Jocelyn Toynbee

Jocelyn Mary Catherine Toynbee (born March 3, 1897 in Paddington , London ; died December 31, 1985 in Oxford ) was a British Classical Archaeologist .

Toynbee was the daughter of Harry Valpy Toynbee and Sarah Edith Toynbee. Her older brother was the historian and history philosopher Arnold Joseph Toynbee . She first attended Winchester High School for girls, then, like her mother, Newnham College in Cambridge , where she did her Magister Artium in Classical Honors Tripos in 1919 . From 1920 to 1921 she taught at Ladies' College in Cheltenham , from 1921 to 1924 at St. Hugh's College in Oxford, which she left as part of the mass layoffs in protest against the dismissal of the Italian historian Cecilia Ady . She was subsequently a lecturer in Classical Antiquities at Reading University until she returned to Cambridge in 1927 as a member of Newnham College. In 1930 , she received her doctorate from Oxford University , and from 1931 on, in addition to her position at Newnham College, she also held the position of lecturer at the Philosophical Faculty of Cambridge University . She held this position until she was appointed to the Laurence Chair in Classical Archeology at Cambridge in 1951. In 1962 she became emeritus and honorary member of Newnham College. Twenty more years of intensive research and publishing and the organization of exhibitions followed.

As a classical archaeologist, Jocelyn Toynbee was one of the few women scientists of her time in a largely male-dominated domain. During her travels to Rome, she developed a close relationship with Eugénie Sellers Strong , the grande dame of Roman archeology and learned society at the time. Encouraged by this contact and following her inclination, she devoted her research primarily to Roman topics from the imperial era to late antiquity , an area of ​​ancient art history that was largely neglected by British archeology and not really appreciated as an area of ​​independent art. Nevertheless, she represented traditional approaches and saw in Roman art from the 3rd century onwards and in the art of late antiquity the simple continuation of the imperial design will. Here she stood in clear contrast to Alois Riegl and Franz Wickhoff , who had just worked out the very different artistic intentions of this time that were at work behind everything .

Her work in the field of numismatics was important and groundbreaking . In contrast to her colleagues in this field, she related coin pictures to other artistic creations of the time, to wall painting and sculpture, to gems and mosaics and metalwork. For her work in this field she received the Medal of the Royal Numismatic Society in 1948 and the Archer M. Huntington Medal in 1956 . Great Britain under Roman rule represented a special area of ​​her work. She read regularly on this subject, two of her monographs were devoted to this subject along with numerous articles.

Toynbee was Vice President of the Society for the Promotion of Roman Studies from 1946, Chair of the Archeology, History and Letters Department of the British School at Rome from 1954 to 1958. She was a member of the Society of Antiquaries of London since 1943, and a member of the British Academy since 1952 , and a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences since 1973. She received honorary degrees from Newcastle University in 1967 and from Liverpool University in 1968.

Publications (selection)

• The Hadrianic School: A Chapter in the History of Greek Art . Cambridge University Press, Cambridge 1934.
• Roman Medallions . The American Numismatic Society, New York 1944.
• Some Notes on Artists in the Roman World . Latomus, Brussels 1951.
• with John Bryan Ward-Perkins : The Shrine of St Peter and the Vatican Excavations . Longmans / Green, London 1956.
• The Flavian Reliefs from the Palazzo delle Cancellaria in Rome . 39. Charlton Lectures on Art. Oxford University Press, London 1957.
• Art in Roman Britain . Phaidon Press, London 1963.
• Art in Britain under the Romans . Clarendon Press, Oxford 1964.
• The Art of the Romans (= Ancient Peoples and Places . Volume 43) Thames & Hudson, London 1965.
• Death and Burial in the Roman World . London 1971, ISBN 0-500-40015-6 .
• Animals in Roman Life and Art . Thames & Hudson, London 1973, ISBN 0-500-40024-5 .
• Roman Historical Portraits . Thames and Hudson, London 1978, ISBN 0-500-23277-6 .
• Ancient wildlife . von Zabern, Mainz 1983 ( Cultural History of the Ancient World . Volume 17), ISBN 3-8053-0481-1 .

literature

• Julian Munby, Martin Henig (Eds.): Roman life and art in Britain: a celebration in honor of the eightieth birthday of Jocelyn Toynbee . BAR Volume 41. Two volumes, Oxford 1977, ISBN 0-904531-91-0 .
• Paul Zanker , Susan Walker , Richard Gordon : Image and Mystery in the Roman World: Three Papers Given in Memory of Jocelyn Toynbee . Sutton, Gloucester 1988, ISBN 0-9514135-0-3 .
• Joyce M. Reynolds: Jocelyn Mary Catherine Toynbee, 1897–1985. In: Proceedings of the British Academy . Volume 80, 1993, pp. 499-508 ( PDF ).
• Malcolm Todd: Toynbee, Jocelyn Mary Catherine (1897-1985) . In: Oxford Dictionary of National Biography . Oxford University Press, Oxford 2004.
• Stefan Heid : Jocelyn Toynbee. In: Stefan Heid, Martin Dennert (Hrsg.): Personal Lexicon for Christian Archeology . Researchers and personalities from the 16th to the 21st century. Volume 2. Schnell & Steiner, Regensburg 2012, ISBN 978-3-7954-2620-0 , pp. 1243-1244.

Web links

• Biography in the Dictionary of Art Historians .
• Literature by and about Jocelyn Toynbee in the catalog of the German National Library