Frederick York Powell (4 January 1850 – 8 May 1904) was an English historian and scholar.

Biography

He was born on 4 January 1850 at 43 Woburn Place,

Bloomsbury Bloomsbury is a district in the West End of London. It is considered a fashionable residential area, and is the location of numerous cultural, intellectual, and educational institutions. Bloomsbury is home of the British Museum, the largest mus ...

, London, the son of Frederick Powell, a commissariat merchant, and his wife Mary Powell, daughter of Dr James Powell. He was educated at the Manor House School at

Hastings Hastings () is a large seaside town and borough in East Sussex on the south coast of England, east to the county town of Lewes and south east of London. The town gives its name to the Battle of Hastings, which took place to the north-west ...

, and

Rugby School Rugby School is a public school (English independent boarding school for pupils aged 13–18) in Rugby, Warwickshire, England. Founded in 1567 as a free grammar school for local boys, it is one of the oldest independent schools in Britain. Up ...

. He matriculated at the

University of Oxford , mottoeng = The Lord is my light , established = , endowment = £6.1 billion (including colleges) (2019) , budget = £2.145 billion (2019–20) , chancellor ...

in 1868 as an unattached student, the following year joining Christ Church, where he took a first-class degree in

law Law is a set of rules that are created and are enforceable by social or governmental institutions to regulate behavior,Robertson, ''Crimes against humanity'', 90. with its precise definition a matter of longstanding debate. It has been vario ...

and modern history in 1872. Whilst at Oxford, he was a member of the exclusive

Stubbs Society The Stubbs Society for Foreign Affairs and Defence, commonly referred to simply as Stubbs Society, is the University of Oxford's oldest officially affiliated paper-reading and debating society (not to be confused with the unaffiliated debating ...

. Powell was called to the bar at the

Middle Temple The Honourable Society of the Middle Temple, commonly known simply as Middle Temple, is one of the four Inns of Court exclusively entitled to call their members to the English Bar as barristers, the others being the Inner Temple, Gray's Inn an ...

in 1874. He became law-lecturer and tutor of Christ Church, fellow of

Oriel College Oriel College () is a constituent college of the University of Oxford in Oxford, England. Located in Oriel Square, the college has the distinction of being the oldest royal foundation in Oxford (a title formerly claimed by University College, wh ...

, delegate of the Clarendon Press, and in 1894 he was made Regius Professor of Modern History in succession to

James Anthony Froude James Anthony Froude ( ; 23 April 1818 – 20 October 1894) was an English historian, novelist, biographer, and editor of ''Fraser's Magazine''. From his upbringing amidst the Anglo-Catholic Oxford Movement, Froude intended to become a clergy ...

. In June 1901 he received an honorary doctorate ( LLD) from the

University of Glasgow , image = UofG Coat of Arms.png , image_size = 150px , caption = Coat of arms Flag , latin_name = Universitas Glasguensis , motto = la, Via, Veritas, Vita , ...

during celebrations for the university's 450th jubilee. Powell died on 8 May 1904 at Staverton Grange,

Banbury Road Banbury Road is a major arterial road in Oxford, England, running from St Giles' Street, Oxford, St Giles' at the south end, north towards Banbury through the leafy suburb of North Oxford and Summertown, Oxford, Summertown, with its local shoppi ...

Oxford Oxford () is a city in England. It is the county town and only city of Oxfordshire. In 2020, its population was estimated at 151,584. It is north-west of London, south-east of Birmingham and north-east of Bristol. The city is home to the ...

, and was buried in

Wolvercote Wolvercote is a village that is part of the City of Oxford, England. It is about northwest of the city centre, on the northern edge of Wolvercote Common, which is itself north of Port Meadow and adjoins the River Thames. History The Domesday B ...

. Part of his collection of artefacts were deposited at the

Pitt Rivers Museum Pitt Rivers Museum is a museum displaying the archaeological and anthropological collections of the University of Oxford in England. The museum is located to the east of the Oxford University Museum of Natural History, and can only be accessed t ...

Associations

Powell took an interest in French poetry, and

Paul Verlaine Paul-Marie Verlaine (; ; 30 March 1844 – 8 January 1896) was a French poet associated with the Symbolist movement and the Decadent movement. He is considered one of the greatest representatives of the ''fin de siècle'' in international and ...

Stéphane Mallarmé Stéphane Mallarmé ( , ; 18 March 1842 – 9 September 1898), pen name of Étienne Mallarmé, was a French poet and critic. He was a major French symbolist poet, and his work anticipated and inspired several revolutionary artistic schools of ...

, and

Emile Verhaeren Emil or Emile may refer to: Literature *'' Emile, or On Education'' (1762), a treatise on education by Jean-Jacques Rousseau * ''Émile'' (novel) (1827), an autobiographical novel based on Émile de Girardin's early life *'' Emil and the Detecti ...

all lectured at Oxford under his auspices. He was also a connoisseur in Japanese art. In politics his sympathies were with the oppressed of all nationalities; he had befriended refugees after the Commune, counting among his friends

Jules Vallès Jules Vallès (11 June 1832 – 14 February 1885) was a French journalist, author, and left-wing political activist. Early life Vallès was born in Le Puy-en-Velay, Haute-Loire. His father was a supervisor of studies (''pion''), later a teac ...

the author of ''Les Réfractaires''; and he was also a friend of Stepniak and his circle. Powell was a member of the

Folklore Society The Folklore Society (FLS) is a national association in the United Kingdom for the study of folklore. It was founded in London in 1878 to study traditional vernacular culture, including traditional music, song, dance and drama, narrative, arts an ...

and became its president in the year that he died. The society's journal, which had published his papers, printed an obituary by

Edward Clodd Edward Clodd (1 July 1840 – 16 March 1930) was an English banker, writer and anthropologist. He had a great variety of literary and scientific friends, who periodically met at Whitsunday (a springtime holiday) gatherings at his home at Aldeburg ...

Works

Powell's contributions to history were not extensive, but he was a particularly stimulating teacher. He had been attracted in his school days to the study of Scandinavian history and literature, and he was closely allied with Professor

Guðbrandur Vigfússon Guðbrandur Vigfússon, known in English as Gudbrand Vigfusson, (13 March 1827 – 31 January 1889Jón þorkelsson, "Nekrolog över Guðbrandur Vigfússon" in ''Arkiv för nordisk filologi'', Sjätte bandet (ny följd: andra bandet), Lund, 18 ...

(d. 1889), whom he assisted in his ''Icelandic Prose Reader'' (1897), ''Corpus Poeticum Boreale'' (1887), and ''Origines Islandicae'' (1905), and in the editing of the ''Grimm Centenary'' papers (1886).

Family

Powell married in 1874 Florence Batten (née Silke). She died in 1888. They had a daughter, Mariella.

References

External links

*Oliver Elton
''Frederick York Powell: A Life and Selection from his Letters and Occasional Writings''
(1906) * * * ;Attribution {{DEFAULTSORT:Powell, Frederick York 1850 births 1904 deaths Alumni of Christ Church, Oxford 19th-century English historians English socialists Fellows of Oriel College, Oxford People educated at Rugby School People from Bloomsbury Regius Professors of History (University of Oxford) Presidents of the Folklore Society