Joyce Reynolds

Joyce Maire Reynolds (born 18 December 1918) is a British classicist and academic, specialising in Roman historical epigraphy. She is an honorary fellow of Newnham College, Cambridge. She has dedicated her life to the study and teaching of Classics. Reynolds' most significant publications were texts from the city of Aphrodisias. These included letters between Aphrodisian and Roman authorities.

Joyce Reynolds was born in Highams Park, Greater London, 18 December 1918. Both her parents came from Walthamstow, her father William Howe Reynolds was a Civil Servant and mother Nellie Farmer a school teacher. Joyce was educated at Walthamstow County Girls' school, and then St Paul's Girls School where she won a scholarship. She studied Classics at Somerville College Oxford, having been awarded an Exhibition between 1937–41. She graduated with a first class degree. (MA Oxon, 1944). During the war Joyce worked as a temporary civil servant, first as an Assistant Principle at the Board of Trade, later Principal.(1941-46)

From 1951 to 1979 Reynolds was Director of Studies in Classics at Newnham College, Cambridge and from 1957 to 1983 was a Lecturer in Classics at the University of Cambridge. From 1983 to 1984 she was a Reader in the Epigraphy of the Roman World at the University of Cambridge and remains an honorary fellow of Newnham College. In her nineties Joyce continues to work, playing a prominent role in the online publication of inscriptions of Aphrodisias (available online) and Roman Tripolitania. She is one of six British women born in 1918 or before who will be featured in The Century Girls, a book being written by Tessa Dunlop to commemorate the 100th anniversary of women getting the vote.

Selected publications