David Knowles (scholar)

David Knowles, OSB, FRHistS (1896–1974) was an English Benedictine monk of Downside Abbey and historian. He became Regius Professor of Modern History at the University of Cambridge in 1954, retiring in 1963. His works on monasticism in England, through to the dissolution of the monasteries, are taken as authoritative.

Life

Born as Michael Clive Knowles, he later adopted the religious name of David, by which he was always known thereafter. He was educated at Downside School, Christ's College, Cambridge, and the Collegio Sant'Anselmo, Rome. At Downside, 1923–33, he was ordained. His research into the early monastic history of England was assisted by the library built up at Downside by Raymund Webster.^[1]

He wanted to change the pattern of life at Downside. He was transferred to Ealing Abbey, another teaching establishment. This he left, becoming ex-claustrated.^[2] He then became a Fellow of Peterhouse, Cambridge. He served as president of the Royal Historical Society from 1957-61.^[3]

An account of Knowles's personal life and conflicts, and an assessment of his four-volume "magnum opus" -"The Monastic Order in England"/"The Religious Orders in England" - can be found in Chapter 8 of Norman F. Cantor's book Inventing the Middle Ages - The Lives, Works, and Ideas of the Great Medievalists of the Twentieth Century (1991).

Works

• The American Civil War: A Brief Sketch (1926)
• The Monastic Order in England: a History of Its Development from the Times of St Dunstan to the Fourth Lateran Council, 943-1216 (1940, 2nd ed. 1963)
• The Religious Houses of Medieval England (1940)
• The Prospects of Medieval Studies (1947)
• The Religious Orders in England (three volumes) (1948-59)
• Archbishop Thomas Becket: a character study (1949)
• Monastic Constitutions of Lanfranc (1951) translator
• Episcopal Colleagues of Archbishop Thomas Becket (1951) Ford Lectures 1949
• Monastic Sites From The Air (1952) with J. S. K. St. Joseph
• Medieval Religious Houses: England and Wales, with R. Neville Hadcock (1953, 2nd ed. 1971)
• The Historian and Character (1954) Inaugural Lecture
• Charterhouse: The Medieval Foundation in the Light of Recent Discoveries (1954) with W. F. Grimes
• Cardinal Gasquet as an Historian (1957)
• The English Mystical Tradition (1961)
• The Evolution of Medieval Thought. (1962)
• Saints and Scholars: Twenty-Five Medieval Portraits (1962)
• The Benedictines: A Digest for Moderns (1962)
• Great Historical Enterprises; Problems in Monastic History (1963)
• The Historian and Character and Other Essays (1963) with others, presentation volume
• Lord Macaulay, 1800 – 1859 (1963)
• From Pachomius to Ignatius: A Study in the Constitutional History of the Religious Orders (1966)
• The Nature of Mysticism (1966)
• What is Mysticism? (1967)
• Authority (1969)
• Christian Monasticism (1969)
• The Christian Centuries: The Middle Ages (volume 2) (1969) with Dimitri Obolensky
• The Heads of Religious Houses: England and Wales, 940-1216 (1972) with C. N. L. Brooke, Vera C. M. London
• Bare Ruined Choirs: The Dissolution of the English Monasteries (1976)
• Thomas Becket (1977)

Notes

1. ^ "Dom Daniel Rees". The Independent (London). 24 January 2007. http://news.independent.co.uk/people/obituaries/article2180749.ece. 
2. ^ Fools For God
3. ^ "List of Presidents". Royal Historical Society. http://www.royalhistoricalsociety.org/rhspresidents.doc. Retrieved 20 December 2010. 

Sources

• David Knowles remembered by Christopher N. L. Brooke, Roger Lovatt and David Luscombe (ISBN#??)
• David Knowles: A Memoir (1979; edited by Adrian Morey) (ISBN#??)
• Obituary, The American Historical Review, Vol. 80, No. 4 (October 1975), pgs. 1086-1090