Kate Norgate

Born in London on December 8, 1853, Kate Norgate was a British historian who built a serious scholarly career at a time when higher education was still largely closed to women. She was self-educated, and her work quickly earned notice from leading historians of the day.

She is best known for England under the Angevin Kings, a major study of the 12th- and 13th-century English monarchy, and for introducing the term “Angevin Empire,” which is still widely used. She also wrote historical works on figures including King John and Richard the Lionheart, helping bring medieval political history to a broad readership.

Norgate died on April 17, 1935. She is remembered as one of the first women in Britain to achieve major recognition as a historian, admired for careful research and for making a complicated period of English history vivid and readable.