Academic was renowned medieval historian
b February 19, 1977
d July 9, 2024
Dr Chris Jones, associate professor in the history department of the University of Canterbury, died suddenly from a heart attack on July 9 while visiting his parents in England.
He was 47 and in his prime as a scholar and teacher. He was probably New Zealand’s leading medieval historian, interested in the history of political thought and concepts of identity, and the way ideas were transmitted and received in the late Middle Ages, especially in France.
His childhood was spent in the Middle East, where his father had served in the Royal Air Force and subsequently worked in civil aviation. The family lived in Jeddah (1982-85) and Abu Dhabi (198791), so Chris grew up surrounded by the Muslim world. After secondary school he attended Durham University where he completed his MA thesis on Marsilius of Padua’s Defensor Pacis in 1999. The next year, he became a member of the Ecclesiastical History Society.
He progressed to doctoral studies, and spent some time improving his Latin at the Pontifical Institute of Mediaeval Studies at Toronto University. He completed his PhD thesis in 2003, which was later published as a big book: Eclipse of Empire? Perceptions of the Western Empire and its Rulers in Late Medieval France (Brepols, 2007). After graduation he spent a year in London working in finance while he applied for university posts.
Jones came to University of Canterbury in 2005 to join the European history team. He was soon lecturing and tutoring in the first-year survey course on medieval Europe, and a second year course on renaissance and reformation. He later contributed to a course on the Muslim world, and developed his own course on France in the Middle Ages, 1150-1350. At honours he contributed to the compulsory course, history as a discipline. He was supervisor for over 20 research exercises and theses, including MA and PhD theses.
Throughout his time at Canterbury he gave numerous conference papers and oral presentations. He served as secretary of the Canterbury Historical Association, 2018-23, and was a member of the executive committee of the Canterbury History Foundation. He brought to all of these roles enthusiasm and bright ideas, being often the first to volunteer when something needed to be done.
In 2008 he was elected a fellow of the Royal Historical Society, London, and from 2008 to 2020 he held an editorial role with Viator, a leading peer-reviewed academic journal of medieval history and literature, published by Brepols for the University of California at Los Angeles. This journal published a series of articles by Jones on Geoffroi de Courlon of Sens, a late 13th century Benedictine chronicler.
From 2009 to 2012, he was a council member of the Medieval Association of the Pacific. In 2010, he was invited to organise a session at the Leeds International Medieval Congress, one of the largest assemblages of medievalists in the world. (That year it had 1673 attendees.) In 2015, he became a member of the Medieval Academy of America. From 2015 to 2020, he was president ofthe Australia and New Zealand Association for Medieval and Early Modern Studies and was heavily involved in organising their conferences. In 2018, he was elected a fellow of the Higher Education Academy (UK) and in 2019 a Ffellow of the Society of Antiquaries, London.
Demonstrating his high reputation internationally in his field, just last year he was appointed chief editor of H-France Review, the leading online review journal in French History. His own publications included several edited volumes: John of Paris: Beyond Royal and Papal Power (Brepols, 2015); Making the Medieval Relevant (Berlin, de Gruyter, 2019); and Rethinking Medieval and Renaissance Political Thought (Routledge, 2023).
Jones has given a great deal to his adopted university. In 2011, Canterbury University Press published Treasures of the University of Canterbury Library, a sumptuous volume with essays from a large team of contributors led by Jones as general editor. This had been his own idea, based on a similar publication at Durham University.
Many people were surprised to discover the range and quality of the rare books at Canterbury. One of those volumes contained the earliest printed version of Magna Carta in a New Zealand library, and Jones organised a conference to mark the 800th anniversary of this foundation document of Western law and politics. He then edited a selection of the papers (with Stephen Winter) as Magna Carta and New Zealand: History, Politics and Law in Aotearoa (Palgrave Macmillan, 2017).
Canterbury University holds what is probably the most significant medieval manuscript in the country, the Canterbury Roll. Previously known as the Maude Roll, from the family that sold it to the university, this is a large (5m long) genealogy of English kings made during the Wars of the Roses in the 15th century. When Jones started work on a new translation and edition, with a group of students, there were only four other such rolls known to exist: thanks to the international attention his project has aroused, another10 have been located, but the Canterbury Roll is thought to be the largest and best example of this unusual group of manuscripts.
In collaboration with Nottingham Trent University, the roll was subjected to scientific analysis, including spectrometry of its inks. Jones was general editor for Lisa Rolston’s new edition and translation in 2017, available online from Canterbury University Press.
In 2019, Jones was asked to chair the editorial board for A New History: The University of Canterbury, 1873-2023, to be written by John Wilson with contributions from the vice- chancellor and others in time for the university’s sesquicentennial in 2023. This was a very tight time-frame, but the book was delivered on time, not least thanks to Jones’ skilful and tactful guidance.
Jones was passionate about his discipline, and the relevance of medieval studies to the present day. He was an enthusiastic teacher and an inspirational supervisor. As a scholar he was tremendously hard-working and meticulous. While he had an ebullient personality, usually good-humoured, cheerful and friendly, at times he could be annoying, but it was not widely known that he suffered from Crohn’s disease, and was often in pain or taking pain-killers. Given his state of health it is remarkable that he achieved so much and was active on so many fronts. His office and his desk were always neat and tidy: the mark of a well-organised scholar. When he died he was working on a small book about the future of universities in NZ with Professor Mike Grimshaw.
Colleagues and friends in Canterbury and around the world mourn the untimely death of a fine scholar and advocate for his field. They will miss his warmth and generosity. He never married, and is survived by his parents, Carol and Neville Jones, and his sister, Vanessa Phillips-Jones.