{{short description|English linguist and feminist (1683–1756)}} {{Use dmy dates|date=October 2016}} {{Use British English|date=October 2016}} {{Infobox scholar | name = Elizabeth Elstob | image = Elizabeth Elstob.jpg | caption = Initial with Elizabeth Elstob's portrait from her ''English-Saxon Homily on the Birth-Day of St. Gregory'' (1709) | birth_date = 29 September 1683 | death_date = 30 May 1756 | birth_place = Newcastle upon Tyne, England | death_place = Bulstrode Park, Buckinghamshire, England | occupation = Anglo-Saxonist, Linguist, Historian, Author, Translator, Governess | notable_works = ''Rudiments of Grammar for the English-Saxon Tongue'' (1715), ''English-Saxon Homily on the Nativity of St Gregory'' (1709), Translation of Madeleine de Scudéry's ''Essay upon Glory'' (1708) | known_for = First scholar to publish Old English grammar in modern English }}
'''Elizabeth Elstob''' (29 September 1683 – 30 May 1756),<ref>Gretsch 2007.</ref> the "Saxon Nymph", was a pioneering scholar of Anglo-Saxon. She was the first person to publish a grammar of Old English written in modern English.<ref>{{Cite web |title=History Today |url=https://www.historytoday.com/first-female-anglo-saxonist}}</ref>
==Life== Elstob was born and brought up in the Quayside area of Newcastle upon Tyne, and, like Mary Astell of Newcastle, is nowadays regarded as one of the first English feminists.<ref>{{cite book|author=Lerner, Gerda|author-link=Gerda Lerner|title=The creation of feminist consciousness: From the middle ages to eighteen-seventy|volume=2|publisher=Oxford University Press on Demand|year=1993|page=37|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=7eYM2NWzQugC&pg=PA37|isbn=9780195090604}}</ref> She was the daughter of Ralph, a merchant, and his wife Jane Elstob (née Hall).<ref name=":0">{{Cite web |last=pixeltocode.uk |first=PixelToCode |title=Elizabeth Elstob |url=https://www.westminster-abbey.org/abbey-commemorations/commemorations/elizabeth-elstob |access-date=2022-05-25 |website=Westminster Abbey |language=en}}</ref> Elizabeth's father died when she was five, and her mother died three years later.<ref name=":1">{{Cite book |last=Stenton |first=Doris Mary Parsons, Lady |title=The English woman in history |date=1977 |publisher=Schocken Books |isbn=0-8052-3669-4 |location=New York |oclc=3016599}}</ref>{{rp|p=238}} She was the youngest of eight children.<ref name=":2">{{Cite web |title=The Correspondence of Elizabeth Elstob – EMLO |url=http://emlo-portal.bodleian.ox.ac.uk/collections/?catalogue=elizabeth-elstob |access-date=2022-05-25 |website=emlo-portal.bodleian.ox.ac.uk}}</ref> Before her mother died, she encouraged Elizabeth to become a scholar, for she was an admirer of learning especially for women.<ref name=":1" />{{rp|p=238}} By the age of eight, Elizabeth had already mastered Latin grammar.
Elizabeth became proficient in eight languages, and was a pioneer in Anglo-Saxon studies, an unprecedented achievement for a woman in the period.<ref name="ht">{{cite web |last1=Seale |first1=Yvonne |title=The First Female Anglo-Saxonist |url=http://www.historytoday.com/yvonne-seale/first-female-anglo-saxonist |publisher=History Today |access-date=5 February 2016 |date=4 February 2016}}</ref> Following the deaths of both of her parents, Elstob was an orphan, and was raised by her aunt and uncle Charles Elstob, a prebendary in Canterbury. He disdained female education, believing that "one tongue is enough for a woman", but her aunt enabled her to learn French.<ref name=":1" />{{rp|p=238}} Doris Mary Stenton attributes the majority of Elstob's education to her brother William Elstob (1673–1715), who was sent to Eton and Cambridge and entered the Church.<ref name=":1" />{{rp|p=238}} Like his sister, he was a scholar and edited Roger Ascham's ''Letters'' in 1703. Elizabeth lived with him at Oxford from 1696, and in London from 1702. As a teenager he introduced her to a small but enthusiastic circle of scholars who worked on Anglo-Saxon history and culture. He described Elizabeth as 'the delightful and tireless companion of my studies'.<ref name=":1" />{{rp|p=238}}thumb|A fleuron (ornamental typography) from Elstob's ''Rudiments of Grammar'' As part of her scholarly interest in early English, Elstob collaborated and corresponded with scholars like Humfrey Wanley and George Hickes. She was introduced to Hickes by her brother William.<ref name=":0" /> She worked with Wanley to design the typeface for her 1715 ''Rudiments of Grammar for the English-Saxon Tongue'', and was a skilled scribe and facsimilist in her own right.<ref>{{Cite web|last=Drieshan|first=Clark|date=August 2020|title=Elizabeth Elstob, Old English Scholar, and the Harleian Library|url=https://blogs.bl.uk/digitisedmanuscripts/2020/08/elizabeth-elstob-and-the-harleian-library.html|access-date=26 October 2020|website=British Library}}</ref> Her facsimile of the ''Textus Roffensis'' is housed at the British Library under the shelfmark [https://www.bl.uk/catalogues/illuminatedmanuscripts/record.asp?MSID=3580&CollID=8&NStart=1866 Harley MS 1866] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201027055924/https://www.bl.uk/catalogues/illuminatedmanuscripts/record.asp?MSID=3580&CollID=8&NStart=1866 |date=27 October 2020 }}. Elstob was the first editor of the ''Old-English Orosius,'' a translation often attributed to Alfred the Great, of Paulus Orosius's ''Historiae adversus paganos'' (''History against the Pagans'').<ref>{{Cite web |title=Elizabeth Elstob, Old English scholar, and the Harleian Library |url=https://blogs.bl.uk/digitisedmanuscripts/2020/08/elizabeth-elstob-and-the-harleian-library.html |access-date=2022-09-23 |website=blogs.bl.uk |language=en}}</ref> Orosius's History was written around 417 CE, probably in north Africa, at the request of Augustine of Hippo.
In London, Elstob translated Madeleine de Scudéry's ''Essay upon Glory'' in 1708, and an ''English-Saxon Homily on the Nativity of St Gregory'' in 1709 Both works are dedicated to Queen Anne, who is praised in feminist prefaces.
From 1702 Elstob was part of the circle of female intellectuals around Mary Astell, who helped to find subscribers for her ''Rudiments of Grammar for the English-Saxon Tongue'' (1715), the first such work written in English. The preface, "An Apology for the Study of Northern Antiquities", took issue with the formidable Jonathan Swift, and seems to have caused him to amend his views. thumb|Fleuron (ornamental typography) from Elstob's ''The Rudiments of Grammar for the English-Saxon Tongue'' After her brother's death in 1715, she was left without a home and plagued by debts he had incurred in financing their expensive publications. She tried to start a girls' school in Chelsea, but despite obtaining so many pupils that she had "scarcely time to eat", they only paid a groat (4d.) a week, and the school failed within six months. In 1718 she fled London and her creditors, leaving behind her books and a partial manuscript of Ælfric’s ''Catholic Homilies'' which she had translated. This was never published, and is now preserved at the British Library. She entrusted her papers to a friend who went to the West Indies, and the papers were lost.<ref name=":2" />{{rp|p=239}}
Elstob ended up in Evesham in rural Worcestershire. She lived there for many years dependent on her friends, running a small dame school under the assumed name of Frances Smith. Her whereabouts were apparently unknown to anyone in the scholarly community until 1735.
In the autumn of 1738 Elstob was introduced to the wealthy Margaret Bentinck, Duchess of Portland, and was made governess to her children, remaining in her service until her death, at Bulstrode Park, Buckinghamshire, on 30 May 1756. In her last years she lived "surrounded by the congenial elements of dirt and her books". She wrote in a letter that "this is not an Age to hope for any encouragement to Learning of any kind".<ref name="ht" />
She was buried in the churchyard of St Margaret's, Westminster<ref>John Chambers, ''Biographical Illustrations of Worcestershire'' (1820), p. 347</ref> on 3 June 1756.
==References== {{reflist}}
==Further reading== *{{cite journal |first=Margaret |last=Ashdown |title=Elizabeth Elstob: the learned Saxonist |journal=Modern Language Review |volume=20 |issue=2 |year=1925 |pages=125–46 | doi=10.2307/3714201|jstor=3714201 }} *{{cite journal |first=Norma |last=Clarke |title=Elizabeth Elstob (1674–1752): England's first professional woman historian? |journal=Gender & History |volume=17 |year=2005 |pages=210–20 |url=https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/action/doSearch?field1=AllField&text1=elstob&publication%5B%5D=14680424&Ppub=&AfterMonth=1&AfterYear=2005&BeforeMonth=12&BeforeYear=2005|doi=10.1111/j.0953-5233.2005.00378.x |s2cid=144579720 |url-access=subscription }} *{{cite book |first=Sarah H. |last=Collins |chapter=The Elstobs and the end of the Saxon revival |title=Anglo-Saxon Scholarship: the first three centuries |editor1-first=Carl T. |editor1-last=Berkhout |editor2-first=Milton McC. |editor2-last=Gatch |place=Boston, MA |publisher=G. K. Hall |year=1982 |isbn=081618321X |pages=107–18 }} *{{cite journal |first=Mechtild |last=Gretsch |title=Elizabeth Elstob: a scholar's fight for Anglo-Saxon studies |journal=Anglia |volume=117 |year=1999 |pages=163–300, 481–524 }} *{{Cite encyclopedia |first=Mechthild |last=Gretsch |title=Elstob, Elizabeth (1683–1756) |encyclopedia=Oxford Dictionary of National Biography |publisher=Oxford University Press |orig-year=2004 |year=2007 |edition=online |doi=10.1093/ref:odnb/8761 }} {{subscription required}} *{{cite book |first=Shaun F. D. |last=Hughes |chapter=Elizabeth Elstob (1683-1756) and the limits of women's agency in early eighteenth-century England |editor-first=Jane |editor-last=Chance |title=Women Medievalists and the Academy |place=Madison, WI |publisher=University of Wisconsin Press |year=2005 |isbn=0299207501 |pages=3–24 }} *{{cite journal |first=Flora |last=Masson |author-link=Flora Masson |title=When Anglo-Saxon did not pay |journal=University of Edinburgh Journal |volume=7 |year=1934 |pages=6–11 }} *{{cite journal |first=Michael |last=Murphy |title=The Elstobs, scholars of Old English and Anglican apologists |journal=Durham University Journal |volume=58 |year=1966 |pages=131–8 }} *{{cite journal |first=John |last=Oxberry |title=Elizabeth Elstob, Saxon scholar and author |journal=Proceedings of the Society of Antiquaries of Newcastle-upon-Tyne |series=4th |volume=6 |year=1934 |pages=159–64 }} *{{cite book |first=Anna |last=Smol |chapter=Pleasure, progress, and the profession: Elizabeth Elstob and contemporary Anglo-Saxon studies |editor1-last=Workman |editor1-first=Leslie J. |editor2-last=Verduin |editor2-first=Kathleen |editor3-last=Metzger |editor3-first=David D. |title=Medievalism and the Academy, I |place=Cambridge |publisher=D. S. Brewer |year=1999 |isbn=0859915328 |pages=80–97 }} *{{cite book |first=Kathryn |last=Sutherland |chapter=Editing for a new century: Elizabeth Elstob's Anglo-Saxon manifesto and Ælfric's St Gregory homily |title=The Editing of Old English: papers from the 1990 Manchester Conference |editor1-first=D. G. |editor1-last=Scragg |editor2-first=Paul E. |editor2-last=Szarmach |place=Woodbridge |publisher=D. S. Brewer |year=1994 |pages=213–37 }} *{{cite book |first=Kathryn |last=Sutherland |chapter=Elizabeth Elstob (1683-1756) |editor1-last=Damico |editor1-first=Helen |editor2-last=Zavadil |editor2-first=Joseph B. |title=Medieval Scholarship: biographical studies on the formation of a discipline |place=New York |publisher=Garland |year=1998 |isbn=0815328907 |volume=2 |pages=59–73 }}
==External links== {{Library resources box|by=yes|onlinebooksby=yes|viaf= 47117288}} * {{cite DNB|author=Stephen, Leslie|wstitle=Elstob, Elizabeth|volume=17|pages=334–335}} * {{Gutenberg author |id=6001| name=Elizabeth Elstob}} * {{Internet Archive author |sname=Elizabeth Elstob}} * {{UK National Archives ID}}
{{Authority control}}
{{DEFAULTSORT:Elstob, Elizabeth}} Category:1683 births Category:1756 deaths Category:18th-century linguists Category:18th-century English women writers Category:18th-century English historians Category:Anglo-Saxon studies scholars Category:English women historians Category:English feminists Category:Founders of English schools and colleges Category:French–English translators Category:English governesses Category:Linguists of English Category:Linguists from England Category:British women linguists Category:Writers from Newcastle upon Tyne Category:18th-century British translators Category:Burials at St Margaret's, Westminster