Ethna Byrne-Costigan
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
24 May 1904
Ethna Byrne-Costigan | |
|---|---|
| Born | Ethna Mary Byrne 24 May 1904 Upper Leeson Street, Dublin |
| Died | 12 January 1991 (aged 86) Palmerstown Villas, Rathmines, Dublin |
| Spouse |
George Costigan
(m. 1941; died 1951) |
| Children | 1 |
Ethna Byrne-Costigan (24 May 1904 – 12 January 1991) was an Irish academic and writer.[1]
Ethna Byrne-Costigan was born at Upper Leeson Street, Dublin on 24 May 1904. She was the eldest daughter of the chief architect to the Office of Public Works, Thomas Joseph Byrne and Mary Ellen Byrne (née Scott). In her youth, she was sent to Italy to live with relatives, attending Les Dames de Scion convent in Rome. When she returned to Dublin she lived alternately with her grandfather and aunts in Dartmouth Square, and in Ballyboden and later Rathgar with her parents. She was schooled at Loreto Hall in St Stephen's Green, going on to attend University College Dublin. In 1925 she graduated with a first class BA in modern languages, and in 1927 a first class MA in French. She went on to study for her doctorate at the Sorbonne in Paris with the thesis Bourdaloue moraliste, which was published by Beauchesne.[1]
Career
Byrne-Costigan was appointed professor of Romance languages at University College Cork (UCC) in 1939, after the retirement of Mary Ryan. She stayed in this position until 1969, establishing the Italian department and introducing a refresher course for French teachers. Her academic publications focused on studies of Le bourgeois gentilhomme by Molière, Athalie by Jean Racine, and Horace by Pierre Corneille. She translated Le mie prigioni by Silvio Pellico into Irish, which is held by the Pellico Museum in Turin. Her Irish translation of a collection of Salvatore Quasimodo's poems was published by the Italian Institute. She founded the Dante Alighieri Society in Cork with Dr Piero Calì, serving as the president from 1956 to 1969.[1][2]
She retired from UCC, taking up part-time lecturing at Trinity College Dublin on Italian philology and medieval texts. Byrne-Costigan was a member of the Irish national committee of UNESCO, and represented Ireland twice at the biennial UNESCO conference in Paris. She was also the honorary secretary of the Celtic Congress. In 1960 she was made a Grand Officer Order of Merit of the Italian Republic for her work on promoting Italian culture and the language in Ireland.[1][3]
