Dorothy Burr Thompson (center) with workmen from the Athenian Agora, 1937. (Photo: Courtesy of the Thompson Family.)

Dorothy Burr Thompson (center) on the Athenian Acropolis with friends, 1934.

Dorothy and Homer Thompson, Athens, 1938. (Photo: Courtesy of the Thompson Family.)

Dorothy Burr Thompson

An American classicist who spent over thirty years working at the Athenian Agora for the American School of Classical Studies at Athens, Dorothy Burr was born into a Philadelphia family of means and intellect and lived within walking distance of the University Museum of the University of Pennsylvania. Her parents introduced her to the Classics at an early age and took her to Europe at age 13. Her mother suggested to her a career in archaeology in which she could put her abilities in writing, drawing and photography to good purpose. The Burr family was in London during World War I and Dorothy was tutored in Latin and Greek at that time. In 1919 Dorothy Burr entered Bryn Mawr to study Classics and upon earning her B.A. in 1923, she was awarded a fellowship to study at the American School at Athens (1923-24), where she worked with Carl Blegen and Hetty Goldman (q.v. Breaking Ground) at Phlius and was subsequently invited by Goldman to join the Harvard-American School expedition at Eutresis near Thebes (1924-25), after which she joined Blegen at the School’s excavation at Prosynna in the Argolid. After two years in Greece, Dorothy returned home where her father had died and family finances had dwindled. She received a fellowship at Bryn Mawr, earning an M.A. in 1926. To pursue her doctorate, she went first to Radcliffe. It was there that she began work on a group of 117 Hellenistic terracotta figurines in Boston’s Museum of Fine Arts, which became the focus of her doctoral dissertation at Bryn Mawr (Ph.D. 1931). In 1932, Dr. Burr began her association with the Athenian Agora excavations of the American School, which led to the writing of twelve articles on the terracot6tas found there and to her marriage to the Assistant Field Director Homer Thompson, a Canadian in 1934. He taught at the University of Toronto and when, in 1942, he enlisted in the Canadian Navy, his wife took on his teaching responsibilities. After the war he was named Director of the American School’s Agora expedition and was given an endowed chair at the Institute for Advanced Study at Princeton. D.B.T. was offered the post of Acting Director of the Royal Ontario Museum for one year, and she used the office to encourage educational outreach programs. 1947 saw both Thompsons living in Princeton while spending summers in Athens. D.B.T. worked intensely on the plentiful terracottas from dated deposits at Athens and was able to outline the development of style, iconography and techniques used by the coroplasts there. She was then invited by Carl Bletgen to publish the terracottas from Troy. The 1960’s saw her study the origin of the controversial Tanagra figures and she also turned to the faience oinochoai commemorating Ptolemaic queens. The 1970’s began the Thompsons’ retirement years, filled with world travel and the receiving of honors. In 1987 she was awarded the gold medal for distinguished archaeological achievement by the Archaeological Institute of America and she received, for her 90th birthday, an honorary doctorate from the State University of New York at New Paltz and the catalogue for a special exhibit at Princeton and Cambridge in her honor devoted to the Coroplast’s art.

Author of biography: J. P. Uhlenbrock
Includes bibliography? Yes

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Keywords: Tanagra, Boeotia, terracotta figurines, Hellenistic Period, Greek religion, Archaeological Institute of America, Philadelphia, Charles Henry Burr Jr. Anna Robeson Brown, Latin High School, American Philosophical Society, Miss Hill’s School, Leonardo da Vinci, Morris Jastrow, University of Pennsylvania, University Museum, Edith Hall Dohan, World War I, Bryn Mawr, American School of Classical Studies at Athens, Mary Hamilton Swindler, Rhys Carpenter, Henry Neville Sanders, Phlius, Peloponnessos, Carl Blegen, Hetty Goldman, Eutresis, Bronze Age, Prosymna, Argolid, Midea, Argive Plain, Axil Persson, Radcliffe, Museum of Fine Arts Boston, Myrina, Louvre Museum, Franz Winter, Priene, Corinth, Lacey D. Caskey, Athenian Agora, Adolf Holzhausens, Lucy Shoe Meritt, Homer Thompson, T. Leslie Shear, Royal Ontario Museum, University of Toronto, German Archaeological Institute, Eugene Vanderpool, Gerhard Kleiner, Carl Blegen, Skmon the shoemaker, Middle Stoa, World War II, the Pnyx, Hesperia, Ontario Classical Association, Mary E. White, Phoenix, Institute for Advanced Study, Princeton, Hetty Goldman, Abraham Flexner, Gerhard Kleiner, Richard Vaughn Nicholls, Fitzwilliam MuseumElizabeth Jastrow, Troy, Istanbul, Ptolemaic queens, Alexandria, faience, Tazza Farnese, Morgantia, Margaret Rothman, coroplast, ancient gardens, Hellenistic terracottas