Women, Peace and Welfare: A Suppressed History of Social Reform, 1880-1920 Paperback – June 1, 2019
by Ann Oakley
Queer Places:
34 Greencroft Gardens, London NW6 3LU, UK
The Cell, Little Hampden, Great Missenden, Buckinghamshire HP16 9PS, UK
Lina Dorina Johanna Eckenstein (September 23, 1857 – May 4, 1931) was a trailblazing British polymath, historian, and scholar of the early women's movement whose multi-faceted intellectual life spanned medieval history, linguistics, archaeology, and radical politics.
Born in Islington, London, she was the daughter of a Jewish socialist from Bonn who had fled Germany after the failed 1848 revolution, and she was the elder sister of the mountaineer Oscar Eckenstein. Adept in a remarkable range of languages—including French, Italian, Middle High German, Middle English, and classical and medieval Latin—her formal education was likely obtained in Germany or Switzerland, setting the foundation for an unconventional and fiercely independent life.
Eckenstein first gained prominence in intellectual circles as a member of the Men and Women's Club in the late 1880s. Formed by the mathematician and eugenicist Karl Pearson, the radical group provided a rare forum for middle-class intellectuals to openly discuss sexuality, prostitution laws, motherhood, and gender roles. Embracing the ethos of the "new woman," Eckenstein presented studies on the sexual relations of the Romans and Reformation-era Swiss populations. This affiliation blossomed into lifelong friendships with Karl and Maria Pearson and their children. Financially self-sufficient, Eckenstein supported herself through translation, proofreading, teaching, and research, notably assisting Martin Conway with work on Albrecht Dürer.
Though vastly overqualified, she also worked as a governess, most notably teaching Margery Corbett Ashby. This professional relationship evolved into a profound, lifelong friendship and political partnership. In 1908, Eckenstein deepened her involvement in the women's rights movement, later supporting Margery—then secretary of the National Union of Women's Suffrage Societies—at the International Women's Suffrage Alliance congress in Geneva in 1920, where she utilized her multilingual skills to translate proceedings.
As a scholar, Eckenstein's masterwork was her 1896 publication "Woman under Monasticism: Chapters on Saint-Lore and Convent Life between A.D. 500 and A.D. 1500." Dedicated to the Pearsons, the book drew on extensive translated sources to argue that the autonomy and aspirations sought by twentieth-century women had historical precedent in medieval religious houses, rescuing figures like Caritas Pirckheimer from obscurity.
Beyond medieval studies, Eckenstein was an intrepid traveler and archaeologist. In 1902, she published an account of a walking tour through the upper Arno valley. Shortly after, she joined archaeologists Hilda and Flinders Petrie in Egypt, managing excavation camps, cataloging finds, and copying wall art at sites like Abydos, Saqqara, and Serabit el-Khadim. Her remarkable camel trek across the Sinai Peninsula with Hilda Petrie culminated in her 1921 book "A History of Sinai." She also drew unusual cultural connections, linking ancient Egyptian cult imagery to the nursery rhyme "Cock Robin" in a 1906 comparative study, and writing historical fiction such as her 1924 book "Tutankh-aten," which explored the imagined childhood of Moses.
Eckenstein spent her final years continuing her writing and research until her death on May 4, 1931, from exhaustion and chronic cystitis in Buckinghamshire. Posthumous publications included "A Spell of Words" (1932) and "The Women of Early Christianity" (1935), cementing her legacy as a foundational intellectual architect of early feminist and historical scholarship.
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Women, Peace and Welfare: A Suppressed History of Social Reform, 1880-1920 Paperback – June 1, 2019 by Ann Oakley |
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