G. R. Elton (1921–1994)

Geoffrey Rudolph Elton (Ehrenberg) was born in Germany in 1921, the son of Victor Leopold Ehrenberg and his wife Eva Sommer. The family emigrated to England in 1939. Elton was educated at the University of London and began teaching at Cambridge in 1949, the same year he was awarded PhD. He became Fellow of Clare College, Cambridge, 1954, Professor of Constitutional History at Cambridge, 1967-1983 and Regius Professor of Modern History from 1983-1988. Elton was President of the Royal Historical Society, 1972-1976. As a scholar of Tudor administrative history, Elton reassessed historical conceptions of the Tudor era. He was Knighted in 1986 and died 3 December 1994. Publications include The Tudor Revolution in Government (1953); England under the Tudors (1955), The Tudor Constitution (1960), Reformation Europe (1963), Reform and Renewal (1973), Reform and Reformation: England 1509-1558 (1977), The Parliament of England 1559-1581 (1986), and The English (1992).