Theodore Cressy Skeat (15 February 1907 — 25 June 2003) was a librarian at the

British Museum The British Museum is a public museum dedicated to human history, art and culture located in the Bloomsbury area of London. Its permanent collection of eight million works is among the largest and most comprehensive in existence. It docume ...

, where he worked as Assistant Keeper (from 1931), Deputy Keeper (from 1948), and Keeper of Manuscripts and Egerton Librarian (from 1961 to 1972). Skeat was educated at Whitgift School, Croydon and

Christ's College, Cambridge Christ's College is a constituent college of the University of Cambridge. The college includes the Master, the Fellows of the College, and about 450 undergraduate and 170 graduate students. The college was founded by William Byngham in 1437 as ...

, where he graduated with a Second-class BA in the Classical Tripos in 1929. Following a further short spell as a student at the British School of Archaeology in Athens, he was recruited by the British Museum in 1931. His work coincided with two important acquisitions by the Trustees of the aforementioned institution, namely the ''

Codex Sinaiticus The Codex Sinaiticus ( Shelfmark: London, British Library, Add MS 43725), designated by siglum [Aleph] or 01 (in the Gregory-Aland numbering of New Testament manuscripts), δ 2 (in the von Soden numbering of New Testament manuscripts ...

'' and the apocryphal Gospel ''Egerton 2 Papyrus'' (a.k.a. the ''

Egerton Gospel The Egerton Gospel (British Library Egerton Papyrus 2) refers to a collection of three papyrus fragments of a codex of a previously unknown gospel, found in Egypt and sold to the British Museum in 1934; the physical fragments are now dated to the ...

''). He made a name for himself with important contributions to

palaeography Palaeography ( UK) or paleography ( US; ultimately from grc-gre, , ''palaiós'', "old", and , ''gráphein'', "to write") is the study of historic writing systems and the deciphering and dating of historical manuscripts, including the analysi ...

, papyrology, and codicology, particularly—but not only—in relation to these two acquisitions. He was the grandson of noted philologist

Walter William Skeat Walter William Skeat, (21 November 18356 October 1912) was a British philologist and Anglican deacon. The pre-eminent British philologist of his time, he was instrumental in developing the English language as a higher education subject in t ...

. Skeat was elected a

Fellow of the British Academy Fellowship of the British Academy (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 the United Kingdom # C ...

in 1963, but resigned (along with his friend Colin Roberts) in 1979, in protest against its decision not to expel

Anthony Blunt Anthony Frederick Blunt (26 September 1907 – 26 March 1983), styled Sir Anthony Blunt KCVO from 1956 to November 1979, was a leading British art historian and Soviet spy. Blunt was professor of art history at the University of London, dire ...

after the latter was exposed as a former Soviet spy.

Obituaries

*J. Keith Elliott, ''Theodore Cressy Skeat'', ''TC: A Journal of Biblical Textual Criticism'', 2003. *J. Keith Elliott, ''Obituary: T. C. Skeat'', The Independent, July 8, 2003. *Dorothy J. Thompson, ''In memoriam Theodore Cressy SKEAT'', 2004.AIP, ''In memoriam T. C. Skeat''
/ref>

Select bibliography

* H. I. Bell, and T. C. Skeat (eds.), ''Fragments of an Unknown Gospel and other early Christian papyri'', London: Trustees of the British Museum, 1935. * H. J. M. Milne, and T. C. Skeat, ''Scribes and Correctors of the Codex Sinaiticus'', London: Trustees of the British Museum, 1938. * C. H. Roberts, and T. C. Skeat, ''The Birth of the Codex, Oxford University Press'', New York – Cambridge 1983. * T. C. Skeat, ''The collected Biblical writings of T. C. Skeat'', ed. J. K. Elliott, Supplements to Novum Testamentum 113, Leiden and Boston: Brill, 2004.

References

External links

Alumni of Christ's College, Cambridge English librarians 1907 births 2003 deaths Employees of the British Library Fellows of the British Academy {{UK-academic-bio-stub