Gerald Bonner

It was Livingstone's meeting with Henry Morton Stanley on 10 November 1871 that gave rise to the popular quote, "Dr. Livingstone, I presume?"

The Crum Papers, of Walter Ewing Crum, proved of particular interest to Bonner, because of Crum's work compiling an authoritative Coptic dictionary.

Coptic, the latest stage of the language of ancient Egypt, is still spoken liturgically in the Coptic Orthodox and Coptic Catholic Church

In addition to his duties at the Museum, Bonner found time to pursue independent scholarship, and publish his first scholarly essays.

Gerald Bonner (18 June 1926 – 22 May 2013) was a conservative Anglican Early Church historian and scholar of religion, who lectured at the Department of Theology of Durham University from 1964 to 1988.

He was also an author and an internationally distinguished scholar of patristic studies.

Gerald Ian Bonner was born in London in 1926.

He was the child of Frederick John Bonner and Constance Emily Bonner.

In a continuation of his earlier interest, while in Tripoli, Bonner purchased a 1930 Turin reprint of St. Augustine's Confessions, which included notes by a seventeen-century German Jesuit, Heinrich Wangnereck.

His father, an Indian Army veteran, died in 1931, as a result of injuries received in World War I.

Constance was left to raise five-year-old Gerald and his three-year-old brother, Nigel Bonner, on a schoolteacher's salary.

Later in their lives, Gerald became a noted Early Church historian and scholar.

At the age of ten, Bonner was awarded a scholarship to the Stationers' Company's School in Hornsey, where he was educated, from 1936 to 1944.

However, in 1939, the school was evacuated to Wisbech for several years, due to World War II.

It was during this period, as a thirteen-year-old schoolboy in 1939, that a sermon sparked Bonner's lifelong interest in St. Augustine.

In 1944, at the age of eighteen, he joined the Army, serving as a wireless operator in Palestine with the First King’s Dragoon Guards before returning to England for officer training in 1947 and subsequently joining the regiment in its deployment to Libya.

After demobilization and a year of civilian employment, Bonner received an ex-serviceman's university grant making it possible for him to attend Wadham College, Oxford, where he studied modern history with Pat Thompson from 1949 to 1952.

and was awarded First Class Honours.

Although it was uncommon at the time, to engage in further studies, from 1952 to 1953 he undertook postgraduate research supervised by Fr. Thomas Corbishley, Master of Campion Hall (1945-1958), the Jesuit hall of studies at Oxford.

England was still suffering from the effects of the war, and twenty-seven year-old Bonner required employment.

As the result of a "rare opportunity", he left Oxford for London, to work in the Department of Manuscripts at the British Museum.

Bonner worked with the Department of Manuscripts at the British Museum, from 1953 until 1964, serving under Bertram Schofield and Theodore Cressy Skeat.

The opportunity to work with such a fine collection of manuscripts, and with the noted scholars on staff, was indeed, a "rare opportunity".

However, there were frustrations, due to the backlog of uncataloged manuscripts which had accumulated during the war years.

As a result, the staff were obliged to spend most of their time cataloguing mundane collections.

One of his colleagues at this time was Janet Backhouse, an authority in the field of illuminated manuscripts.

Some of his more interesting cataloging responsibilities included a tenth century Greek manuscript of the orations of the Cappadocian Father, St. Gregory Nazianzen, a 4th-century Archbishop of Constantinople, and theologian.

Bonner also cataloged the letters of David Livingstone, a Christian missionary, and explorer of Africa.

Bonner's interest in St. Augustine, sparked at the age of thirteen, came to fruition when, in 1963, he published his seminal study, St. Augustine of Hippo: Life and Controversies, the first of his published works on this important Church Father.

The "Church Fathers" were ancient and influential Christian theologians and writers who established the intellectual and doctrinal foundations of Christianity.

While attending the Oxford Patristic Conference of 1963, Bonner chanced to meet Hugh Turner, an Anglican priest, theologian, and academic.

Turner invited him to apply for a lecturership at Durham University.

He joined the Theology Department at Durham in 1964, and served as resident historian, and teacher of church history until 1988.

During this time, he was promoted to the rank of Reader of Theology in recognition of his high

standard of scholarship.

As of 1964, the Department of Theology was heavily oriented to biblical studies.

Bonner's appointment represented an attempt by the University to expand expertise in early Church history.

As a result, by the early 1970s, both Church History and Theology had become accepted tracks for Durham theology students.

Nigel became a zoologist, heading the Life Sciences Division of the British Antarctic Survey from 1974 to 1986, and retired as deputy director (1986 to 1988).

Nigel was awarded the Polar Medal in 1987.