Lady Charlotte Guest | |
|---|---|
.jpg) Portrait of Lady Charlotte Guest | |
| Born | Charlotte Elizabeth Bertie 19 May 1812 Uffington, Lincolnshire, England |
| Died | 15 January 1895 (age 82) Canford Manor, Dorset |
| Occupation(s) | Translator, businesswoman |
| Spouses | |
| Children | Charlotte Maria Guest Ivor Bertie Guest Katharine Gwladys Guest Thomas Merthyr Guest Montague Guest Augustus Frederick Guest Arthur Edward Guest Mary Enid Evelyn Guest Constance Rhiannon Guest Blanche Guest |
| Parent(s) | Albemarle Bertie, 9th Earl of Lindsey Charlotte Susannah Elizabeth Layard |
Lady Charlotte Elizabeth Guest (née Bertie; 19 May 1812 – 15 January 1895), later Lady Charlotte Schreiber, was an English aristocrat who is best known as the first publisher in modern print format of the Mabinogion, the earliest prose literature of Britain. Guest established the Mabinogion as a source literary text of Europe, claiming this recognition among literati in the context of contemporary passions for the chivalric romance of King Arthur and the Gothic movement. The name Guest used for the book was derived from a mediaeval copyist's error, already established in the 18th century by William Owen Pughe and the London Welsh societies.
As an accomplished linguist and the wife of a foremost Welsh[citation needed] ironmaster John Josiah Guest, she became a leading figure in the study of literature and the wider Welsh Renaissance of the 19th century. With her second husband, Charles Schreiber, she became a well known Victorian collector of porcelain; their collection is held in the Victoria and Albert Museum. She also created major collections of fans, games, and playing cards, which she gave to the British Museum.[1] She was noted as an international industrialist, pioneering liberal educator, philanthropist and elite society hostess.[2]
- ^ Lady Charlotte Schreiber (Biographical details), British Museum. Accessed 8 May 2019
- ^ David Jones, "Lady Charlotte Guest: Victorian Businesswoman" History Today (1973) 23#1 pp 38-45.