Full Name: Droop, J. P.
Other Names:
- John Percival Droop
Gender: male
Date Born: 1882
Date Died: 1963
Place Died: Vence, Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur, France
Home Country/ies: United Kingdom
Subject Area(s): archaeology and Classical
Overview
Classical archaeologist; namesake of the “Droop cup” genre of kylix. Droop was descended from a Dutch family; his name was always pronounced according to that language. He was educated at Marlborough College and Trinity College, Cambridge, graduating in 1904. He worked as an archaeologist, both as a student and then as a member, at the British School in Athens, participating in their excavations at Sparta, Thessaly, Melos, and Crete. His published findings on a particular broad-lipped kylix (Greek drinking cup) resulted in classical scholars thereafter referring to the genre as “Droop cups.” In 1911 he participated in the Egypt Exploration Fund at Abydos (Upper Egypt), under the direction of T. Eric Peet (1882-1934). Peet and Droop developed a dating system for pre-dynastic Egyptian pottery which was not subsequently adopted. He worked for the Admiralty during the First World War through 1921. That year he was appointed Charles W. Jones chair in Classical Archaeology at the University of Liverpool. He remained at Liverpool, teaching for the rest of his career. As a scholar in Liverpool, Droop excavated in Britain at Chester, Bainbridge and Lancaster. He also participated in the Niebla, Spain, digs. He edited the Annals of Archaeology and Anthropology from 1937 until his retirement in 1948. Droop cups exist in many museum and classical-object collections.
Selected Bibliography
“Two Cyrenaic Kylikes.” Journal of Hellenic Studies 28 (1908): 175-179; “Pottery,” in Dawkins, Richard McGillivray, ed. The Sanctuary of Artemis Orthia at Sparta, Excavated and Described by Members of the British School at Athens, 1906-1910. London: Council of Learned Societies/Macmillan, 1929; translated, Xanthoudides, Stephanos Antoniou. The Vaulted Tombs of Mesará: an Account of Some Early Cemeteries of Southern Crete. Liverpool: University Press of Liverpool, 1924; Archaeological Excavation. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1915.
Sources
[obituary:] “Prof. J. P. Droop Classical Archaeology.” Times (London) October 7, 1963, p. 15.