J. B. Bury

John Bagnell Bury

At Cambridge, Bury became mentor to Steven Runciman (the medievalist), who later commented that he had been Bury's "first, and only, student." At first the reclusive Bury tried to brush him off; then, when Runciman mentioned that he could read Russian, Bury gave him a stack of Bulgarian articles to edit, and so their relationship began. Bury was the author of the first truly authoritative biography of Saint Patrick (1905).

Bury remained at Cambridge until his death at the age of 65 in Rome, where he took his annual retreat since 1918.^[6] He is buried in the Protestant Cemetery in Rome.

He received the honorary degree Doctor of Laws (LL.D.) from the University of Glasgow in June 1901,^[7] the honorary degree of Doctor of Laws (LL.D.) from the University of Aberdeen in 1905, and the honorary degree Doctor of Letters (D.Litt.) from the University of Oxford in October 1902, in connection with the tercentenary of the Bodleian Library.^[8]

His brother, Robert Gregg Bury, was an Irish clergyman, classicist, philologist, and a translator of the works of Plato and Sextus Empiricus into English.

Writings

Bury's writings, on subjects ranging from

Bury's career shows his evolving thought process and his consideration of the discipline of history as a "science".[11] From his inaugural lecture as Regius Professor of Modern History at Cambridge delivered on 26 January 1903^[12][13] comes his public proclamation of history as a "science" and not as a branch of "literature". He stated:

I may remind you that history is not a branch of literature. The facts of history, like the facts of geology or astronomy, can supply material for literary art; for manifest reasons they lend themselves to artistic representation far more readily than those of the natural sciences; but to clothe the story of human society in a literary dress is no more the part of a historian as a historian, than it is the part of an astronomer as an astronomer to present in an artistic shape the story of the stars.^[14][15]

Bury's lecture continues by defending the claim that history is not literature, which in turns questions the need for a historian's narrative in the discussion of historical facts and essentially evokes the question: is a narrative necessary? But Bury describes his "science" by comparing it to Leopold von Ranke's idea of science and the German phrase that brought Ranke's ideas fame when he exclaimed "tell history as it happened" or "Ich will nur sagen wie es eigentlich gewesen ist." [I only want to say how it actually happened.] Bury's final thoughts during his lecture reiterate his previous statement with a cementing sentence that argues "...she [history] is herself simply a science, no less and no more".^[16]

On the

Some people speak as if we were not justified in rejecting a theological doctrine unless we can prove it false. But the burden of proof does not lie upon the rejecter. I remember a conversation in which, when some disrespectful remark was made about hell, a loyal friend of that establishment said triumphantly, "But, absurd as it may seem, you cannot disprove it." If you were told that in a certain planet revolving around Sirius there is a race of donkeys who speak the English language and spend their time in discussing eugenics, you could not disprove the statement, but would it, on that account, have any claim to be believed? Some minds would be prepared to accept it, if it were reiterated often enough, through the potent force of suggestion.^[17]

Bibliography

The Odes of Pindar

• The Nemean Odes of Pindar (1890)^[18]
• The Isthmian Odes of Pindar (1892)^[19]

Rome

• A History of the Later Roman Empire from Arcadius to Irene (2 vols.) (1889)^[20][21]
• A History of the Roman Empire From its Foundation to the Death of Marcus Aurelius (1893)^[22][23]
• The Imperial Administrative System in the Ninth Century, with a revised text of the Kletorologion of Philotheos (1911)
• A History of the Eastern Roman Empire from the Fall of Irene to the Accession of Basil I (A. D. 802–867) (1912)^[24]
• A History of the Later Roman Empire from the Death of Theodosius I to the Death of Justinian (1923)^[25]
• The Invasion of Europe by the Barbarians (1928)^[26][27]
• The Life of St. Patrick and His Place in History (1905)^[28]
• History of the Papacy in the 19th Century (1864–1878) (1930)

Greece

• A History of Greece to the Death of Alexander the Great (1900)^[29]
• The Ancient Greek Historians (Harvard Lectures) (1909)^[30]
• The Hellenistic Age: Aspects of Hellenistic Civilization (1923), with E. A. Barber, Edwyn Bevan, and W. W. Tarn^[31]

Philosophical

• A History of Freedom of Thought (1913)^[32]
• The Idea of Progress: An Inquiry into Its Origin and Growth (1920)^[33]

As editor

• Edward Gibbon, The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire (7 Editions: November 1898–1925) – 2ND American edition at Online Library of Liberty in 12 volumes
  • J.B. Bury, ed., 2 volumes, 4TH Edition (New York: The Macmillan Company, 1914) Volume 1 Volume 2
• Edward Augustus Freeman, Freeman's Historical Geography of Europe (third edition, 1903)
• Edward Augustus Freeman, The Atlas To Freeman's Historical Geography (third edition, 1903)

See also

• Historiography of the United Kingdom

Notes

References

• Andrews, Helen (2009), "Bury, John Bagnell", Dictionary of Irish Biography,
  doi:10.3318/dib.001220.v1
• doi:10.1093/ehr/xliii.clxix.66
• doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/32202. (Subscription or UK public library membership
  required.)

External links

Wikiquote has quotations related to J. B. Bury.

Wikisource has original works by or about:
J. B. Bury

Wikimedia Commons has media related to John Bagnell Bury.

• Works by J. B. Bury at Project Gutenberg
• Works by or about J. B. Bury at Internet Archive
• Works by J. B. Bury at LibriVox (public domain audiobooks)