Frederic Madden

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Sir Frederic Madden (born February 16, 1801 in Portsmouth , † March 8, 1873 in London ) was an English librarian and paleographer at the library of the British Museum .

Life

Madden was born on February 16, 1801, the eleventh of thirteen children of Captain William John Madden, captain of the Royal Marines , and Sarah Carter Madden, daughter of a canon of Rochester Cathedral . First Madden attended local schools and later a boarding school at Bishop's Waltham.

On March 18, 1829, Madden married Mary Hayton, whom he had previously wooed for ten years against her family's opposition. The two had been married for barely a year when Mary died on February 26, 1830. Their son, Frederic Hayton, died just a few days after his mother on March 3, 1830.

While at Holkham Hall, Madden had an affair with Jane Digby , which he ended in favor of Emily Sarah Robinson. The two married on September 14, 1837 and had six children together, two of whom died in childhood. After the death of his son George, who died at the age of 24, Madden turned briefly to esotericism, from which Anthony Panizzi dissuaded him again.

Madden died in London on March 8, 1873.

Create

In February 1824 Madden, who showed early interest in antiquarian work, got a job as a copyist with the archivist Sir Henry Petrie . First, however, Madden thought about a clerical profession and therefore matriculated in July 1825 at Magdalen Hall (now Hertford College ) in Oxford . In parallel with his studies, Madden worked on a catalog of the manuscripts of Thomas William Coke , which he completed in 1828, at the invitation of William Roscoe . Since Madden had to travel to Holkham Hall ( Leicestershire ) to compile the catalog and was also employed at the British Museum from 1826 , he finally gave up studying. Madden was paid £ 350 for the catalog, but the publication of the catalog, which Madden had hoped for scientific recognition, was abandoned for cost reasons.

Coke appeased the angry Madden by significantly accelerating his career in the manuscript department of the British Museum. In February 1828 he was appointed Assistant Keeper of Manuscripts and in the same year a Fellow of the Royal Society . He had good social contacts, was regularly invited to the Queen's balls and was knighted as a Knight Bachelor and Knight of the Guelph Order (KH) in 1833 .

On July 18, 1837, Madden was appointed to succeed Josiah Forshall as Keeper of Manuscripts. Madden could never forgive those in charge that the latter promotion was scheduled three days after Panizzi’s Keeper of Printed Books. In particular, the Archbishop of London Wiliam Howley , on whom the postponement of three days can be traced back, accused Madden of being involved in a Panizzi conspiracy against himself. The aversion quickly turned into a hatred that fills many pages of Madden's 40-volume diary, which is kept with the rest of his estate in the Bodleian Library and excerpts from the Cambridge Bibliographical Society were published in 1980.

During his time as Keeper of Manuscripts, Madden introduced the systematic cataloging of collections and used an international network of booksellers to purchase new manuscripts. One of his greatest accomplishments was the identification and restoration of manuscripts in the possession of Robert Bruce Cotton (especially a Beowulf manuscript) that had been damaged in the museum's fire in 1731. Modern techniques such as photography also found their way into the British Museum under Madden: In 1856 Roger Fenton was hired to photograph the first and second letters of Clement in the Codex Alexandrinus , thus creating the basis for a facsimile edition .

When Panizzi retired in July 1866 and Madden was again passed over in the election to Principal Librarian, he resigned on September 29, 1866 and retired, but without continuing to receive his full salary like Panizzi.

Madden was considered a leading paleographer in England and was involved, among other things, in a debate about the correct spelling of the name of William Shakespeare (after Madden: Shakspere). He also published an investigation into the Lewis chess pieces . Madden made a name for himself as a publisher by editing the Middle English chivalric novel Havelok the Dane in 1828 , the Bible edition of John Wyclif together with Forshall in 1850 and the Historia Minor by Matthew Paris for the Rolls Series between 1866 and 1869 .

literature

  • Robert William Ackerman, Gretchen P. Ackerman: Sir Frederic Madden. A biographical sketch and bibliography . Garland, New York 1979.
  • Philipp R. Harris: A History of the British Museum Library 1753–1973 . British Library Board, London 1998.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u Michael Borrie: Madden, Sir Frederic (1801–1873), palaeographer and librarian . In: Henry Colin Gray Matthew (ed.): The Oxford dictionary of national biography: from the earliest times to the year 2000 . tape 36 . Oxford University Press, Oxford 2004.
  2. ^ Journal of Sir Frederic Madden, Bodleian Library
personal data
SURNAME Madden, Frederic
BRIEF DESCRIPTION British librarian and paleographer
DATE OF BIRTH February 16, 1801
PLACE OF BIRTH Portsmouth
DATE OF DEATH March 8, 1873
Place of death London