Celebrating Hampshire Historians

Pevsner, Nikolaus Bernhard Leon

30 January 1902 – 18 August 1983

Born in Leipzig to a Russian-Jewish family, the architectural historian Nikolaus Pevsner was educated at the universities of Leipzig, Munich, Berlin and Frankfurt. In 1933, he lost his lecturer’s post at Göttingen University due to the Nazis’ race laws and left Germany for England. In 1942, he became part-time lecturer (from 1959 professor) at Birkbeck College, London, a post he combined with writing and broadcasting, including giving the BBC’s annual Reith Lectures in 1955.

In 1945, he started work on the publishing project which is still closely associated with his name: the Buildings of England series of 46 county volumes (also known as ‘Pevsner Architectural Guides’ or simply ‘Pevsners’), whose first editions had been completed by 1974 and which quickly became a national institution. The volume for Hampshire and the Isle of Wight, 32nd in the series, was co-authored with David Lloyd and published in 1967. Pevsner always intended the first editions to be eventually superseded by revised editions, which in the case of Hampshire resulted in three expanded follow-up volumes: the Isle of Wight (2006), Hampshire: North (2010) and Hampshire: South (2018).

Pevsner was knighted for his services to art and architecture in 1969, the year he retired.

Sources

• Harries, Susie (2011), Nikolaus Pevsner: The Life, London

• Harrison, Brian (2004), ‘Pevsner, Sir Nikolaus Bernhard Leon (1902–1983), architectural historian’, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, accessed 27 March 2022

• Sorensen, Lee (n.d.), ‘Pevsner, Nikolaus Bernhard Leon, Sir’, Dictionary of Art Historians, accessed 27 March 2022

Portrait

Photographic portrait of Nikolaus Pevsner by Paul Joyce, 1975 (National Portrait Gallery, NPG x13416, accessed 27 March 2022). This image will open in a new tab/webpage.

Contribution to county’s history

The Buildings of England volume for Hampshire and the Isle of Wight filled a major gap in scholarship and demonstrated the central role buildings played in the county’s history. Pevsner also wrote an article on the buildings mentioned in the novels of Hampshire’s most famous novelist, Jane Austen.

Relevant published works

• Bullen, Michael, Crook, John, Hubbuck, Rodney & Pevsner, Nikolaus (2010) Hampshire: Winchester and the North (Buildings of England), New Haven and London

• Lloyd, David Wharton (2006) The Isle of Wight (Buildings of England), New Haven and London

• O’Brien, Charles, Bruce, Bailey, Lloyd, David W. & Pevsner, Nikolaus (2018) Hampshire: South (Buildings of England), New Haven and London

• Pevsner, Nikolaus & Lloyd, David (1967) Hampshire and the Isle of Wight (Buildings of England), Harmondsworth

• Pevsner, Nikolaus (1968) ‘The Architectural Setting of Jane Austen’s Novels’, Journal of the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes 31, 404-22

Critical Comments

Other Comments

The Buildings of England volumes are now published by Yale University Press.

Contributor

Johanna Roethe, 31 March 2022

Key Words

Hampshire, Isle of Wight, Architecture, Buildings

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