Cecilia Mary Ady was an English writer, academic and historian. She worked at the University of Oxford, and – like her mother – became known as an authority on the Italian Renaissance. She came to wider public attention after she was dismissed by a former friend from her college, and her colleagues supported her reinstatement.
Life
Ady was born in Edgcote in Northamptonshire in 1881, the only child of Rev. William Henry Ady, a clergyman, and his wife, Julia Cartwright Ady, a biographer and an amateur expert on the Italian Renaissance. Her mother's interest in Italy had been fired by her uncle, William Cornwallis Cartwright. Her mother took responsibility for Cecilia's education, and Cecilia obtained a place at Oxford, where she studied at St Hugh's Hall, and obtained a first in the honours school of modern history in 1903. She became a protégée of the historian Edward Armstrong. He was commissioned to oversee a book series titled "The States of Italy": his plans were not fully realised, but Ady's book, History of Milan under the Sforza was one of two to be published. In 1909 she joined St Hugh's as a tutor, where she developed a close relationship with the college's principal, Eleanor Jourdain. Jourdain eventually turned against Ady, allegedly jealous of her popularity. Ady was sacked from her position in November 1923, at Jourdain's insistence, for disloyalty. Jourdain felt that Ady had leaked information to the staff about her plans for introducing a vice-principal to the college. Ady protested, and a mass resignation followed, which included six of the college's council. The matter became of wider public interest, and Lord Curzon was asked to investigate. Ady's name was eventually cleared, and Jourdain died just before she was to be asked to resign. The inquiry resulted in improvements to the employment conditions of female tutors. Ady then became a tutor with the Society of Home Students. In 1929 her old college re-employed her as a research fellow. In 1938 she was awarded the degree of Doctor of Letters, after she published a monograph titled The Bentivoglio of Bologna: a Study in Despotism. Ady died in Oxford in 1958. Following her death, her colleagues and former research students compiled a memorial volume of donated essays, titled Italian Renaissance Studies.
