Charles W. Jones (1905–1989) was a medievalist scholar who served on the faculties of

Cornell University Cornell University is a private statutory land-grant research university based in Ithaca, New York. It is a member of the Ivy League. Founded in 1865 by Ezra Cornell and Andrew Dickson White, Cornell was founded with the intention to teach an ...

and the

University of California, Berkeley The University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley, Berkeley, Cal, or California) is a public land-grant research university in Berkeley, California. Established in 1868 as the University of California, it is the state's first land-grant u ...

. He is noted for his work on

Bede Bede ( ; ang, Bǣda , ; 672/326 May 735), also known as Saint Bede, The Venerable Bede, and Bede the Venerable ( la, Beda Venerabilis), was an English monk at the monastery of St Peter and its companion monastery of St Paul in the Kingdom o ...

, the development of the ecclesiastical calendar, medieval

hagiography A hagiography (; ) is a biography of a saint or an ecclesiastical leader, as well as, by extension, an adulatory and idealized biography of a founder, saint, monk, nun or icon in any of the world's religions. Early Christian hagiographies migh ...

, and Carolingian aesthetics. At his death a major work titled ''The Age of the Book: Christian Foundations of Western Literature'' was left unfinished. Jones contributed to the third volume of the monumental ''The

Plan of St. Gall The Plan of Saint Gall is a medieval architectural drawing of a Christian monasticism, monastic compound dating from 820–830 AD. It depicts an entire Rule of Saint Benedict, Benedictine monastic compound, including Church (building), churches, ...

'' (1979) by Walter Horn and

Ernest Born Ernest Born (1898−1992) was an architect, designer, and artist based in California. He and his wife Esther Baum Born (1902−1987) collaborated on diverse projects in the San Francisco Bay Area from 1936 on. She was also a notable architect ...

, translating the 9th-century

Latin Latin (, or , ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally a dialect spoken in the lower Tiber area (then known as Latium) around present-day Rome, but through the power of the ...

text "Customs of

Corbie Corbie (; nl, Korbei) is a commune of the Somme department in Hauts-de-France in northern France. Geography The small town is situated up river from Amiens, in the département of Somme and is the main town of the canton of Corbie. It lies ...

" (''Consuetudines Corbienses'') of Adalhard, and two other documents. The ''Consuetudines'' consist of Adalhard's managerial directives to the heads of the departments in his

monastery A monastery is a building or complex of buildings comprising the domestic quarters and workplaces of monastics, monks or nuns, whether living in communities or alone (hermits). A monastery generally includes a place reserved for prayer which ...

. They are significant for outlining in prose the objectives illustrated graphically by the architectural drawing that is the subject of the book. The difficulty of the translation is indicated by the number of

footnotes A note is a string of text placed at the bottom of a page in a book or document or at the end of a chapter, volume, or the whole text. The note can provide an author's comments on the main text or citations of a reference work in support of th ...

, which occupy twice as much space as the text itself. Horn and Born noted that Jones "accomplished this gruesome task without the slightest loss of enthusiasm!" Jones is best known outside scholarly circles for his work on the legend of

Saint Nicholas Saint Nicholas of Myra, ; la, Sanctus Nicolaus (traditionally 15 March 270 – 6 December 343), also known as Nicholas of Bari, was an early Christian bishop of Greeks, Greek descent from the maritime city of Myra in Asia Minor (; modern-da ...

and the

Santa Claus Santa Claus, also known as Father Christmas, Saint Nicholas, Saint Nick, Kris Kringle, or simply Santa, is a Legend, legendary figure originating in Western Christianity, Western Christian culture who is said to Christmas gift-bringer, bring ...

tradition, having written the

article Article often refers to: * Article (grammar), a grammatical element used to indicate definiteness or indefiniteness * Article (publishing), a piece of nonfictional prose that is an independent part of a publication Article may also refer to: G ...

"Knickerbocker Santa Claus" (1954), the

monograph A monograph is a specialist work of writing (in contrast to reference works) or exhibition on a single subject or an aspect of a subject, often by a single author or artist, and usually on a scholarly subject. In library cataloging, ''monograph ...

''The Saint Nicholas Liturgy and its Literary Relationships'' (1963), and the book ''Saint Nicholas of Myra, Bari, and Manhattan'' (1978).

Sources

* University of California (System) Academic Senate, "Charles W. Jones, English: Berkeley,
Calisphere.
1905 births 1989 deaths 20th-century American historians 20th-century American male writers American male non-fiction writers American medievalists Cornell University faculty Fellows of the Medieval Academy of America Historians from California Santa Claus University of California, Berkeley faculty {{US-historian-stub