Valerie Flint
| Valerie Flint | |
|---|---|
| Born | July 5, 1936 Derby, England |
| Died | January 7, 2009 (aged 72) Beverley, England |
| Nationality | British |
| Fields | Medieval intellectual history, cultural history |
| Institutions | Princeton University, University of Cambridge, University of Oxford |
| Alma mater | University of Oxford |
| Doctoral advisor | Beryl Smalley, Richard Southern, Richard Hunt |
| Known for | Seminal contributions to medieval studies[1] |
Valerie Irene Jane Flint (5 July 1936 – 7 January 2009) was a British scholar and historian, specialising in medieval intellectual and cultural history.
Biography
Early life
Flint was born in Derby. She studied at Rutland House School, before winning a scholarship to read at Lady Margaret Hall at the University of Oxford.[2] Focusing on the 12th century, Flint studied for an MPhil under Beryl Smalley, Richard Southern, Richard Hunt and Lorenzo Minio-Paluello.
Academic career
After education, Flint took up lecturing and worked at the University of Auckland.[1] In the late 1980s, Flint relocated to Princeton University as a Fellow of the Davis Center. While working at the Institute for Advanced Study (also in Princeton), Flint completed her most extended and important[2] publication, The Rise of Magic in Early Medieval Europe.[1] She also held fellowships with the University of Canberra, Clare Hall, Cambridge, the University of Chicago, the University of Minneapolis, Trinity College, Cambridge, and All Souls, Oxford.[2]
Later life and death
In 1999, while at Princeton as a Visitor at the Institute for Advanced Study, Flint discovered that she was suffering from a virulent form of cancer.[2] When her treatment enabled her to, she returned to Beverley in the East Riding of Yorkshire. She centred her subsequent studies on the Hereford Mappa Mundi.[1]
On 7 January 2009, Flint died at home in her library.[2]
Personal life
Flint never married, and said that "marriage is for men". In the 1960s, she was accepted into the Catholic Church.[2]
Works
- Imago Mundi (1982)
- Ideas in the Middle Ages (1988)
- The Rise of Magic in Early Medieval Europe (1991)
- The Imaginative Landscape of Christopher Columbus (1992)
- Authors of the Middle Ages 6 (1995)
