Phillimore, Catherine Mary

Title: Phillimore, Catherine Mary
Full Name: Phillimore, Catherine Mary (1847-1929)
Lifespan: 1847-1929
Place of origin: Henley-on-Thames
Country of origin: England, United Kingdom
Language: English; Italian
Occupation: Scholar; Historian; Public Lecturer; Lecturer; Member of the London Dante Society
Short biography: Catherine Phillimore was born Shiplake House near Henley-on-Thames, Oxfordshire.

She was the eldest daughter of Robert Phillimore, known as Sir Walter Phillimore, 2nd Baronet, from 1885 to 1918, a British lawyer and judge. A close friend of William Gladstone, he was the person who initially gave to his wife Catherine Glynn at Rome in 1839 the the Comino ‘pocket Dante' edition, which the Prime minister minutely annotated throughout his life.; Catherine Mary Phillimore was regular contributor to Macmillan’s Magazine, the Edinburgh Review, The Saint Paul’s Magazine, The Church Quarterly Review, and Dictionary of Music and Musicians. She was also one of the earliest paying subscribers of the Giornale Dantesco.

Before working on Dante, she published historical biographies of Fra Angelico for the “Great Artist” (1880) series and the Medici family (1887).
Her studies in Italian Literature: Classical and Modern (1887) spanning from Dante to Manzoni, had multiple editions and Italian translation (1900).; During the 1880s, she lived in Italy. In March 1886 (20/03/1886), she subscribed to the Gabinetto Vieusseux, with a one-month membership and the records shows that, at that time, she was residing at Palazzo Mozzi, guest to S.E.; Libro dei Soci, Gabinetto Vieusseux; Phillimore was a member London Dante Society and its first female lecturer. Her inaugural lecture in 1900 explored “Dante in Exile” with Oscar Browning, Cambridge historian and educationalist, as chair in 1900. The lecture, later included in the 1904 volume Dante Society Lectures, drew largely from her Dante at Ravenna (1898), «a brief study of the closing years of the life of Dante» showing «how much his mind was influenced by the place of his latest sojourn upon earth» . The product of painstaking fieldwork research «in the libraries of Ravenna and Paris, the Bodleian, and the British Museum», the book had quickly become a staple of anglophone critical bibliographies: cited by scholars, acquired by subscription and public libraries, and exceptionally issued in Italian by the Rimini-based publisher, Benzi (1901) . Notably, she gifted a copy of her "Dante in Ravenna" to every member of the London Dante Society.

On March 20th, 1901, Phillimore returned to the lecture-stage with a paper on “Cino da Pistoia” illustrating it by means of lantern views. In 1904, she presented on “Aleardo Aleardi” an Italian romantic poet and dantofilo who had taken part to the 1865 Dante Centenary, while four years later, in 1908, she spoke about “Il Volto Santo”, the crucifix from Lucca mentioned by Dante in Inferno XXI 48. In 1912, Phillimore she examined “The Iron crown” and concluded her lecturing career the following year with an analysis of the stylistic and poetic influence of the Commedia on Vincenzo Monti’s “La Basvilliana” perhaps inspired by Giorgio Trenta 1891 study on the same subject.; She did unmarried on 31st October, 1929. Her effects amounted to £ 2661 2s. 11d.
Relation: Anglophone women writers
Link to external sources: Letter from Catherine Mary Phillimore, to her aunt Viscountess Ossington; https://discovery.nationalarchives.gov.uk/details/r/517fd4ec-70da-4631-8b28-e23384842074