Nora Griffith

{{Infobox person | image = Nora Christina Cobban Griffith.jpg | caption = Griffith in 1900 | birth_name = Nora Christina Cobban Macdonald | birth_date = {{Birth date|1870|12|07}} | birth_place = Newmachar, Scotland | death_date = {{Death date and age|1937|10|21|1870|12|07}} | death_place = Oxford | resting_place = Holywell Cemetery, Oxford | monuments = Griffith Institute, University of Oxford | occupation = Egyptologist<br>Philanthropist | spouse = Francis Llewellyn Griffith }}

'''Nora Griffith''' (7 December 1870 – 21 October 1937) was a Scottish Egyptologist, archaeologist, illustrator and conservator. On the death of her husband, the eminent Egyptologist Francis Llewellyn Griffith, she founded and endowed the Griffith Institute at Oxford University with their joint fortunes and collections.<ref>Thompson, Jason (2015) [https://books.google.com/books?id=tLs-DAAAQBAJ&pg=PA174 ''Wonderful Things (Volume 2): A History of Egyptology: 2: The Golden Age: 1881-1914''], The American University in Cairo Press, p. 174, {{ISBN|9789774166921}}</ref>

== Early life == Born as Nora Christina Cobban Macdonald in Newmachar near Aberdeen in 1870, she was the daughter of Surgeon-Major James Macdonald of Aberdeen and Margaret Helen Leslie ''née'' Collie<ref>Nora Christina Cobban Macdonald in the Scotland, Select Births and Baptisms, 1564-1950</ref> and the sister of Sir James Ronald Leslie Macdonald, a Scottish engineer, explorer, cartographer and British Army engineer.<ref name="Aberdeen" /><ref name="Obit" />

Griffith first visited Egypt in 1906; following which she acted as a conservator in the Archaeology Museum at King's College in Aberdeen.<ref name="Aberdeen">{{Cite web |title=Famous Faces - Aberdeenshire Council |url=https://www.aberdeenshire.gov.uk/leisure-sport-and-culture/archaeology/projects/famous-faces/ |access-date=2024-09-28 |website=www.aberdeenshire.gov.uk |language=en |archive-date=22 July 2019 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190722205534/https://www.aberdeenshire.gov.uk/leisure-sport-and-culture/archaeology/projects/famous-faces/ |url-status=live }}</ref><ref name="Obit" /> Becoming interested in Egyptology she studied it under the eminent British Egyptologist Francis Llewellyn Griffith at Oxford University. In 1909 she became Griffith's second wife<ref name="Academy">Bosworth, Edward C. ed. (2001) [https://books.google.com/books?id=bkfTKkrBW1wC&pg=PA195 ''A Century of British Orientalists, 1902-2001''], Oxford University Press, p. 194, {{ISBN|9780197262436}}</ref> and assisted him in his studies and excavations in Egypt and Nubia in 1910–13, 1923, 1929 and 1930.<ref name="Obit" /> A skilled photographer and illustrator, she was highly intelligent and had a gift for ancient and modern languages.<ref name="Aberdeen" /> In 1923 she published her article 'Akhenaten and the Hittites' in ''The Journal of Egyptian Archaeology''.<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Griffith |first=Nora |date=1923 |title=Akhenaten and the Hittites |url=http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/030751332300900105 |journal=The Journal of Egyptian Archaeology |language=en |volume=9 |issue=1 |pages=78–79 |doi=10.1177/030751332300900105 |issn=0307-5133 |url-access=subscription |archive-date=19 September 2023 |access-date=9 July 2025 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230919145205/https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/030751332300900105 |url-status=live }}</ref>

After her husband's death in 1934 she prepared his unfinished work for publication including his two volume ''Demotic Graffiti in the Dodecaschoenus'', complete with 70 illustrations in addition to photographs taken by herself. She organised and funded further excavations at Firka and Kawa in the Sudan and financially supported the Egypt Exploration Society in its work. She added to and expanded the already large Egyptological library collected by her husband and herself and which was later donated to the University of Oxford and added her own personal fortune to that of her late husband for the building and endowment of the Griffith Institute at Oxford which is dedicated to the advancement of Egyptology and Ancient Near Eastern Studies.<ref name=Aberdeen/><ref name=Obit/><ref>[http://egyptartefacts.griffith.ox.ac.uk/people/nora-griffith Nora Griffith - Artefacts of Excavation: British Excavations in Egypt 1880-1980], The Griffith Institute, University of Oxford, Retrieved 4 February 2019.</ref><ref>{{Cite web |url=http://www.egyptologyscotland.co.uk/scots |title=Nora Griffiths- Scots & Egyptology - Egyptology Scotland |access-date=22 July 2019 |archive-date=22 July 2019 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190722200216/http://www.egyptologyscotland.co.uk/scots |url-status=live }}</ref><ref name=ODNB>R. S. Simpson, [https://www.oxforddnb.com/view/10.1093/ref:odnb/9780198614128.001.0001/odnb-9780198614128-e-33579 Francis Llewellyn Griffith (1862-1934)] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210310022112/https://www.oxforddnb.com/view/10.1093/ref:odnb/9780198614128.001.0001/odnb-9780198614128-e-33579 |date=10 March 2021 }} - Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (ODNB) - Oxford University Press - Published in print: 23 September 2004 Published online: 23 September 2004</ref> thumb|A commemorative plaque to Nora Griffith, displayed at King's College Nora Griffith died at the Acland Home in Oxford of peritonitis after an appendectomy in 1937 at the age of 66.<ref name=Obit>{{Cite web |url=http://www.gizapyramids.org/static/pdf%20library/notes_jea_23_1937.pdf |title=Obituary for Nora Griffith - ''The Journal for Egyptian Archaeology'', Volume XXIII - The Egypt Exploration Society (1937) |access-date=22 July 2019 |archive-date=19 September 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230919093735/http://www.gizapyramids.org/static/pdf%20library/notes_jea_23_1937.pdf |url-status=dead }}</ref><ref name=ODNB/> She was buried with her husband in Holywell Cemetery in Oxford.<ref>[https://www.thisisoxfordshire.co.uk/news/11088321.the-strange-mystery-of-the-egyptologists-missing-tomb/ 'The strange mystery of the Egyptologist’s missing tomb' - ''This is Oxfordshire'' 20 March 2014]</ref> While she published several articles in scholarly journals, she is frequently overlooked in the records of Egyptology.<ref name="Aberdeen" />

==Legacy== In addition to her endowment of the Griffith Institute at Oxford, in 2017 Aberdeen City Council approved the erection of a blue plaque to honour her as a "noted Egyptologist".<ref name="aberdeen">{{cite web |title=Council approves commemorative plaques for pioneers |url=https://news.aberdeencity.gov.uk/council-approves-commemorative-plaques-for-pioneers/ |publisher=Aberdeen City Council |accessdate=4 February 2019 |date=26 April 2017 |archive-date=7 February 2019 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190207015009/https://news.aberdeencity.gov.uk/council-approves-commemorative-plaques-for-pioneers/ |url-status=live }}</ref> This was unveiled in November 2018 and is located at Kings College Quad in Aberdeen<ref>{{Cite web |url=http://womenshistoryscotland.org/2018/11/24/out-gallivanting-nora-griffith-plaque-unveiling-8-november/ |title=Nora Griffith plaque unveiling - Women's History Scotland - 24 November 2018 |access-date=22 July 2019 |archive-date=22 July 2019 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190722193543/http://womenshistoryscotland.org/2018/11/24/out-gallivanting-nora-griffith-plaque-unveiling-8-november/ |url-status=live }}</ref>

==References== {{reflist|2}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Griffith, Nora}} Category:1870 births Category:1937 deaths Category:People from Garioch Category:Scottish Egyptologists Category:Scottish women archaeologists Category:British archaeologists Category:British women historians Category:Conservator-restorers Category:Deaths from peritonitis Category:Burials at Holywell Cemetery Category:Scottish archaeologists Category:Women archaeologists