Rebecca Jane Probert, (born 1973) is a British

legal historian Legal history or the history of law is the study of how law has evolved and why it has changed. Legal history is closely connected to the development of civilizations and operates in the wider context of social history. Certain jurists and histo ...

and academic. Born in

Rugby, Warwickshire Rugby is a market town in eastern Warwickshire, England, close to the River Avon, Warwickshire, River Avon. At the 2021 United Kingdom census, 2021 census, its population was 78,117, making it the List of Warwickshire towns by population, secon ...

, she lives in

Exeter Exeter ( ) is a City status in the United Kingdom, cathedral city and the county town of Devon in South West England. It is situated on the River Exe, approximately northeast of Plymouth and southwest of Bristol. In Roman Britain, Exeter w ...

with her husband, the travel writer Liam D'Arcy-Brown. She studied for an undergraduate degree in

Jurisprudence Jurisprudence, also known as theory of law or philosophy of law, is the examination in a general perspective of what law is and what it ought to be. It investigates issues such as the definition of law; legal validity; legal norms and values ...

Oxford University The University of Oxford is a collegiate research university in Oxford, England. There is evidence of teaching as early as 1096, making it the oldest university in the English-speaking world and the second-oldest continuously operating u ...

and for an

LLM A large language model (LLM) is a language model trained with Self-supervised learning, self-supervised machine learning on a vast amount of text, designed for natural language processing tasks, especially Natural language generation, language g ...

University College, London University College London (Trade name, branded as UCL) is a Public university, public research university in London, England. It is a Member institutions of the University of London, member institution of the Federal university, federal Uni ...

. She currently holds a

chair A chair is a type of seat, typically designed for one person and consisting of one or more legs, a flat or slightly angled seat and a back-rest. It may be made of wood, metal, or synthetic materials, and may be padded or upholstered in vario ...

in Law at

Exeter University The University of Exeter is a research university in the West Country of England, with its main campus in Exeter, Devon. Its predecessor institutions, St Luke's College, Exeter School of Science, Exeter School of Art, and the Camborne School o ...

. Specialising as she does in the history of

marriage Marriage, also called matrimony or wedlock, is a culturally and often legally recognised union between people called spouses. It establishes rights and obligations between them, as well as between them and their children (if any), and b ...

England England is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. It is located on the island of Great Britain, of which it covers about 62%, and List of islands of England, more than 100 smaller adjacent islands. It ...

and

Wales Wales ( ) is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. It is bordered by the Irish Sea to the north and west, England to the England–Wales border, east, the Bristol Channel to the south, and the Celtic ...

, her monograph ''Marriage Law & Practice in the Long Eighteenth Century: A Reassessment'' is widely accepted among legal historians as having overturned previous understandings of the history of

common law marriage Common-law marriage, also known as non-ceremonial marriage, marriage, informal marriage, de facto marriage, more uxorio or marriage by habit and repute, is a marriage that results from the parties' agreement to consider themselves married, follo ...

. She is also the author of a number of leading

text book A textbook is a book containing a comprehensive compilation of content in a branch of study with the intention of explaining it. Textbooks are produced to meet the needs of educators, usually at educational institutions, but also of learners (w ...

s such as ''Cretney & Probert's Family Law'' and ''Principles of Family Law''. Probert has appeared widely on television and radio, notably including interviews for

Channel 4 Channel 4 is a British free-to-air public broadcast television channel owned and operated by Channel Four Television Corporation. It is state-owned enterprise, publicly owned but, unlike the BBC, it receives no public funding and is funded en ...

news during the controversy surrounding the

wedding of Prince Charles and Camilla Parker Bowles The wedding of Prince Charles and Camilla Parker Bowles (later King Charles III and Queen Camilla) took place in a civil ceremony at Windsor Guildhall, on 9 April 2005. The ceremony, conducted in the presence of the couple's families, was fol ...

and on

BBC1 BBC One is a British free-to-air public broadcast television channel owned and operated by the BBC. It is the corporation's oldest and Flagship (broadcasting), flagship channel, and is known for broadcasting mainstream programming, which includ ...

's '' Who Do You Think You Are?'', in which she threw light on the bigamous marriage of the actress

Kim Cattrall Kim Victoria Cattrall (; born 21 August 1956) is a British, Canadian, and American actress. She is known for her portrayal of Samantha Jones on HBO's ''Sex and the City'' (1998–2004), for which she received five Primetime Emmy Award nominati ...

's grandfather. In the run-up to the

wedding of Prince William and Catherine Middleton The wedding of Prince William and Catherine Middleton took place on Friday, 29 April 2011 at Westminster Abbey in London, England. William was second in the line of succession to the British throne at the time, later becoming heir apparent. T ...

in 2011, Probert published ''The Rights & Wrongs of Royal Marriage: how the law has led to heartbreak, farce and confusion, and why it must be changed'', in which she argued the case for rationalising and simplifying the laws which govern royal marriages in

Great Britain Great Britain is an island in the North Atlantic Ocean off the north-west coast of continental Europe, consisting of the countries England, Scotland, and Wales. With an area of , it is the largest of the British Isles, the List of European ...

. In 2022, she was elected a

Fellow of the British Academy Fellowship of the British Academy (post-nominal letters FBA) is an award granted by the British Academy to leading academics for their distinction in the humanities and social sciences. The categories are: # Fellows – scholars resident in t ...

(FBA), the United Kingdom's national academy for the humanities and social sciences, and in 2024 she was elected a

Fellow of the Royal Historical Society A fellow is a title and form of address for distinguished, learned, or skilled individuals in academia, medicine, research, and industry. The exact meaning of the term differs in each field. In learned or professional societies, the term refers ...

References

External links

Professor Probert's Exeter University webpage
{{DEFAULTSORT:Probert, Rebecca 1973 births Living people People from Rugby, Warwickshire Alumni of St Anne's College, Oxford Alumni of University College London Academics of the University of Warwick English historians British legal historians Fellows of the British Academy Alumni of the UCL Faculty of Laws