Davies, Horton (Marlais) 1916–2005

OBITUARY NOTICE—See index for CA sketch: Born March 10, 1916, in Port Talbot, Wales; died May 11, 2005, in Princeton, NJ. Historian, educator, and author. A Henry W. Putnam professor of religion emeritus, Davies was a scholar of English Protestant and Catholic church history. He was a graduate of the University of Edinburgh, where he earned an M.A. in 1937 and a B.D. in 1940. He later earned his D.Phil. in 1943 at Mansfield and St. Catherine's Colleges, Oxford. During World War II, he served as a minister for the Wallington Congregational Church in South London, a dangerous area that was heavily bombed by the Germans. Immediately after the war, he worked with the British Army of the Rhine as director of education for the YMCA in Germany, France, and other countries. He next moved to South Africa to accept a post as a professor of divinity at Rhodes University, where he also served as dean of faculty until 1953. Returning to England, Davies taught at Oxford and was head of the department of church history for Mansfield and Regent's Park Colleges. When Princeton University decided to create a new religion program for graduate students, Davies was invited to teach there. He accepted the offer in 1956, making Princeton his new home and retiring there as professor emeritus in 1984. His involvement in education also included helping to organize a multi-university graduate program in liturgical studies based at Drew University. While at Princeton, Davies was awarded Guggenheim fellowships in 1960 and 1965, as well as a Huntington Library Award in 1968, that provided him with the ability to complete his most ambitious project, the multi-volume Worship and Theology in England (1961–96). Among his many other publications are Christian Worship: Its History and Meaning (1957), The Ecumenical Century, 1900–1965 (1967), Catching the Conscience (1984), The Worship of the American Puritans, 1629–1730 (1990), and A Church Historian's Odyssey: A Memoir (1993). Also an artist in his spare time, Davies painted everything from still lifes to scenes from the Bible, and many of these works were shown at exhibits and galleries. He wrote about religious art in a book published with his son Hugh titled Sacred Art in a Secular Century (1979).

OBITUARIES AND OTHER SOURCES:

PERIODICALS

New York Times, May 14, 2005, p. A25.

ONLINE

Princeton Weekly Bulletin Online, http://www.princeton.edu/pr/pwb/ (May 30, 2005).