 Just before Christmas came sad news of the death of TGH James, former Keeper of Egyptian Antiquities at the British Museum. Harry passed away peacefully in hospital in London on 16th December 2009, after an extended illness.
Harry James was born on 8th May 1923 in Neath, South Wales, and educated at the local grammar school. Admitted in 1941 to Exeter College, Oxford, to read Classics and Oriental Studies, active service in north-west Europe with the Royal Artillery (2nd Lieutenant 1943; Captain 1945) in fact took up most of his time until 1946. Harry eventually graduated in 1950 with a First in Egyptian and Coptic, and the following year joined the British Museum as Assistant Keeper in the Department of Egyptian and Assyrian Antiquities. He would remain at the BM until his retirement in 1988 as Keeper of Egyptian Antiquities, a post he had occupied for the previous fourteen years.
Harry’s list of appointments and honours was long and impressive: Laycock Student of Egyptology, Worcester College, Oxford, 1954-1960; Wilbour Fellow at The Brooklyn Museum, 1964-1965; Elected Member of the German Archaeological Institute, 1974; Fellow of the British
Academy, 1976; Visiting Professor at the Collège de France, Paris, 1983; Visiting Professor at Memphis State University, 1990; and Chairman of the advisory committee of the Freud Museum in London, from 1987 on.
He enjoyed a particularly close association with the Egypt Exploration Society in London throughout his career. From 1960 to 1970, Harry served as Editor of the Journal of Egyptian Archaeology, and then and later as an exacting Editor of the Society’s monograph series. His long association with the EES culminated in his appointment as Chairman in 1983 (a position he held until 1989) and Vice-President in 1990.
As a scholar, Harry liked to describe himself as a generalist. He had dug, undertaken epigraphic work, he was a meticulous researcher and he taught. First and foremost, though, he was a curator, proud of his association with the British Museum and immensely loyal to that institution. That loyalty, and his many contributions to Egyptology during his extensive time in office, were recognised by the award of a CBE in 1984.
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Harry James’s list of publications was extensive and included a number of fundamental works: The Mastaba of Khentika called Ikhekhi (1953); Hieroglyphic Texts in the British Museum, I and IX (1961 and 1970); The Hekanakhte Papers and other Early Middle Kingdom Documents (1962); and Gebel es-Silsila, I (1963), a joint publication with the late Ricardo Caminos. He contributed to the Journal of Egyptian Archaeology, the Cambridge Ancient History, and the Encyclopedia Britannica. He was the author, too, of a host of didactic publications issued by the British Museum, and of several popular books including The Archaeology of Ancient Egypt (1972) and Pharaoh’s People (1984) – this last dedicated to his much-loved and ever-supportive wife, Diana.
After retirement from the British Museum, Harry took the opportunity to travel widely and lecture often. His first retirement project was a biography of the discoverer of the Tomb of Tutankhamun, a fundamental piece of research published in 1992 as Howard Carter: The Path to Tutankhamun. A second project, a biography of the celebrated philologist Sir Alan Gardiner, whom he had known well, was still in progress at the time of Harry’s death.
Through his writings, TGH James’s scholarly achievement will live on. But it is in our hearts that Harry will best be remembered by those of us who were fortunate enough to know him, work with him, and enjoy his supportive friendship and gentle humour. Egyptology without Harry is a sorrier place. He will be much missed.
Nicholas worked under Harry James as a Junior Curator at the British Museum between 1984 and 1988.
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