Helen Maud Cam (1885–1968) was an English historian known for her contributions to medieval history and local government studies. She was the first woman to hold a tenured professorship at Harvard University, a milestone in academia.
Born in Abingdon, Berkshire (now Oxfordshire,) England, Cam studied at Royal Holloway College, University of London, earning a First in History. She pursued an MA in Anglo-Saxon and Frankish studies, leading to her first book, Local Government in Francia and England, 768–1034 (1912.) She held academic positions at Royal Holloway, Girton College, and Harvard, where she became Zemurray Radcliffe Professor of History (1948–54.)
Notable works include Studies in the Hundred Rolls (1921,) The Hundred and the Hundred Rolls (1930,) Liberties and Communities in Medieval England (1944,) and England before Elizabeth (1950.) She also edited Selected Historical Essays of F. W. Maitland (1957.)
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As soon as you begin to say “We have always done things this way—perhaps that might be a better way,” conscious law-making is beginning. As soon as you begin to say “We do things this way—they do things that way—what is to be done about it?” men are beginning to feel towards justice, that resides between the endless jar of right and wrong.
—Helen Cam
Topics: Law
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