Charles Thomas (historian)


Antony Charles Thomas, was a British historian and archaeologist who was Professor of Cornish Studies at Exeter University, and the first Director of the Institute of Cornish Studies, from 1971 until his retirement in 1991. He was recognised as a Bard of the Cornish Gorseth with the name Gwas Godhyan in 1953.

Birth, early life and education

He was born 26 April 1928, the son of Donald Woodroffe Thomas and Viva Warrington Thomas, his wife.
He attended Elmhirst Preparatory day school, Camborne and Upcott House School, Okehampton. In 1940 he received a scholarship to Bradfield College, but on the advice of a family friend was instead sent to Winchester College on a 'Headmaster's Nomination'. In 1945 at the age of 17 he joined the army as a Young Soldier and later was an ammunition examiner in the Royal Army Ordnance Corps; he would serve in Northern Ireland, Portsmouth, Scotland and Egypt, the latter of which helped inspire his interest in archaeology. He demobilised in 1948 at which point he matriculated into Corpus Christi College, Oxford, receiving a BA Honours degree in Jurisprudence in 1951. He then studied under V. Gordon Childe at the UCL Institute of Archaeology and received a Diploma in Prehistoric Archaeology in 1953.

Academic career

Thomas' first public lecture was entitled 'The Glebe Lands of Camborne' for the Camborne Old Cornwall Society in 1946, while on a week's leave from the Army in Portsmouth. His academic career officially began as a part-time Workers' Educational Association lecturer in archaeology in Cornwall 1954–58. He became Lecturer in Archaeology at the University of Edinburgh from 1958 to 1967. From 1967 to 1971, he was appointed the first Professor of Archaeology at the University of Leicester. During this period, he became a FSA in 1960 and was awarded a Leverhulme Fellowship for 1965 to 1967.
In 1972 Thomas founded and became director of the Institute of Cornish Studies, affiliated with the University of Exeter at which he was now the first Professor of Cornish Studies. At this time he also launched and edited its learned journal, Cornish Studies. He defined its field as:
"the study of all aspects of man and his handiwork in the regional setting, past, present and future. The development of society, industry and the landscape in our fast changing world is as much of concern … as the history of those vast topics in the recent and remote past."

In 1983, he was awarded a Doctorate of Literature by the University of Oxford. He was Sir John Rhys Fellow of the University of Oxford and Visiting Senior Research Fellow at Jesus College from 1985 to 1986.
He retired as Director of the Institute and Professor of Cornish Studies in 1991; he was awarded an Emeritus Fellowship at Exeter by the Leverhulme Trust. Thomas was also awarded Doctor of Letters, honoris causa, by the National University of Ireland in 1996.

Archaeological work

Thomas' first archaeological excavation was at the Bronze Age barrow on Godrevy headland, St Ives Bay in 1950, and he initially saw himself as a prehistorian. He was Director of excavations at Gwithian, Cornwall, which revealed an important post-Roman occupation.
He was best known for his contributions to early medieval archaeology, particularly to the archaeology of early Christianity in Britain and Ireland. After Gwithian, excavations at early Christian sites included Nendrum Monastery, County Down in 1954; a chapel at East Porth, Teän, Isles of Scilly in 1956; Iona Abbey, Argyll in 1956–1963; Ardwall Island, Kirkcudbright; and Abercorn, West Lothian 1964–65. His first major work in this field was The Early Christian Archaeology of North Britain, followed by similarly influential volumes including Christianity in Roman Britain to AD 500 and And Shall These Mute Stones Speak?: post-Roman inscriptions in Western Britain.

Roles in organizations

;Learned societies
He was a Board Member of the Royal Institution of Cornwall and Honorary Librarian of its Courtney Library until 2011, having previously served as its president in 1970–71. He is a Fellow of the British Academy, and was President of the Council for British Archaeology 1970–73.
He was President of the Cornwall Archaeological Society 1984–88 and of the Society for Medieval Archaeology, 1986–89.
He has been President of the Society for Landscape Studies since 1993. He was president of the Cornish Methodist Historical Association in 1993. He was Chairman of the Society for Church Archaeology, 1995–98.
;Quangos
He has been Chairman of the BBC South West Regional Advisory Council, 1975–80; of the Department of the Environment Area Archaeology Committee, Cornwall and Devon, 1975–79; and of the Cornwall Committee for Rescue Archaeology 1976–88.
He was a Member of the Royal Commission on Historical Monuments.

Honours

See full Biography in Gathering the Fragments, 2012, pp. 177–183,.

Personal life

Thomas married the writer Jessica Mann a week after she completed her Cambridge finals in 1959, and they had two sons and two daughters. He died on 7 April 2016.

Publications

Key publications (in date order)