Katharine Dorothea Ewart (November 26, 1870 – May 21, 1956) was a British historian and author of books on Italian history.

Katharine Dorothea Ewart
Born(1870-11-26)November 26, 1870
Bishops Cannings, Wiltshire, U.K.
DiedMay 21, 1956(1956-05-21) (aged 85)
Isleworth, U.K.
OccupationAuthor
LanguageEnglish
NationalityBritish
Alma materUniversity of Oxford
SubjectItalian history
SpouseHorace Middleton Vernon
ChildrenMagdalen Vernon, Philip Vernon

Early life

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She was born at the vicarage in Bishops Cannings, Wiltshire on 26 November 1870, the daughter of William Ewart (1818 – 1873), vicar of Bishops Cannings, and his wife, Katharine, née Matthews (1840 – 1918). After her father's death, her widowed mother settled in Bristol where Dorothea was educated at Clifton High School for Girls. She won a Clothworkers' scholarship at Somerville College, Oxford, where she took first-class honours in modern history in 1893.[1] She served as secretary for the Oxford Association for Mental Welfare.[2]

Family

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On 12 December 1899, she married Horace Middleton Vernon, an Oxford scholar of physiology.[1] The couple settled in Oxford and had five children, of whom a son and three daughters survived to adulthood.[1] Their eldest daughter Magdalen and their son Philip both later became eminent professors of psychology.[1][3]

Published works

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Her first work was a biography of Cosimo de' Medici published in 1899 as part of Macmillan's Foreign Statesmen Series.[4] In 1909 she published a survey of Italian history entitled Italy 1494–1790, part of the Cambridge Historical Series,[5] which was reviewed as a welcome contribution to the subject.[6] In 1909 she also wrote a short history of the Oxford University Museum with her husband.[7] She coauthored Italy, Medieval and Modern, a History, published in 1917.[8] Her final work was The Story of Italy, published in 1939.[9]

Death

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She was widowed by her husband's death in 1951.[1] She died in the mental hospital at Wyke House,[10] Syon Lane, Isleworth, Middlesex, on 21 May 1956.[1]

References

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Sources

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  • Bartrip, P.W.J. (2004). "Vernon, Horace Middleton (1870–1951), physiologist and industrial health specialist". Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (online ed.). Oxford University Press. doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/106741. ISBN 978-0-19-861411-1. Retrieved 27 January 2023. (Subscription or UK public library membership required.)
  • BPS. "Vernon; Philip Ewart (1905-1987); Professor; HonFBPsS". The History of Psychology Centre. The British Psychological Society. Retrieved 27 January 2023.
  • Bryant, Hilda; Wheeler, P (1961). Somerville College Register, 1879-1959. Oxford: University Press.
  • Ewart, K. Dorothea (1899). Cosimo de' Medici. London: Macmillan and Co.
  • Ewart, K. Dorothea (1909). Italy from 1494 to 1790. Cambridge: University Press.
  • Ewart, K. Dorothea (1939). The story of Italy, from the end of the Roman empire to the beginning of the Italian kingdom. London: J. Clarke & Co., Ltd.
  • Jamison, Evelyn M.; Ady, Cecelia M.; Ewart, K. Dorothea; Terry, Charles-Sanford; David, H.W.Carless (1917). Italy, Medieval and Modern, a History. Oxford: The Clarendon Press.
  • JMS (1954). "Wyke House". Journal of Mental Science. October: 1.
  • Thayer, William Roscoe (1909). "Italy from 1494 to 1790. By Mrs. H. M. Vernon (K. Dorothea Ewart)". The American Historical Review. 15 (1): 125–127. doi:10.1086/ahr/15.1.125. Retrieved 27 January 2023.
  • Vernon, Horace Middleton; Ewart, K. Dorothea (1909). A History of the Oxford Museum. Oxford: Clarendon Press.