Grierson Constantia

Grierson Constantia

nee Crawley

Kilkenny and Dublin

1706

Constantia

Grierson

Carpenter, 203; DNB; Fullard, 556; Lonsdale, (1989), 91-3; Rowton, 161-2; Todd, Dictionary of...Women Writers 1660-1800; Backscheider, 406; Backscheider & Ingrassia, 875

(Occasional) [--Iain Rowley] Irish printer’s wife, daughter of ‘poor illiterate country people’, self-taught classicist, born in Graiguenamanagh, Co. Kilkenny. Although born to a poor family, Grierson’s father facilitated her rapid mastery of the classical languages through supplying her with suitable volumes. She proceeded to garner further instruction from the minister of the parish when she could find time away from her needlework. At age 18, Grierson was appointed to a Dublin physician to train as a midwife, and married George Grierson, the King’s Printer, soon after her arrival. This granted her the direct means for publishing her own work, and she produced three editions of Latin classics: Virgil (1724), Terence (1727) and Tacitus (1730). Dr E. Harwood considered the latter to be ‘one of the best edited books ever delivered to the world’. Grierson was working on an edition of Sallust when she died at 27. Her Poems on Several Occasions was printed in 1735, but many of her poems are no longer extant; a few have survived mainly through inclusion in collections. Laetitia Pilkington ranked her talent beyond that of any other woman writer of her era, singling out a poem on ‘Bishop Berkeley’s Bermudian Scheme’—which presented the Bishop as a true ambassador of Christ—as particularly noteworthy. Of her two sons, one died young, while the other, George Abraham Grierson, grew to be King’s Printer. Like his mother, he died at 27, after a spell of recognition for his exceptional knowledge, wit and vigour.

Classicist

1733

Irish

‘The Goddess Envy’ (1730), Poems on Several Occasions (London: Printed for C. Rivington 1735), ‘On the Art of Printing’ (1764)

Yes