Pearl Kibre
Pearl Kibre, 1985

Pearl Kibre (September 2, 1900 — July 15, 1985) was an American historian. She won a Guggenheim Fellowship in 1950 for her work on medieval science and universities.

Early life and education

Pearl Kibre was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, the daughter of Kenneth Kibre, an optometrist born in Russia, and Jane du Pione Kibre. She moved to California as a girl with her parents; she attended Manual Arts High School in Los Angeles. Kibre attended the University of California at Berkeley as an undergraduate (1924) and master's (1925) student, and completed doctoral studies at Columbia University in 1936, with Lynn Thorndike as her mentor.[1] She taught at Pasadena Junior College for a few years before resuming graduate work. (Her sister Adele Kibre also earned a Ph.D., in Latin Language and Literature, from the University of Chicago.)[2]

Career

Pearl Kibre "helped lay the foundations for the contemporary study of medieval science and medieval universities."[2] She was on the faculty of Hunter College from 1937 until she retired in 1971.[1] She helped found the doctoral program in history at the Graduate Center of the City University of New York.[3]

In 1950 she was awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship to travel to European archives to study medieval universities.[4] She became a corresponding member of the International Academy of the History of Science in 1960.[5] Kibre was a member of the International Committee of Historical Sciences, the United States Subcommission for the History of Universities, and the editorial board of Medieval and Renaissance Latin Translations and Commentaries. She was elected a fellow of the Medieval Academy of America in 1964, the same year she won the Haskins Medal from the same organization.[6]

Books by Pearl Kibre included The Library of Pico della Mirandola (1936),[7] A Catalogue of Incipits of Mediaeval Scientific Writings in Latin (1937, revised 1963, with Lynn Thorndike),[8] The Nations in the Mediaeval Universities (1948),[9] Scholarly Privileges in the Middle Ages (1962), Hippocrates Latinus: Repertorium of Hippocratic Writings in the Latin Middle Ages, Volume 3 (1975),[10] Studies in Medieval Science: Alchemy, Astrology, Mathematics, and Medicine (1984).[11] In addition, an edited volume of essays was collected in her honor, Science, Medicine, and the University, 1200-1500 (1976); and she contributed to the Didascaliae, a volume of research using materials from the Vatican Library, presented to the Vatican in 1961.[12]

Death and legacy

Pearl Kibre died in 1985, aged 84 years, at her home in New York City.[13]

The Pearl Kibre Medieval Study is a study space maintained by an interdisciplinary graduate student organization at The Graduate Center, CUNY, begun in 1972 and named in her honor.[14]

References

  1. 1 2 Jennifer Scanlon and Shaaron Cosner, eds., American Women Historians, 1700s-1990s (Greenwood Publishing 1996): 131-132. ISBN 9780313296642
  2. 1 2 Elspeth Whitney and Irving A. Kelter, "Pearl Kibre (1900-1985): Manuscript Hunter and Historian of Medieval Science and the Universities" in Jane Chance, ed., Women Medievalists and the Academy (University of Wisconsin Press 2005): 541-551. ISBN 9780299207502
  3. ↑ Ronald Doviak, "Pearl Kibre: A Bio-Bibliography" Manuscripta 20(3)(1976): 244-250.
  4. ↑ "Pearl Kibre", John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation, Directory of Fellows.
  5. ↑ "Pearl Kibre". International Academy of the History of Science. Retrieved 2020-09-15.
  6. ↑ Edward Grant and Astrik L. Gabriel, "Pearl Kibre" in Paul Oskar Kristeller, ed., Studies in Renaissance Thought and Letters IV 193(Rome 1996): 538-542.
  7. ↑ Pearl Kibre, The Library of Pico della Mirandola (Columbia University Press 1936).
  8. ↑ Lynn Thorndike and Pearl Kibre, A Catalogue of Incipits of Mediaeval Scientific Writings in Latin (Mediaeval Academy of America 1963).
  9. ↑ Pearl Kibre, The Nations in the Mediaeval Universities (Mediaeval Society of America 1948).
  10. ↑ Pearl Kibre, Hippocrates Latinus: Repertorium of Hippocratic Writings in the Latin Middle Ages, Volume 3 (Fordham University Press; Books on Demand 1975). ISBN 9780783756073
  11. ↑ Pearl Kibre, Studies in Medieval Science: Alchemy, Astrology, Mathematics, and Medicine (Hambledon Press 1984). ISBN 9780907628217
  12. ↑ "22 Scholars Here to Thank Vatican" New York Times (April 23, 1961): 66.
  13. ↑ "Dr. Pearl Kibre" New York Times (July 20, 1985).
  14. ↑ Pearl Kibre Medieval Study, CUNY Academic Commons.
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