Leonard Robert Palmer (5 June 1906, Bristol – 26 August 1984, Pitney, Somerset) was author and Professor of Comparative Philology at the

University of Oxford , mottoeng = The Lord is my light , established = , endowment = £6.1 billion (including colleges) (2019) , budget = £2.145 billion (2019–20) , chancellor ...

from 1952 to 1971. He was also a

Fellow A fellow is a concept whose exact meaning depends on context. In learned or professional societies, it refers to a privileged member who is specially elected in recognition of their work and achievements. Within the context of higher education ...

Worcester College, Oxford Worcester College is one of the constituent colleges of the University of Oxford in England. The college was founded in 1714 by the benefaction of Sir Thomas Cookes, 2nd Baronet (1648–1701) of Norgrove, Worcestershire, whose coat of arms ...

. Palmer made some significant contributions to the study of

Classical language A classical language is any language with an independent literary tradition and a large and ancient body of written literature. Classical languages are typically dead languages, or show a high degree of diglossia, as the spoken varieties of the ...

s, and in the area of historical linguistics.

Career

Palmer was educated at

Cardiff High School ) , established = 1895 (Creation of earliest of predecessor schools) , closed = , type = Public (magnet) secondary , religious_affiliation = , president = , head_label = Headmaster , head = Stephen Jones , r ...

, the

University of South Wales The University of South Wales ( cy, Prifysgol De Cymru) is a public university in Wales, with campuses in Cardiff, Newport and Pontypridd. It was formed on 11 April 2013 from the merger of the University of Glamorgan and the University of Wa ...

Trinity College, Cambridge Trinity College is a constituent college of the University of Cambridge. Founded in 1546 by King Henry VIII, Trinity is one of the largest Cambridge colleges, with the largest financial endowment of any college at either Cambridge or Oxford. ...

, and the

University of Vienna The University of Vienna (german: Universität Wien) is a public research university located in Vienna, Austria. It was founded by Duke Rudolph IV in 1365 and is the oldest university in the German-speaking world. With its long and rich histo ...

. He started his academic career in 1931, teaching classics at

Manchester University , mottoeng = Knowledge, Wisdom, Humanity , established = 2004 – University of Manchester Predecessor institutions: 1956 – UMIST (as university college; university 1994) 1904 – Victoria University of Manchester 1880 – Victoria Unive ...

. He held the Chair of Classical Literature at

King's College, London King's College London (informally King's or KCL) is a public university, public research university located in London, England. King's was established by royal charter in 1829 under the patronage of George IV of the United Kingdom, King G ...

between 1945 and 1946, followed by the Chair of Greek there from 1946 to 1952. During World War II, Palmer worked at the

Government Code and Cypher School (GC&CS) Government Communications Headquarters, commonly known as GCHQ, is an intelligence and security organisation responsible for providing signals intelligence (SIGINT) and information assurance (IA) to the government and armed forces of the Unit ...

Bletchley Park Bletchley Park is an English country house and estate in Bletchley, Milton Keynes (Buckinghamshire) that became the principal centre of Allied code-breaking during the Second World War. The mansion was constructed during the years following 1 ...

, at the so-called Hut 4. Their work was the translation, interpretation and distribution of enemy messages. A strong focus of Palmer's work was the Greek linguistics, and in particular the language and dating of the Mycenaean

Linear B Linear B was a syllabic script used for writing in Mycenaean Greek, the earliest attested form of Greek. The script predates the Greek alphabet by several centuries. The oldest Mycenaean writing dates to about 1400 BC. It is descended from ...

tablets. He also researched the pre-Greek languages in the

Aegean Sea The Aegean Sea ; tr, Ege Denizi (Greek: Αιγαίο Πέλαγος: "Egéo Pélagos", Turkish: "Ege Denizi" or "Adalar Denizi") is an elongated embayment of the Mediterranean Sea between Europe and Asia. It is located between the Balkans ...

area, their origin and chronology. Palmer also wrote an influential historical and linguistic survey of the

Latin language Latin (, or , ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally a dialect spoken in the lower Tiber area (then known as Latium) around present-day Rome, but through the power of the ...

; he later followed this with a companion work on the Greek language, focusing on its development from Linear B and its evolution into multiple dialects throughout the Aegean region. Palmer played a role in the controversies over the dating of archaeological finds from

Minoan Crete The Minoan civilization was a Bronze Age Aegean civilization on the island of Crete and other Aegean Islands, whose earliest beginnings were from 3500BC, with the complex urban civilization beginning around 2000BC, and then declining from 1450B ...

, where he disagreed with the excavator,

Sir Arthur Evans Sir Arthur John Evans (8 July 1851 – 11 July 1941) was a British archaeologist and pioneer in the study of Aegean civilization in the Bronze Age. He is most famous for unearthing the palace of Knossos on the Greek island of Crete. Based on ...

, and favoured a later date. In his book ''Descriptive & Comparative Linguistics'' (1972), among other things, he took issue with the Chomskian linguistics.

Proto-Greek studies

Palmer was one of the linguists who were investigating the theories that some unknown language or languages were spoken in prehistoric Greece before the settlement of

Proto-Greek The Proto-Greek language (also known as Proto-Hellenic) is the Indo-European language which was the last common ancestor of all varieties of Greek, including Mycenaean Greek, the subsequent ancient Greek dialects (i.e., Attic, Ionic, Aeoli ...

speakers in the area. So this is the question of an ancient linguistic

Pre-Greek substrate The Pre-Greek substrate (or Pre-Greek substratum) consists of the unknown pre-Indo-European language(s) spoken in prehistoric Greece before the coming of the Proto-Greek language in the Greek peninsula during the Bronze Age. It is possible that ...

in Greece. According to Palmer, this may have been one of the ancient

Anatolian languages The Anatolian languages are an extinct branch of Indo-European languages that were spoken in Anatolia, part of present-day Turkey. The best known Anatolian language is Hittite, which is considered the earliest-attested Indo-European language. ...

, perhaps a

Luwian language Luwian (), sometimes known as Luvian or Luish, is an ancient language, or group of languages, within the Anatolian branch of the Indo-European language family. The ethnonym Luwian comes from ''Luwiya'' (also spelled ''Luwia'' or ''Luvia'') – ...

. He suggested that the language of

Linear A Linear A is a writing system that was used by the Minoans of Crete from 1800 to 1450 BC to write the hypothesized Minoan language or languages. Linear A was the primary script used in palace and religious writings of the Minoan civil ...

might be Luwian on the basis of -ss- and -nd- (corresponding to -ss- and -nth- in mainland Greece) placenames being widespread in Western Anatolia. esp. 42–64. Reveiewed in

Honours

Palmer was elected Secretary and then President of the British

Philological Society The Philological Society, or London Philological Society, is the oldest learned society in Great Britain dedicated to the study of language as well as a registered charity. The current Society was established in 1842 to "investigate and promote ...

. He was also a corresponding member of the

Deutsches Archäologisches Institut The German Archaeological Institute (german: Deutsches Archäologisches Institut, ''DAI'') is a research institute in the field of archaeology (and other related fields). The DAI is a "federal agency" under the Federal Foreign Office of Germany ...

. In 1981, he received an honorary doctorate from the

University of Innsbruck The University of Innsbruck (german: Leopold-Franzens-Universität Innsbruck; la, Universitas Leopoldino Franciscea) is a public research university in Innsbruck, the capital of the Austrian federal state of Tyrol, founded on October 15, 1669. I ...

References

OBITUARY: PROF LEONARD PALMER
''The Times'', 29 August 1984 *Morpurgo Davies, A. and Meid, W. (eds), ''Studies in Greek, Italic and Indo-European Linguistics offered to Leonard R. Palmer on the occasion of his seventieth Birthday''. Innsbruck 1976.

Publications

*The Greek language (The Great languages) by Leonard Robert Palmer, 355 Pages, Published 1980 by Humanities Press *Descriptive & Comparative Linguistics (Updated) A Critical Introduction (Studies in General Linguistics) by Leonard R. Palmer, Paperback, 430 Pages, Published 1979 by Faber & Faber *The Latin Language. by Leonard Robert Palmer. Paperback, 372 Pages, Published 1988 by University Of Oklahoma Press. *New Guide to the Palace of Knossos. by Leonard R. Palmer, L.R Palmer Hardcover, 144 Pages, Published 1969 by Faber And Faber *Leonard Robert Palmer, Interpretation of Mycenaean Greek Texts (Oxford University Press academic monograph reprints) *Leonard Robert Palmer, On the Knossos tablets: The find-places of the Knossos tablets. Book, 1963. 251 p. *Leonard Robert Palmer, Mycenaeans and Minoans; Aegean prehistory in the light of the Linear B tablets. 2d rev. ed. 1965. 368 p *Leonard Robert Palmer, A grammar of the post-Ptolemaic papyri (15 editions published between 1945 and 1948) *Leonard Robert Palmer, The language of Homer (1962) *Leonard Robert Palmer, Aegean chronology (1984) *

External links

WorldCat library catalog of academic publications by Robert Palmer
(over 300 results) {{DEFAULTSORT:Palmer, Leonard Robert Linguists from the United Kingdom British philologists Indo-Europeanists 1906 births 1984 deaths Diebold Professors of Comparative Philology Fellows of Worcester College, Oxford 20th-century linguists 20th-century philologists Bletchley Park people