A woman of letters and the first woman member of the American Philosophical Society, Ekaterina Romanovna Dashkova (née Vorontsova) was also the first modern stateswoman in Russia. Early in her life she dressed in an officer’s uniform and boldly stepped forward to play an active role in the political arena, where she participated in the palace revolution of 1762. Subsequently, Dashkova was appointed director of the Academy of Sciences by Catherine II and she founded and became president of the Russian Academy. For close to twelve years, she headed both these prestigious academic institutions. She was a leading figure in eighteenth-century Russian culture as she strove to institute reforms, to adapt and apply the ideas of the Enlightenment, and to establish new approaches to the education of Russia’s youth. Sadly, her relationship with her own children was deeply tragic, and later in life she was exiled to the north of Russia. This biography focuses on Dashkova’s efforts in her life and works to isolate, clarify, and define patterns of action, identity, and gender for herself as well as for other women.

Alexander Woronzoff-Dashkoff is Professor of Russian language and literature at Smith College in Massachusetts. Born in Renon, Italy, he received a Ph.D. in Comparative Literature at the University of Southern California. For many years he worked in the Russian School at Middlebury College, the last nine years as Director of the School. His scholarship has been devoted to the life and works of Ekaterina Dashkova, of whom he is a descendent. He has compiled and annotated the French edition of Dashkova’s autobiography, Mon Histoire: Mémoires d’une Femmes de Lettres Russe àl’Epoque des Lumières, including the letters of Catherine II (Paris: L’Harmattan, 1999).

Vincent Bourne (1694-1747) was one of the most, if not the most, popular Latin poets of his day. In its depiction of homely urban scenes and in its sensitive portrayal of animal and civic behavior (and the reciprocity between such behavior) his Latin verse appealed to early eighteenth-century and Romantic sensibilities. The present study examines a broad range of that Latin verse in its classical, neo-Latin, and vernacular contexts with particular attention to the theme of identity (and differing forms of identity). It surveys the quest for identity, reciprocal identities, metropolitan identities, the recreation of identity, and assesses ways in which Bourne's fusion of the classical and the Romantic gave him a unique neo-Latin voice which enabled him to stand out from his predecessors and contemporaries. Appended to the study are the texts (with Haan's translations) of the Latin poetry discussed therein.

Estelle Haan (Sheehan) is Professor of Renaissance and Anglo-Latin Literature at Queen's University Belfast. Previous publications with the American Philosophical Society include From Academia to Amicitia: Milton's Latin Writings and the Italian Academies (Transactions volume 88, part 6) and Vergilius Redivivus: Studies in Joseph Addison's Latin Poetry (Transactions volume 95, part 2).

Peter Collinson’s life is a microcosm of eighteenth-century natural history. A London Quaker, a draper by trade, and a passionate gardener and naturalist by avocation, Collinson was what we would now call a facilitator in natural science, disseminating botanical and horticultural knowledge during the Enlightenment. He influenced men such as Comte de Buffon and Linnaeus. He found clients for the Philadelphia Quaker farmer and naturalist, John Bartram, at a time when the English landscape was evolving to emphasize trees and shrubs, and the more exotic the better. Thus, American plants populated great estates like those of the Dukes of Richmond, Norfolk, and Bedford, as well as the Chelsea Physic Garden, and nurseries of James Gordon and Robert Furber. Botanic painters such as Mark Catesby and Georg Dionysius Ehret painted American plants in Collinson’s garden. His membership in the Royal Society enabled him to broaden his scope: he encouraged Franklin’s electrical experiments and had the results published, he corresponded about myriad natural phenomena, and he was ahead of his time in understanding the extinction of animals and the migration of birds. Though a man of modest Quaker demeanor, because of his passion for natural science, he had an unprecedented effect on the exchange of scientific information on both sides of the Atlantic. In this monograph, the authors give a convincing biographical portrait of Collinson. He “speaks” to the reader throughout the book in a distinct voice.

Jean O’Neill (1915–2008) was awarded the Gold Veitch Memorial Medal by the Royal Horticultural Society in 2001. She concentrated her scholarly research on Collinson’s life and writings and his place in Anglo-European history. Lady O’Neill, wife of the late Northern Ireland prime minister Terence O’Neill, was a passionate lover of nature and frequent author of articles in horticulture. She had a keen interest in the history of plants. She was chairwoman of the National Trust Gardens Committee and a fellow of the Linnean Society of London.

Elizabeth P. McLean, a graduate of the Arboretum School of the Barnes Foundation, is Research Associate in Botany at the Academy of Natural Sciences in Philadelphia and on the boards of the Library Company of Philadelphia (having served as past president) and the Morris Arboretum of the University of Pennsylvania. Her particular expertise is in the Anglo-American horticultural relationships of the eighteenth century. She has written various garden history articles, and is co-author, with architectural historian Mark Reinberger, of the forthcoming Country Houses and Landscapes of Colonial Philadelphia.

Indexed in H.W. Wilson’s

Essay and General Literature Index

This English translation of Georges Le Rider’s comprehensive study of the coinage and financial policy of Alexander the Great (Alexandre Le Grand: Monnaie, Finances et Politique) brings, for the first time, the magisterial scholarship of one of the world’s greatest living numismatists before an Anglophone public. For more than forty years Le Rider has published fundamental studies on the coinages of the ancient Middle East and eastern Mediterranean world, particularly from the time of Philip II (Alexander’s father), Alexander himself, and the Seleucid empire. The book of 2003 that is now appearing in English represents the culmination of a lifetime of reflection on the coinage of Alexander.

It is not only Le Rider’s gift for seeing the implications of his multitudinous coinage issues that every reader of his works in French will know so well: it is the uncommon lucidity and simplicity of his presentation of the material. No one could hope to capture the crystalline clarity of his French prose, but, by working closely with Le Rider himself and with numismatic specialists, above all Le Rider’s friend and collaborator Hyla Troxell, William E. Higgins has created a book worthy of the original. It manages to retain the excitement of a detective investigation that begins with an anecdote handed down by Plutarch and ends by subverting it. Special thanks go to the Aristotle Onassis Foundation, which generously funded the translation through the intercession of Michel Amandry.

French historian Georges Le Rider is a professor at the Collège de France, a member of l'Institut de France and a specialist in numismatics. He has taught at both the Ecole Pratique des Hautes Etudes and the Collège de France, and has also served as Director of the French Institute of Anatolian Studies in Istanbul. From 1975-1981 he had the major position of Administrateur général of the Bibliothèque Nationale of France. Since 1989 he has been a Member of the Institut de France in the Académie des Inscriptions et Belles Lettres. In 1996 he was elected to the American Philosophical Society.