Phyllis Walter Goodhart Gordan (4 October 1913 - 24 January 1994) was a rare book and manuscript collector and a leading scholar of the Renaissance, known for her research into the life of

Poggio Bracciolini Gian Francesco Poggio Bracciolini (11 February 1380 – 30 October 1459), usually referred to simply as Poggio Bracciolini, was an Italian scholar and an early Renaissance humanist. He was responsible for rediscovering and recovering many classi ...

Personal life and education

Phyllis Walter Goodhart was born on October 4, 1913, to Howard Lehman Goodhart and Marjorie Walter. Phyllis' uncle was

Arthur Lehman Goodhart Arthur Lehman Goodhart (1 March 1891 in New York City – 10 November 1978 in Oxford) was an American-born academic jurist and lawyer; he was Professor of Jurisprudence at the University of Oxford, 1931–51, when he was also a Fellow of Un ...

, and her great-grandfather was

Mayer Lehman Mayer Lehman (January 9, 1830 – June 21, 1897) was a German-born American businessman, banker, and philanthropist. He was one of the three founding brothers of the investment bank Lehman Brothers. Early life Mayer Lehman was born in 1830 to ...

. She attended

Brearley School The Brearley School is an all-girls private school in New York City, located on the Upper East Side neighborhood in the borough of Manhattan. The school is divided into lower (kindergarten – grade 4), middle (grades 5–8) and upper (grades 9– ...

in New York City and then went on to

Bryn Mawr College Bryn Mawr College ( ; Welsh: ) is a women's liberal arts college in Bryn Mawr, Pennsylvania. Founded as a Quaker institution in 1885, Bryn Mawr is one of the Seven Sister colleges, a group of elite, historically women's colleges in the United St ...

, where she majored in Latin, graduating in 1935. She attended

Radcliffe College Radcliffe College was a women's liberal arts college in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and functioned as the female coordinate institution for the all-male Harvard College. Considered founded in 1879, it was one of the Seven Sisters colleges and he ...

from 1935 to 1938, receiving her M.A. in Latin, Greek, and paleography. She married John Dozier Gordan in 1938, and they had one son and three daughters.

Career

Gordan's life work of editing, translating, and annotating the letters of

Niccolò de' Niccoli Niccolò de' Niccoli (1364 – 22 January 1437) was an Italian Renaissance humanist. He was born and died in Florence, and was one of the chief figures in the company of learned men which gathered around the patronage of Cosimo de' Medici. Nicc ...

resulted in the 1974 publication of ''Two Renaissance Book Hunters'' (Columbia University Press). Her interest in Renaissance manuscripts and her study of Bracciolini's search for "lost" texts fueled her own collecting. Her father, Howard Lehman Goodhart, supported and encouraged her research by amassing a notable collection of

incunabula In the history of printing, an incunable or incunabulum (plural incunables or incunabula, respectively), is a book, pamphlet, or broadside that was printed in the earliest stages of printing in Europe, up to the year 1500. Incunabula were pro ...

and Renaissance manuscripts. After her father's death in 1951, Gordan continued to seek out and collect rare materials from the Medieval and Renaissance eras. Gordan was a lllTrustee at Bryn Mawr and a founding member of the Friends of the Bryn Mawr College Library in 1951. She was a charter member of

The Renaissance Society of America The Renaissance Society of America (RSA) is an academic association founded in 1954 supporting the study of the Renaissance period, 1300–1650. The RSA brings together scholars from many backgrounds in a wide variety of disciplines from North A ...

, serving as lllPresident from 1967 to 1968. Gordan was the first woman appointed to the

American Academy in Rome The American Academy in Rome is a research and arts institution located on the Gianicolo (Janiculum Hill) in Rome. The academy is a member of the Council of American Overseas Research Centers. History In 1893, a group of American architects, ...

's lllBoard of lllTrustees in 1971. She was also a lifelong supporter of New York Public Library, serving as a Trustee from 1974 to 1985.

Death and legacy

Gordan died on January 24, 1994. Following her death,

created the Phyllis Goodhart Gordan Book Prize in her memory. The

awards pre- and post-doctoral student winners of the

Rome Prize The Rome Prize is awarded by the American Academy in Rome, in Rome, Italy. Approximately thirty scholars and artists are selected each year to receive a study fellowship at the academy. Prizes have been awarded annually since 1921, with a hiatus ...

in Phyllis G. Gordan's name. Most of Gordan's book and manuscript collections were donated to Bryn Mawr College and the

New York Public Library The New York Public Library (NYPL) is a public library system in New York City. With nearly 53 million items and 92 locations, the New York Public Library is the second largest public library in the United States (behind the Library of Congress ...

. In 2016, Bryn Mawr College hosted a symposium dedicated to Gordan's memory, entitled ''Poggio Bracciolini and the Re(dis)covery of Antiquity: Textual and Material Traditions''.

Published works

“The Medieval Library at Bryn Mawr.”
�''The Papers of the Bibliographical Society of America'', vol. 46, no. 2, 1952, pp. 87–98. * ''Fifteenth Century Books in the Collection of Howard Lehman Goodhart''. Stamford: Overbrook Press, 1955.
"Of What Use are Old Books?"
A talk given 4 April 1972 to celebrate the adding of the one-thousandth incunabulum to the Bryn Mawr Library, Privately printed by the Friends of the Bryn Mawr College Library, 1973 * ''Two Renaissance Book Hunters: The Letters of Poggius Bracciolini to Nicolaus De Niccolis''. New York: Columbia, 1974 * "To hold the Renaissance in our hands." Text of address given at the annual general meeting of Friends of the Bodleian, 26 June 1973. Oxford: University Press, 1974

References

1913 births American book and manuscript collectors Brearley School alumni Bryn Mawr College alumni 1994 deaths Radcliffe College alumni {{DEFAULTSORT:Gordan, Phyllis Historians of the Renaissance Writers from New York City