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12

The Curious Case of Professor Dobson’s Book

6 Feb, 2023 (edited)
2023-2-6 5:48:20 PM UTC

I’ve recently acquired a copy of Þorgils saga ok Hafliða, edited by Ursula Brown from 1952. The narrative of a feud between two great chieftains in Iceland, at the beginning of the twelfth century in Icelandic, with notes and commentary to help the reader. This is volume three of seven of the Oxford English Monograph series while JRR Tolkien was one of the general editors.

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Why is this significant you may ask? I bought it from a dealer in Australia who informed me that it belonged to one Professor T.P. Dobson. I did a little research and found out that he was a language professor at Monash University in Melbourne. I discovered this by finding a 1964 calendar from the university with Dobson’s information in it. You can see that University's crest here on page eleven. And Mr. Dobson's info on page 38.
https://www.monash.edu/__data/assets/p ... /1964-calendar-part-1.pdf

An interesting, albeit tertiary association copy, I thought. Tolkien was a language professor, Dobson was a language professor or lecturer at least. The price was fine, so I went ahead and bit the bullet and paid it and the shipping cost to the United States. Then things got really interesting when the volume showed up in the mail and I removed to the dust jacket to look at the boards.

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The front board bears a crest that I was unfamiliar with and was completely different from the crest for Monash University. Although based on my research at the time, professor Dobson had no connection with any English school.

As a teacher of History, I knew a little about English heraldry and I recognized the lion, fleur-de-lie and Tudor Roses were all used by the English, nothing really Australian in the images used. I then enlisted the help of Trotter and together we did some detective work on which English schools actually used this type of heraldry together. We started with the crest of Henry VI.

1024px-coat-of-arms-of-henry-vi-of-england-1422-1471-svg_orig.png

One of the last Kings of England from the Lancaster/York Houses during the War of the Roses, which eventually saw Henry VII the first of the Tudor Monarchs on the English throne. Before the war, Henry the VI awarded a crest to Eton College, which looked like this.

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Very similar to the one on the book, but not quite the same. This led us to the actual crest seen on the boards and that came from King’s College (sister school to Eton) in Cambridge. Which matches exactly the one on the book.

Kingscollegearms-alternative.svg.png

So, the puzzle of the crest was solved, but the question still remains; how did Professor Dobson acquire a copy of Porgils Saga OK Haflida? I eventually came to see that he got his MA in Cambridge and our most plausible theory was that he was awarded it by the college while there.

I am working on a longer article on the entire Oxford English Monograph series but that will have to wait for another day.
6 Feb, 2023
2023-2-6 6:30:19 PM UTC
Fascinating trying to find out as much as possible about Thomas Pye Dobson and why he would have this book with a coat of arms on it
6 Feb, 2023
2023-2-6 11:29:29 PM UTC
Looking forward to that article on the Monographs MrUnderhill. The saga of Torgil and Havlide is my favourite of the english monographs tolkien edited and its also the only one I dont have a copy of myself :)
Some of them are rather dry reads :)
7 Feb, 2023
2023-2-7 6:19:53 AM UTC
I advise you to look for a possible relationship between Thomas Pye Dobson and Eric John Dobson. Both Australian, E.J. Dobson had numerous links to Tolkien, C.L. Wrenn, Nichol Smith, d'Ardenne etc....
7 Feb, 2023
2023-2-7 1:27:59 PM UTC

Tolkieniano wrote:

I advise you to look for a possible relationship between Thomas Pye Dobson and Eric John Dobson. Both Australian, E.J. Dobson had numerous links to Tolkien, C.L. Wrenn, Nichol Smith, d'Ardenne etc....

Much obliged Tolkieniano. I'll look into it.
9 Feb, 2023
2023-2-9 3:54:34 PM UTC
Þ

Just dropping a thorn in the chat for easy copy–pasting so everyone can stop calling this “Porgils Saga.” ;) (“Thorgils” would also be an acceptable transcription.)

Eth is optional but also recommended: ð

And “ok” ‘and’ (or at least its k) should be lowercase.

OK, that’s all. Just some thorns in my side. This is neat by the way.
9 Feb, 2023
2023-2-9 3:59:31 PM UTC

Philomythos wrote:

Þ

Just dropping a thorn in the chat for easy copy–pasting so everyone can stop calling this “Porgils Saga.” ;) (“Thorgils” would also be an acceptable transcription.)

Eth is optional but also recommended: ð

And “ok” ‘and’ (or at least its k) should be lowercase.

OK, that’s all. Just some thorns in my side. This is neat by the way.

Yes, thanks Philomythos, I should have lowered the "k". You're correct about the other characters as well, just didn't have them on my keyboard when typing it up.
9 Feb, 2023
2023-2-9 5:28:14 PM UTC
I've added back in the "special character" widget due to popular demand ?

Here are screenshots of where to find them - just click on the character you want and it will be inserted wherever the cursor is in the text editor.

1_63e52d1a99c78.png 338X322 px

1_63e52d1a99ea5.png 444X388 px
9 Feb, 2023
2023-2-9 5:30:52 PM UTC
Oh...now you add them
9 Feb, 2023
2023-2-9 6:09:30 PM UTC
I had them for a long time, but no-one used them, and on a mac all of the special characters are pretty easy so I started using those, and then in a code cleanup I turned off the widget for a while, and just now noticed I still had it turned off. Feel free to blame me ?
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