Cheltenham
Cheltenham () is a historic spa town and borough adjacent to the Cotswolds in Gloucestershire, England. Cheltenham became known as a health and holiday spa town resort following the discovery of mineral springs in 1716, and claims to be the mo ...
, 25 July 1802 –
Bergamo
Bergamo ( , ; ) is a city in the Alps, alpine Lombardy region of northern Italy, approximately northeast of Milan, and about from the alpine lakes Lake Como, Como and Lake Iseo, Iseo and 70 km (43 mi) from Lake Garda, Garda and Lake ...
, 4 October 1888) was an English author and literary translator from Italian, Spanish and German.
Biography
After studying classic and modern languages, and already a widow at 30, on 7 March 1832 in
Chelwood
Chelwood is a small village and civil parish in Somerset, England, and is in the Chew Valley in the Bath and North East Somerset council area, about from Bristol and Bath. The parish, which includes the hamlets of West Chelwood and Breach, h ...
Yorkshire
Yorkshire ( ) is an area of Northern England which was History of Yorkshire, historically a county. Despite no longer being used for administration, Yorkshire retains a strong regional identity. The county was named after its county town, the ...
, 1782 –
Paris
Paris () is the Capital city, capital and List of communes in France with over 20,000 inhabitants, largest city of France. With an estimated population of 2,048,472 residents in January 2025 in an area of more than , Paris is the List of ci ...
, 1859), with whom she had a son who later worked as deputy commissioner of customs in
British India
The provinces of India, earlier presidencies of British India and still earlier, presidency towns, were the administrative divisions of British governance in South Asia. Collectively, they have been called British India. In one form or another ...
until he suddenly died there in 1870.Troy J. Bassett Author Information: Eliza Vere Foster ''At the Circulating Library ''
Eliza Foster worked as translator for publisher
Bohn Bohn is a German surname. Notable people with the surname include:
*Adam Bohn, video game developer and founder of Artix Entertainment
*Carsten Bohn (born 1948), German musician
* Frank P. Bohn (1866–1944), U.S. Representative from Michigan
* Ger ...
, most notably by translating and adding careful and abundant annotations to the first English-language translation (as "Mrs. Jonathan Foster") of the 5 volumes of
Vasari
Giorgio Vasari (30 July 1511 – 27 June 1574) was an Italian Renaissance painter, architect, art historian, and biographer who is best known for his work '' Lives of the Most Excellent Painters, Sculptors, and Architects'', considered the ide ...
's ''
Lives of the Most Excellent Painters, Sculptors, and Architects
''The Lives of the Most Excellent Painters, Sculptors, and Architects'' () is a series of artist biographies written by 16th-century Italian painter and architect Giorgio Vasari, which is considered "perhaps the most famous, and even today the ...
'' in 1850–1851. According to professor
Patricia Rubin
Patricia Lee Rubin is an American art historian and a scholar of Italian Renaissance art.
Early life and education
Rubin received her BA from Yale University in 1975, where she was elected to Phi Beta Kappa. She received her MA from the Courtauld ...
of
New York University
New York University (NYU) is a private university, private research university in New York City, New York, United States. Chartered in 1831 by the New York State Legislature, NYU was founded in 1832 by Albert Gallatin as a Nondenominational ...
, "her translation of Vasari brought the ''Lives'' to a wide English-language readership for the first time. Its very real value in doing so is proven by the fact that it remained in print and in demand through the nineteenth century."
Patricia Rubin
Patricia Lee Rubin is an American art historian and a scholar of Italian Renaissance art.
Early life and education
Rubin received her BA from Yale University in 1975, where she was elected to Phi Beta Kappa. She received her MA from the Courtauld ...
, “Eliza Foster (dates unknown)”, ''Interdisciplinary Studies in the Long Nineteenth Century'' 2019 (28). doi: https://doi.org/10.16995/ntn.864
She also translated from German (as "E. Foster")
Leopold von Ranke
Leopold von Ranke (21 December 1795 – 23 May 1886) was a German historian and a founder of modern source-based history. He was able to implement the seminar teaching method in his classroom and focused on archival research and the analysis of ...
’s ''History of the Popes'' for H. G. Bohn’s Standard Library (3 vols; 1847–48), in the preface of which she noted how the ‘noble office of the historian’ required ‘unwearied patience in research nda pure conscientiousness and profound respect for the sacredness of Truth’.
As author, Eliza Foster published two travelogues on
Bohemia
Bohemia ( ; ; ) is the westernmost and largest historical region of the Czech Republic. In a narrow, geographic sense, it roughly encompasses the territories of present-day Czechia that fall within the Elbe River's drainage basin, but historic ...
and
Saxony
Saxony, officially the Free State of Saxony, is a landlocked state of Germany, bordering the states of Brandenburg, Saxony-Anhalt, Thuringia, and Bavaria, as well as the countries of Poland and the Czech Republic. Its capital is Dresden, and ...
(1857) and on
Silesia
Silesia (see names #Etymology, below) is a historical region of Central Europe that lies mostly within Poland, with small parts in the Czech Silesia, Czech Republic and Germany. Its area is approximately , and the population is estimated at 8, ...
and
Austria
Austria, formally the Republic of Austria, is a landlocked country in Central Europe, lying in the Eastern Alps. It is a federation of nine Federal states of Austria, states, of which the capital Vienna is the List of largest cities in Aust ...
(1859) with the pseudonym "An Old Traveller", as well as the novel ''The Boatman of the Bosphorus'' (1854) under the name "The Osmanli Abderahman Effendi." Together with
Anna Maria Hall
Anna Maria Hall (6 January 1800 – 30 January 1881) was an Irish novelist who often published as "Mrs. S. C. Hall". She married Samuel Carter Hall, a writer on art, who described her in ''Retrospect of a Long Life, from 1815 to 1883''. She was ...
, Eliza Foster also published a pedagogical volume of ''Stories and Studies from the Chronicles and History of England'' (1847).
With the pseudonym of "An Old Traveller", Eliza Foster also published two articles in ''
The Art Journal
''The Art Journal'' was the most important British 19th-century magazine on art. It was founded in 1839 by Hodgson & Graves, print publishers, 6 Pall Mall, with the title ''Art Union Monthly Journal'' (or ''The Art Union''), the first issue of 7 ...
'' in 1856 and 1857: ‘Suggestions of Subject to the Student in Art by an Old Traveller’ and ‘Talk of Pictures and the Painters by an Old Traveller’. The journal editor,
Samuel Carter Hall
Samuel Carter Hall (9 May 1800 – 11 March 1889) was an Irish-born Victorian journalist who is best known for his editorship of '' The Art Journal'' and for his much-satirised personality.
Early years
Hall was born at the Geneva Barracks in Wa ...
(husband of
Anna Maria Hall
Anna Maria Hall (6 January 1800 – 30 January 1881) was an Irish novelist who often published as "Mrs. S. C. Hall". She married Samuel Carter Hall, a writer on art, who described her in ''Retrospect of a Long Life, from 1815 to 1883''. She was ...
), introduces her as an "accomplished lady" possessing a "very rare" combination of "extensive reading, acquaintance with many languages, the advantage of travelling in several countries, and above all an intimate acquaintance with Art, in the past and in the present". According to
Bergamo
Bergamo ( , ; ) is a city in the Alps, alpine Lombardy region of northern Italy, approximately northeast of Milan, and about from the alpine lakes Lake Como, Como and Lake Iseo, Iseo and 70 km (43 mi) from Lake Garda, Garda and Lake ...
Alta.
Due to her economic conditions and late-age infirmity, she several times applied and was granted support by the Royal Literary Fund between 1874 and 1883. She is buried in the evangelical section of the
Bergamo cemetery
Bergamo ( , ; ) is a city in the Alps, alpine Lombardy region of northern Italy, approximately northeast of Milan, and about from the alpine lakes Lake Como, Como and Lake Iseo, Iseo and 70 km (43 mi) from Lake Garda, Garda and Lake ...
.
Works
* (with
Anna Maria Hall
Anna Maria Hall (6 January 1800 – 30 January 1881) was an Irish novelist who often published as "Mrs. S. C. Hall". She married Samuel Carter Hall, a writer on art, who described her in ''Retrospect of a Long Life, from 1815 to 1883''. She was ...
) ''Stories and Studies from the Chronicles and History of England'' (1847 * (as "The Osmanli Abderahman Effendi") ''The Boatman of the Bosphorus: A Tale of Turkey'' (3 vols; London: T. C. Newby, 1854 * (as "An Old Traveller") ‘Suggestions of Subject to the Student in Art by an Old Traveller’, in ''Art Journal'' (1856 * (as "An Old Traveller") ‘Talk of Pictures and the Painters by an Old Traveller’, in ''Art Journal'' (1857 * (as "An Old Traveller") ''Travels in Bohemia, with a Walk through the Highlands of Saxony'' (2 vols; London: T. C. Newby, 1857 * (as "the Author of Travels in Bohemia") ''An Autumn in Silesia, Austria Proper, and the Ober Enns'' (London: T. C. Newby, 1859)bol.com /ref
; Translations
* (as "E. Foster")
Leopold von Ranke
Leopold von Ranke (21 December 1795 – 23 May 1886) was a German historian and a founder of modern source-based history. He was able to implement the seminar teaching method in his classroom and focused on archival research and the analysis of ...
’s ''History of the Popes'' for H. G. Bohn’s Standard Library (3 vols; 1847–48)
* (as "Mrs. Jonathan Foster")
Vasari
Giorgio Vasari (30 July 1511 – 27 June 1574) was an Italian Renaissance painter, architect, art historian, and biographer who is best known for his work '' Lives of the Most Excellent Painters, Sculptors, and Architects'', considered the ide ...
's ''
Lives of the Most Excellent Painters, Sculptors, and Architects
''The Lives of the Most Excellent Painters, Sculptors, and Architects'' () is a series of artist biographies written by 16th-century Italian painter and architect Giorgio Vasari, which is considered "perhaps the most famous, and even today the ...
'' (5 vols; 1850–51)
* (as "Mrs. Jonathan Foster")
José Antonio Condé
José is a predominantly Spanish and Portuguese form of the given name Joseph. While spelled alike, this name is pronounced very differently in each of the two languages: Spanish ; Portuguese (or ).
In French, the name ''José'', pronounced , ...
's ''History of the Dominion of the Arabs in Spain'' (1855)