Welcome to Oxford Dictionary of National Biography

Learn more

Information for Librarians

What’s New: June 2023

This month’s update comprises ten new articles on women active in public life from the end of the fourteenth to the late twentieth century: Joan Beauchamp (Lady Bergavenny), Joan Cooke, Hortense Mancini (duchess of Mazarin), Jane Baldwin, Sarah Curran, Lucy Cavendish, Marjorie Powell, Madeleine Symons, Dorothy Elliott, Margaret Campbell (duchess of Argyll). Read the introduction here.

Find out more

Cooke [née Massinger], Joan (d. 1545/6)

Cooke [née Massinger], Joan (d. 1545/6)

The benefactor and vowess Joan Cooke was depicted with her late husband in a portrait commissioned by the corporation of Gloucester. They had spent their married life planning to make their mark on Gloucester, and founded a grammar school in the city which opened in 1539.

Find out more

 

News

JUNE 7, 2023

What’s new: June 2023

This month’s update comprises ten new articles on women active in public life from the end of the fourteenth to the late twentieth century: Joan Beauchamp (Lady Bergavenny), Joan Cooke, Hortense Mancini (duchess of Mazarin), Jane Baldwin, Sarah Curran, Lucy Cavendish, Marjorie Powell, Madeleine Symons, Dorothy Elliott, Margaret Campbell (duchess of Argyll).  Read the introduction here.

MAY 11, 2023

What's New: May 2023

This month’s update, introduced by Carolyn Oulton, adds the lives of eleven women who were successful writers of popular fiction between 1870 and 1920: Florence Barclay, Elizabeth Burgoyne Corbett, Theo Douglas, Mary Gordon, Maxwell Gray, Ella Lindow, Bessie Marchant, Jean Middlemass, Catherine Pirkis, Florence Warden, and Gertrude Warden.  Read the introduction here.

APRIL 12, 2023

What's New: April 2023

This month’s update adds new biographies of 247 men and women who died in the year 2019. Browse a selection of new articles here, and read the summary of new content here.