Elizabeth Caroline Gray
Elizabeth Caroline Hamilton Gray (née Johnstone, 1800 – 21 February 1887) was a Scottish historian and travel author. She was born in Alva, Clackmannanshire, in 1800,[1] the eldest daughter of James Raymond Johnstone and granddaughter of the colonial businessman John Johnstone.[2][3] After marrying John Hamilton Gray, a priest and genealogist, in June 1829, Gray moved to Bolsover Castle in England, where she lived until shortly before her death.[2][4]
Research
Gray became interested in the history of the Etruscans after visiting an exhibition of Etruscan artefacts in London organised by Domenico Campanari in 1837,[5] and pursued her interest during a visit to Italy in 1837–1839, drawing on contacts in German and Italian archaeological circles. In 1840 she published Tour to the Sepulchres of Etruria, which served as a travelogue and as an account of her archaeological research. She then wrote a general History of Etruria: the first two volumes in 1843–1844 and the third in 1868.[2]
As a woman, Gray was attacked for conducting historical research. The explorer George Dennis, who went on to write his own history of the Etruscans, stated in a review of Gray's work in 1844 that "any deep or earnest investigation of matters connected with the social institution of a gentile nation is not properly within the female province."[6]
Other than her research on Etruria, Gray wrote a work on the classical and early medieval church and empire, as well as two popular children's histories of Rome.[2] With her husband she maintained a collection of antiquities, acquired both from dealers in Italy and her own excavations, which included an unusual red-and-black Etruscan amphora in the Italo-Geometric style, known as the "Hamilton Gray vase".[7] She died on 21 February 1887.[8]
Works
- Tour to the Sepulchres of Etruria. London: J. Hatchard and Son. 1840. (1843 ed.)
- The History of Etruria. London: J. Hatchard and Son. 1843–68. (Vol. 1, 2, 3)
- History of Rome for Young Persons. London: T. Hatchard. 1847. (1858 ed.)
- Emperors of Rome from Augustus to Constantine: Being a Continuation of the History of Rome. London: T. Hatchard. 1850.
- The Empire and the Church, from Constantine to Charlemagne. Oxford: J. Henry and J. Parker. 1857.
References
- ^ Italia antiqua. Storia dell'etruscologia tra archeologia e storia della cultura (in Italian). Orvieto and Rome: Quasar. 2006. p. 32. ISBN 8871402960.
- ^ a b c d "Elizabeth Caroline Gray". British Travel Writing. University of Wolverhampton. Retrieved 23 April 2020.
- ^ Burke, John (1835). A Genealogical and Heraldic History of the Commoners of Great Britain and Ireland. Vol. 2. London: R. Bentley. p. 302.
- ^ Williams, Dyfri (2009). "The Hamilton Gray Vase". In Swaddling, Judith; Perkins, Philip (eds.). Etruscan by Definition: Papers in Honour of Sybille Haynes. London: British Museum Press. pp. 10–20: 10. ISBN 978-0861591732.
- ^ de Grummond, Nancy Thomson, ed. (1996). "Campanari Family". Encyclopedia of the History of Classical Archaeology. London and New York: Routledge. p. 225. ISBN 978-1884964800.
- ^ Quoted in Williams 2009, p. 11.
- ^ Williams 2009, p. 13.
- ^ Boase, Frederic (1892). "Gray, Rev. John Hamilton". Modern English Biography. Vol. 1 – via Project Gutenberg.
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