Professor Arthur Dale Trendall, C.M.G., M.A., Litt.D., F.B.A.

Dale Trendall was born in Auckland, New Zealand, on 28 March 1909, and educated at King's College, Auckland, and the University of Otago, where he first read mathematics but switched to classics. In 1931 he was awarded a postgraduate scholarship to Trinity College, Cambridge, and subsequently a Rome scholarship which enabled him to spend two years as librarian at the British School at Rome. The research he did there on Italiot vases was the foundation for all his later work on the analysis and classification of red figure-decorated pottery from the Greek colonial cities of southern Italy from the fifth to the fourth centuries B.C., a subject on which he became the acknowledged world authority. When Enoch Powell returned to Britain in 1939, Trendall succeeded him to the chair of Greek (later extended to Greek and Archaeology) at the University of Sydney, and he remained there until 1954, interrupted by war service in Signals Intelligence working on Japanese naval codes. In 1954 he moved to Canberra as master of the new University House where, having already placed Mediterranean archaeology on the national academic agenda, he exerted great influence on the teaching of the humanities in general, and classical studies in particular, as a member of the Australian Universities Commission from 1959-70. In this capacity he was closely involved in the creation of the Australian Humanities Research Council, later the Australian Academy of Humanities. Trendall was also a member of the National Capital Planning Committee from 1958-67, playing a key role in the development of Canberra, and often advising the prime minister, Robert Menzies. At the same time, his dedicated research flourished; the diverse corpus of figure-decorated vases was examined, painstakingly put in order, dates assigned, the painters and workshops identified, and the whole body of work systematically brought up to date by the publication of supplements. Paestan Pottery appeared in 1936 (Supplement 1952, Addenda 1960); The Red-Figured Vases of Lucania, Campania and Sicily , in 1967 (Supplement 1 1970, II 1973, III 1983); The Red-Figured Vases of Apulia, with A. Cambitoglou, F.S.A., in 1978-82 (Supplements I 1983, II 1991-2); The Red-Figured Vases of Paestum, in 1987 and, lastly, Greek Red-Figured Fish-Plates, in 1987. After retirement in 1969 Trendall spent the rest of his life as Resident Fellow of La Trobe University in Bundoora, working on his publications. Until the last few years he made annual visits to Europe in pursuit of pottery, and always spent a few days in the Antiquaries' library. Despite his proud Antipodean origins, Trendall's old fashioned courtesy, impeccably tailored suits, precise speech and modest sense of humour, made him appear more English than the English, albeit of a disappearing vintage. His work was acknowledged by fellowship of many academies worldwide, by medals, and honorary doctorates. Trendall left his invaluable library to La Trobe, together with his equally precious photographic archive of southern Italian vases, to form the basis of a research centre for scholars of classical art. He died on 13 November 1995.