The Journal Of Classical And Sacred Philology

The Journal of Classical and Sacred Philology was founded by three Cambridge contemporaries, Joseph Barber Lightfoot, Fenton John Anthony Hort, and John Eyton Bickersteth Mayor, in 1854. The journal was devoted to the study of classical and sacred literature and was published triannually for the first four years. Volume 4, which was published in 1859, contains the 1857-9 issues. The journal is interesting for its combination of classical and patristic material, illuminating the close relationship between theology and classics in the period, and as an example from the early history of academic journals, an emerging genre which would develop into its current form over the following decades.

Contemporaries as Cambridge undergraduates in the late 1840s, Joseph Barber Lightfoot (1828-89), Fenton John Anthony Hort (1828-92), and John Eyton Bickersteth Mayor (1825-1910) all went on to distinguished careers. Mayor, a classical scholar, became President of St John's, while Lightfoot and Hort - members, along with Brooke Foss Westcott (1825-1901) of the 'Cambridge triumvirate' - were eventually appointed respectively Bishop of Durham and Lady Margaret Professor of Divinity at Cambridge. This short-lived triannual journal, which they founded and edited from 1854 to 1859, is interesting both for its combination of classical and patristic material, illuminating the close relationship between theology and classics in the period, and as an example from the early history of academic journals, an emerging genre which would develop into its current form over the following decades. Volume 4, published in 1859, contains the 1857-9 issues.