Sarah Joanne Clackson (née Quinn) (11 December 1965 – 10 August 2003) was a

British British may refer to: Peoples, culture, and language * British people, nationals or natives of the United Kingdom, British Overseas Territories, and Crown Dependencies. ** Britishness, the British identity and common culture * British English, ...

Coptologist Coptology is the science of Coptic studies, the study of the Coptic language and Coptic literature.What is Cop ...

; she was Britain's foremost Coptologist. Born in

Leicester Leicester ( ) is a city status in the United Kingdom, city, Unitary authorities of England, unitary authority and the county town of Leicestershire in the East Midlands of England. It is the largest settlement in the East Midlands. The city l ...

, she was educated at

Loughborough High School ) , established = , closed = , type = Independent , religion = Christian , president = , head_label = Headmistress , head ...

and St John's College,

Cambridge Cambridge ( ) is a university city and the county town in Cambridgeshire, England. It is located on the River Cam approximately north of London. As of the 2021 United Kingdom census, the population of Cambridge was 145,700. Cambridge bec ...

where she studied

classics Classics or classical studies is the study of classical antiquity. In the Western world, classics traditionally refers to the study of Classical Greek and Roman literature and their related original languages, Ancient Greek and Latin. Classics ...

and

Egyptology Egyptology (from ''Egypt'' and Greek , '' -logia''; ar, علم المصريات) is the study of ancient Egyptian history, language, literature, religion, architecture and art from the 5th millennium BC until the end of its native religious ...

. She obtained a PhD from UCL in 1996; her PhD at

University College London , mottoeng = Let all come who by merit deserve the most reward , established = , type = Public research university , endowment = £143 million (2020) , budget = ...

was completed in four years, resulting in her first major book, ''Coptic and Greek texts Relating to the Hermopolite Monastery of Apa Apollo'' (2000). At the same time, she was working as Project Officer for the Manichaean Documentation Centre based first at the Institute of Classical Studies, London, and then at Warwick University; ''The Dictionary of Manichaean Texts, volume i, Texts from the Roman Empire'' (1998), bears her name among its authors, as does ''The Elephantine Papyri in English'' (1996). ''Our Father who writes: orders from the Monastery of Apollo at Bawit'', was published in 2008. She held the Eugénie Strong Fellowship in Arts at

Girton College Girton College is one of the Colleges of the University of Cambridge, 31 constituent colleges of the University of Cambridge. The college was established in 1869 by Emily Davies and Barbara Bodichon as the first women's college in Cambridge. In 1 ...

(1996–98) and the Lady Wallis Budge Fellowship in Egyptology at Christ's College (from 1998). A fund in her name, Sarah (J.) Clackson Coptic Fund, enables scholars to access her papers, which are held in the Archive of the Griffith Institute, Oxford, and to further her work in Coptic and papyrology. She married fellow Old Loughburian and Cambridge academic

James Clackson James Peter Timothy Clackson (born 13 September 1966) is a British linguist and Indo-Europeanist. He is a professor of Comparative Philology at the Faculty of Classics, University of Cambridge, and a Fellow and Director of Studies at Jesus Colle ...

in 1991. She was diagnosed with cancer in 1998 and died peacefully at home at 3.00 p.m. on Sunday 10 August 2003. Her funeral took place at the West Chapel, Cambridge Crematorium, at 12.45 p.m. on Tuesday 19 August. Her memorial is at the Parish of the Ascension Burial Ground in Cambridge.

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Clackson, Sarah 1965 births 2003 deaths Alumni of St John's College, Cambridge Alumni of University College London Fellows of Girton College, Cambridge Fellows of Christ's College, Cambridge Coptologists People educated at Loughborough High School