Wedgwood, C. V. (1910–1997)

British historian. Born Cicely Veronica Wedgwood, July 20, 1910, in Stocksfield, Northumberland, England; died Mar 9, 1997, in London; dau. of Sir Ralph Wedgwood (chief general manager of a British railroad) and Iris Veronica (Pawson) Wedgwood (author of books on history and topography); descendant of Staffordshire potter Josiah Wedgwood; studied at Bonn University in Germany and at Sorbonne, 1927–28; Lady Margaret Hall, Oxford, BA, 1931.

One of England's premier historians, who specialized in 17th-century Europe, published 1st book, Strafford, 1593–1641 (1935), a biography of Thomas Wentworth, advisor to Charles I; wrote The Thirty Years War (1938), which became the definitive work on the subject; also wrote Oliver Cromwell (1939) and Oliver Cromwell and the Elizabethan Inheritance (1970); received James Tait Black Prize for William the Silent (1944); recaptured events preceding the Civil War in The Great Rebellion: The King's Peace, 1637–1641 (1955), those of the war itself in The King's War, 1641–1647 (1958), and its conclusion A Coffin for King Charles: The Trial and Execution of Charles I (1964); published several studies of poetry and literature in their historical context, including Seventeenth Century English Literature (1950), Poetry and Politics Under the Stuarts (1960), Milton and His World (1969) and The Political Career of Peter Paul Rubens (1975), and translated several volumes from the German; was literary editor of journal Time and Tide (1944–50); also frequently lectured and spoke on the BBC; at 75, published The Spoils of Time: A World History from the Dawn of Civilization through the Early Renaissance (1985). Named Commander of the British Empire (1956), then Dame Commander (1968).

See also Women in World History.