MA and a PhD in 1957. He was appointed a Fellow of Sidney Sussex College, Cambridge in 1955 and a University Lecturer in History in 1965, which he held until 1980.Profile
British Academy, retrieved 14 July 2018. He was then Professor of Modern History at Cambridge until 1997. He was editor of ''

The Historical Journal ''The Historical Journal'', formerly known as ''The Cambridge Historical Journal'', is a peer-reviewed academic journal published by Cambridge University Press. It publishes approximately thirty-five articles per year on all aspects of British, ...

'' from 1971 until 1975. From 1984 until 1987 he was a member of the council of the

Royal Historical Society The Royal Historical Society, founded in 1868, is a learned society of the United Kingdom which advances scholarly studies of history. Origins The society was founded and received its royal charter in 1868. Until 1872 it was known as the Histori ...

. In 1989 he was elected a fellow of the

British Academy The British Academy is the United Kingdom's national academy for the humanities and the social sciences. It was established in 1902 and received its royal charter in the same year. It is now a fellowship of more than 1,000 leading scholars spa ...

Works

*''England and Italy, 1859-60'' (London: Nelson,1961). *''From Castlereagh to Gladstone, 1815-1885'' (London: Thomas Nelson and Sons Ltd, 1969). *''Joseph II, Volume I: In the Shadow of Maria Theresa, 1741-1780'' (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1987). *''Prosperity and Plunder: European Catholic Monasteries in the Age of Revolution, 1650–1815'' (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2003). *''Enlightenment and Reform in 18th-Century Europe'' (I.B. Tauris, 2005). *''Joseph II, Volume II: Against the World, 1780–1790'' (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2009).

Works

Notes

Further reading