Leslie Elizabeth Webster, (born 8 November 1943) is an English retired museum curator and art historian of

Anglo-Saxon The Anglo-Saxons were a Cultural identity, cultural group who inhabited England in the Early Middle Ages. They traced their origins to settlers who came to Britain from mainland Europe in the 5th century. However, the ethnogenesis of the Anglo- ...

and

Viking art Viking art, also known commonly as Norse art, is a term widely accepted for the art of Scandinavian Norsemen and Viking settlements further afield—particularly in the British Isles and Iceland—during the Viking Age of the 8th-11th centuries ...

. She worked from 1964 until 2007 at the

British Museum The British Museum is a public museum dedicated to human history, art and culture located in the Bloomsbury area of London. Its permanent collection of eight million works is among the largest and most comprehensive in existence. It docum ...

, rising to Keeper, where she curated several major exhibitions, and published many works, on the Anglo-Saxons and

Early Middle Ages The Early Middle Ages (or early medieval period), sometimes controversially referred to as the Dark Ages, is typically regarded by historians as lasting from the late 5th or early 6th century to the 10th century. They marked the start of the Mi ...

Early life and education

Leslie Elizabeth Webster was born on 8 November 1943 to James Lancelot Dobson and Elizabeth Marjorie Dobson (née Dickenson). After attending

Central Newcastle High School Newcastle High School for Girls is an independent day school for girls aged 3–18 in Newcastle upon Tyne, England. The Junior School is at Sandyford Park and the Senior School is located in the neighbouring suburb of Jesmond. The school was f ...

she matriculated at

Westfield College Westfield College was a small college situated in Hampstead, London, from 1882 to 1989. It was the first college to aim to educate women for University of London degrees from its opening. The college originally admitted only women as students and ...

at the

University of London The University of London (UoL; abbreviated as Lond or more rarely Londin in post-nominals) is a federal public research university located in London, England, United Kingdom. The university was established by royal charter in 1836 as a degree ...

, where in 1964 she received a

Bachelor of Arts Bachelor of arts (BA or AB; from the Latin ', ', or ') is a bachelor's degree awarded for an undergraduate program in the arts, or, in some cases, other disciplines. A Bachelor of Arts degree course is generally completed in three or four years ...

with first class honours.

Career

Following her graduation from Westfield, Webster began work at the

, serving from 1964 to 1969 as assistant keeper of the Department of British and Medieval Antiquities. In 1969 the department was split in two and Webster moved to the newly-structured Department of Medieval and Later Antiquities (in 2000 renamed the Department of Medieval and Modern Europe), serving as assistant keeper until 1985, from then until 2002 as deputy keeper, and during 2002–2003 as the acting keeper. The departments were merged back into one body in 2002, the Department of Prehistory and Europe, of which Webster served as Keeper from 2003 until her 2007 retirement. During her time at the British Museum, Webster was the co-curator for four major exhibitions about the

. As part of the Transformation of the Roman World AD 400–900 project of the

European Science Foundation The European Science Foundation (ESF) is an association of 11 member organizations devoted to scientific research in 8 European countries. ESF is an independent, non-governmental, non-profit organisation that promotes the highest quality science ...

, she also coordinated exhibitions in five major European museums. Webster's work, both before and after retirement, has also included the publication of works on

Anglo-Saxon art Anglo-Saxon art covers art produced within the Anglo-Saxon period of English history, beginning with the Migration period style that the Anglo-Saxons brought with them from the continent in the 5th century, and ending in 1066 with the Norma ...

and archaeology. These include ''The Golden Age of Anglo-Saxon Art, 966-1066'' (1984), ''The Making of England: Anglo-Saxon Art and Culture AD 600–900'' (1991, ''The Transformation of the Roman World AD 400–900'' (1997), ''Anglo-Saxon Art: A New History'' (2012), and ''The Franks Casket'' (2012). She is the co-author of a forthcoming work on the finds from the Staffordshire Hoard.

Other activities

Webster has served since 2002 as an honorary visiting professor at the Institute of Archaeology 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 = ...

, and on the advisory panel of the

National Heritage Memorial Fund The National Heritage Memorial Fund (NHMF) was set up in 1980 to save the most outstanding parts of the British national heritage, in memory of those who have given their lives for the UK. It replaced the National Land Fund which had fulfilled the ...

since 2012. From 2011 to 2014 she chaired the research advisory panel of the Staffordshire Hoard Research Project, and from 2013 to 2017 she was a member of the Reviewing Committee on the Export of Works of Art and Objects of Cultural Interest. She was the President of the Society for Medieval Archaeology from 2007 to 2010, and the Vice President of the

Royal Archaeological Institute The Royal Archaeological Institute (RAI) is a learned society, established in 1844, with interests in all aspects of the archaeological, architectural and landscape history of the British Isles. Membership is open to all with an interest in these ...

from 2007 until 2012. She has also served as a trustee for the

Society of Antiquaries of London A society is a group of individuals involved in persistent social interaction, or a large social group sharing the same spatial or social territory, typically subject to the same political authority and dominant cultural expectations. Societ ...

, an organisation of which she was elected a fellow in 1973, in addition to memberships on the

English Heritage English Heritage (officially the English Heritage Trust) is a charity that manages over 400 historic monuments, buildings and places. These include prehistoric sites, medieval castles, Roman forts and country houses. The charity states that i ...

Museums and Archives Advisory Panel, and 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 span ...

Corpus of Anglo-Saxon Stone Sculpture Committee. From 1986 to 1999 she served as the UK representative for the Koordinierend Ausschuss der Internationalen Arbeitsgemeinschaft für Sachsenforschung.

Personal life

Webster married William Ian Webster in 1966. She has one son, and two daughters. ''

Who's Who ''Who's Who'' (or ''Who is Who'') is the title of a number of reference publications, generally containing concise biography, biographical information on the prominent people of a country. The title has been adopted as an expression meaning a gr ...

'' describes her interests as "books, music, walking, cooking, France, whistling".

Publications

* * * * **Republished as * *

References

Bibliography

* * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Webster, Leslie E. 1943 births Living people English curators Employees of the British Museum English art historians Women art historians British medievalists Women medievalists Anglo-Saxon studies scholars Fellows of the Society of Antiquaries of London Academics of the UCL Institute of Archaeology British women historians British women curators