HART, Gillian (Jill) R. Eastbourne, Sussex 11.8.1934 — 8.2.2004. British Indo-European Linguist. Daughter of farmer Alexander and Catherine Hart. During the war the family moved to Devon and 1945 to South Oxfordshire. After school in Reading 1947-53 one year studies at Reading University, then from 1954 at Oxford (Lady Margaret Hall, mainly Classics, also Sanskrit under Burrow), M.A, in Hittite. In 1960-69 Lecturer in Classics at University College of Wales, Aberystwyth. B.Phil. 1967 Oxford, in Hittite. In 1969-93 Lecturer at Durham University, then took early retirement. She was conscientious teacher who, beside linguistics, also taught classical literature, but all vacations and sabbaticals she spent in Oxford concentrating on research. In retirement she suffered of ill-health and deteriorating eyesight, but nevertheless also taught Hittite.
Beside IE Hart was mainly interested in Anatolian and Mycenaean. Rejecting the Indo-Hittite theory she nevertheless emphasized the importance of Hittite evidence for Proto-IE reconstruction.
Publications: Articles, mainly on Mycenaean and Hittite, i. al. “Anatolian evidence and the origins of the Indo-European mediopassive”, BSOAS 51, 1988, 69-95; “‘Class I present’, subjunctive and middle voice in Indo-European”, BSOAS 53, 1990, 446-468.
– Reviews of Indological books in JRAS 1988, 439-442 & 1990, 178-181 & 1994, 452-454; BSOAS 55, 1992, 346.
– Obiturary of T. Burrow, BSOAS 50, 1987, 347-257.
Sources: Brief obituary in university home page; Titus; E. Tucker, JRAS 39, 2006, 83-88 with bibliography.
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