Urban T. Holmes Jr.
American historian (1900-1972)
Urban Tigner Holmes Jr. (July 13, 1900 – May 12, 1972) was an American scholar focusing on medieval literature and Romance philology.
The son of Commander Urban T. Holmes, United States Navy, Holmes was born in Washington, D.C. In 1916, he enrolled at the U.S. Naval Academy only to withdraw the following year for health reasons. In 1917, he began schooling at the University of Pennsylvania, where he studied Greek, Russian, Sanskrit, and Old French. After graduating with a Bachelors in 1920, Holmes continued his doctoral studies at Harvard and La Sorbonne. While at the Sorbonne, Holmes studied under scholars such as Joseph Bédier and Mario Roques.
Holmes taught at the University of Western Ontario and the University of Missouri before settling down at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in 1925. By 1945, he was the Kenan Professor of Romance Philology.
Urban T. Holmes was recognized both nationally and internationally for his scholarship. In 1950, he became a Chevalier de la Légion d'honneur.
“Urban T. Holmes Jr.” enters the record as american historian (1900-1972). Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what Urban, Holmes and American can confirm, complicate or overturn.
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The entry’s evidential value lies in the named roles, institutions and publications that can be tested against primary documentation. The source revision retrieved here is dated Aug 30, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q615432. VIAF identifies the subject as 17289660. The Library of Congress control number is n80032032. 3 of 3 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1900, 1972, 1916 and 1917.
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This entry incorporates text from “Urban T. Holmes Jr.” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.