R. E. Latham

Ronald Edward Latham (1907-1992) was an English classicist best known for his translation of On the Nature of the Universe by Lucretius. He also translated The Travels of Marco Polo and Bede's 'Ecclesiastical History of the English People.

Latham was educated at Royal Grammar School, Newcastle and Balliol College, Oxford, where he read Literae humaniores. In 1934 he was appointed Assistant Keeper at the Public Record Office. His 1938 lectures at the St Pancras Working Men's College were published in book form as In Quest of Civiliation (1946).

In 1968 he was appointed the first editor of the Dictionary of Medieval Latin from British Sources. In 1977 he retired, and was succeeded by David Howlett.

• In quest of civilization. London: Jarrolds, 1946.
• (tr.) Lucretius on the nature of the universe by Lucretius. Harmondsworth, England: Penguin, 1951.
• (tr.) The travels of Marco Polo, the Venetian by Marco Polo. Harmondsworth, England: Penguin, 1958.
• (ed.) Revised medieval Latin word-list from British and Irish sources. London: Published for the British Academy by the Oxford University Press, 1965
• (tr.) Ecclesiastical history of the English people with Bede's letter to Egbert and Cuthbert's letter on the death of Bede.