Arthur Elam Haigh

Arthur Elam Haigh (1855–1905) was an English classical scholar.

Life Born in Leeds on 27 February 1855, he was the third son, in a family of three sons and two daughters, of Joseph Haigh, a chemist, by his wife Lydia, daughter of Charles James Duncan. He was educated at Leeds Grammar School, and on 22 October 1874 matriculated at Corpus Christi College, Oxford with a scholarship. As an undergraduate, he took a first class in classical moderations in 1875 and in literæ humaniores in 1878; he won the two Gaisford prizes for Greek verse (1876) and Greek prose (1877), the Craven Scholarship (1879), and the Stanhope Essay Prize on the topic Political Theories of Dante (1878). He made speeches at the Oxford Union on the Liberal side, and he rowed in the Corpus Christi eight.

On graduating B.A. in 1878 (M.A. 1881) Haigh was elected to a fellowship at Hertford College, which he held till 1886. He became classical lecturer at Corpus Christi also in 1878, and for the next twenty-seven years taught there and at other colleges. In 1901 he was admitted fellow of Corpus Christi, and was appointed senior tutor the following year. He was classical moderator in 1888–9, and again in 1897–8. He laid more stress than most Oxford tutors of his time on verbal accuracy and the need for close textual study.