Antony Lentin

Anthony Lentin
Born	1941
Occupation(s)	Barrister History tutor
Known for	Studies of Lloyd George, Henry McCardie
Academic work
Institutions	Open University Wolfson College, Cambridge
Notable works	Lloyd George, Woodrow Wilson and the Guilt of Germany (1984) Banker, Traitor, Scapegoat, Spy? (2013) Mr Justice McCardie (1869-1933) (2016)

Antony Lentin, also known as Tony, ^[1] (born 1941) is a British scholar, former barrister, and professor of history and law at the Open University. He is a distinguished member of Wolfson College, Cambridge, and a fellow of the Royal Historical Society. ^[2]

Known for his studies on Lloyd George, Lentin uses his career to examine broader themes such as Germany’s position after the First World War, the impact of the war, the making of liberal foreign policies, how peace treaties shaped future conflicts, and the controversies surrounding appeasement. His major works include Lloyd George, Woodrow Wilson and the Guilt of Germany (1984), The Versailles peace settlement : peacemaking with Germany (1991), and Lloyd George and the Lost Peace: From Versailles to Hitler, 1919-1940 (2001).

Works

Lentin's research has covered a range of historical figures and topics. ^[3] He has written on Peter the Great, ^{[4] [5] [6]} with British historian Paul Dukes, and American historian James Cracraft describing Peter the Great: His Law on the Imperial Succession (1996) as "scholarly", ^{[7] [8]} with "extensive notes and commentary". ^[9] He has also written on Catherine the Great. ^{[5] [10]}

Lentin has focused particularly on Lloyd George, using his career to explore wider issues including Germany’s role after the First World War, the impact of the war, the making of liberal foreign policies, how peace treaties shaped future conflicts, and debates over appeasement. ^{[11] [12] [13]} His major works include Lloyd George, Woodrow Wilson and the Guilt of Germany (1984), ^{[14] [15] [16]} The Versailles peace settlement : peacemaking with Germany (1991), and Lloyd George and the Lost Peace: From Versailles to Hitler, 1919-1940 (2001). ^{[17] [18] [19]} His other works includes studies of Lord Sumner, ^[20] and General Smuts's role at the 1919 Paris Peace Conference. ^{[21] [22]} The peace settlement of 1919 has in addition been a feature of several of his journal articles. ^[23]

Later, Lentin studied and wrote on Edgar Speyer. ^{[24] [25]} In his biography of Speyer, Banker, Traitor, Scapegoat, Spy? The Troublesome Case of Sir Edgar Speyer (2013), Lentin states that Speyer was crucial to funding Captain Scott's Antarctic expeditions, developing the London Underground, and founding proms. ^[26]

After contributing an entry on Justice McCardie to the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography , Lentin went on to research and write his full length biography, Mr Justice McCardie (1869-1933): Rebel, Reformer, and Rogue Judge (2016). ^{[27] [28] [29]} It includes a detailed chapter on the O'Dwyer v. Nair Libel Case of 1924. ^[30]

Selected publications

Books

• Russia in the Eighteenth Century: From Peter the Great to Catherine the Great [1696-1796). Heinemann Educational. 1973. ISBN   978-0-435-32523-7.
• Lloyd George, Woodrow Wilson and the Guilt of Germany: An Essay in the Pre-history of Appeasement. Leicester University Press. 1984. ISBN   978-0-7185-1251-4.
• The Versailles peace settlement : peacemaking with Germany. London : Historical Association. 1991. ISBN   978-0-85278-324-5.
• Peter the Great: His Law on the Imperial Succession : the Official Commentary (Pravda Voli Monarshei). Oxford: Headstart History. 1996. ISBN   978-1-85943-001-9.
• Lloyd George and the Lost Peace: From Versailles to Hitler, 1919-1940. Springer. 2001. ISBN   978-0-230-51148-4.
• The Last Political Law Lord: Lord Sumner (1859-1934). Cambridge Scholars Publishing. 2008. ISBN   978-1-4438-0381-6.
• General Smuts: South Africa. Haus Publishing. 2010. ISBN   978-1-907822-07-0.
• Banker, Traitor, Scapegoat, Spy?: The Troublesome Case of Sir Edgar Speyer. Haus Publishing. 2013. ISBN   978-1-908323-17-0.
• Mr Justice McCardie (1869-1933): Rebel, Reformer, and Rogue Judge. Cambridge Scholars Publishing. 2016. ISBN   978-1-4438-7864-7.

Articles

• "Trick or treat? The Anglo-French Alliance, 1919". History Today. 42 (12): 28. 1 December 1992.
• "Several types of ambiguity: Lloyd George at the Paris peace conference". Diplomacy and Statecraft. 1 March 1995. doi:10.1080/09592299508405960.
• "'Une aberration inexplicable'? Clemenceau and the abortive Anglo‐French guarantee treaty of 1919". Diplomacy and Statecraft. 1 July 1997. doi:10.1080/09592299708406042.
• "Maynard Keynes and the 'Bamboozlement' of Woodrow Wilson: What Really Happened at Paris? (Wilson, Lloyd George, pensions and pre-armistice agreement)". Diplomacy & Statecraft. 15 (4): 725–763. 1 December 2004. doi:10.1080/09592290490886829. ISSN   0959-2296.
• "Germany: a New Carthage?". History Today. 62 (1): 20. 1 January 2012.

References

1. Page, Alan (3 September 2013). "New Book". Overstrand Parish Council. Archived from the original on 21 August 2025. Retrieved 20 August 2025.
2. "Banker, Traitor, Scapegoat, Spy? by Anthony Lentin - Haus Publishing". 23 March 2021. Archived from the original on 19 August 2025. Retrieved 19 August 2025.
3. "Antony Lentin". LibraryThing.com. Archived from the original on 19 August 2025. Retrieved 17 August 2025.
4. Hughes, Lindsey (1998). "Review of Peter the Great: His Law on the Imperial Succession in Russia, 1722. The Official Commentary. Pravda voli monarshei vo opredelenii naslednika derzhavy svoei" . The Slavonic and East European Review. 76 (1): 160–161. ISSN   0037-6795.
5. McConnell, Allen (September 1976). "Russia In The Eighteenth Century: From Peter The Great To Catherine The Great (1696-1796)" . Slavic Review. 35 (3): 532–533. doi:10.2307/2495128. ISSN   0037-6779.
6. Lee, Stephen J. (1993). "3. Peter the great's internal reforms". Peter the Great. Abingdon, Oxon: Routledge. p. 37. ISBN   978-1-136-45325-0.
7. Dukes, P (1 September 1999). "Shorter notice. Peter the Great. His Law on the Imperial Succession in Russia, 1722. The Official Commentary. A Lentin (ed)" . The English Historical Review. 114 (458): 994–995. doi:10.1093/ehr/114.458.994. ISSN   0013-8266.
8. Cracraft, James (2009). The Revolution of Peter the Great. Harvard University Press. p. 178. ISBN   978-0-674-02994-1.
9. Cracraft, James (2009). The Petrine Revolution in Russian Culture. Harvard University Press. ISBN   978-0-674-02996-5.
10. Wuthnow, Robert (2009). Communities of Discourse: Ideology and Social Structure in the Reformation, the Enlightenment, and European Socialism. Harvard University Press. pp. 299–300. ISBN   978-0-674-04540-8.
11. Fry, Michael Graham (2002). "Review of Lloyd George and the Lost Peace: From Versailles to Hitler, 1919-1940" . The International History Review. 24 (3): 674–676. ISSN   0707-5332.
12. Elcock, Howard (2018). Could the Versailles System have Worked?. Switzerland: Springer. p. 48. ISBN   978-3-319-94734-1.
13. Baxter, C.; Dockrill, M.; Hamilton, K. (2013). Britain in Global Politics Volume 1: From Gladstone to Churchill. Springer. p. 176. ISBN   978-1-137-36782-2.
14. Unterberger, Betty Miller (1986). "The Treaty of Versailles: Carthaginian Peace or Pragmatic Compromise?" . Reviews in American History. 14 (3): 398–404. doi:10.2307/2702615. ISSN   0048-7511.
15. Williams, Andrew J. (2025). Liberalism and War: The Victors and the Vanquished. Abingdon, Oxon: Routledge. p. 223. ISBN   978-1-040-26853-7.
16. "The Treaty of Versailles and The Carthaginian Peace: Peacemaking and Mythmaking 1918-1919". www.cambridgescholars.com. Archived from the original on 20 August 2025. Retrieved 20 August 2025.
17. Kitching, Carolyn (2002). "Review of Lloyd George and the Lost Peace: From Versailles to Hitler, 1919-1940" . History. 87 (288): 631–632. ISSN   0018-2648.
18. Black J. Lloyd George and the Lost Peace/Does Peace Lead to War?/Three Postwar Eras in Comparison (Book). History Today. 2002;52(7):58.
19. Martel, Gordon (2011). A Companion to Europe, 1900 - 1945. John Wiley & Sons. p. 569. ISBN   978-1-4443-9167-1.
20. Matlock, Wendy A. (March 2010). "The Last Political Law Lord: Lord Sumner (1859–1934)". Law & Society Review. 44 (1): 198–200. doi:10.1111/j.1540-5893.2010.00400_6.x. ISSN   0023-9216.
21. Katz, David (2024). "5. Discovering General Smuts through the lens of World War I in Africa". In Boucher, David; Ngqulunga, Bongani (eds.). Reappraising the Life and Legacy of Jan C. Smuts (in Arabic). University of Johannesburg Press. p. 140. ISBN   978-1-7764896-8-8.
22. Robinson, Will (1 May 2010). "A firm believer in leniency". The Spectator. Archived from the original on 20 August 2025. Retrieved 20 August 2025.
23. Sharp, Alan; Stone, Glyn; Stone, Professor Glyn A. (2002). Anglo-French Relations in the Twentieth Century: Rivalry and Cooperation. London: Routledge. p. 9. ISBN   978-1-134-69073-2.
24. Phythian, Mark (1 April 2015). "Book Review: Banker, Traitor, Scapegoat, Spy? The Troublesome Case of Sir Edgar Speyer by Antony Lentin" . War in History. 22 (2): 253–255. doi:10.1177/0968344515575852b. ISSN   0968-3445.
25. Dutton, David (2013). "Scapegoat for Liberalism?" (PDF). Journal of Liberal History.
26. "Scott Polar Research Institute, Cambridge » Recent news". www.spri.cam.ac.uk. University of Cambridge. 27 October 2014. Retrieved 22 August 2025.
27. Grabiner, Anthony (November 2018). "Mr Justice McCardie (1869–1933): Rebel, Reformer, and Rogue Judge" . The Cambridge Law Journal. 77 (3): 636–639. doi:10.1017/S0008197318000454. ISSN   0008-1973.
28. Magrath, Paul (2 May 2017). "Book review: Mr Justice McCardie (1869-1933) – Rebel, Reformer, and Rogue Judge". ICLR. Incorporated Council of Law Reporting. Retrieved 20 August 2025.
29. Pascoe, Nigel (27 June 2017). "Mr Justice McCardie (1869-1933) – Rebel, Reformer, and Rogue Judge". Counsel Magazine. Archived from the original on 21 August 2025. Retrieved 21 August 2025.
30. Kha, Henry (May 2018). "Mr Justice McCardie (1869–1933): Rebel, Reformer and Rogue Judge" . Ecclesiastical Law Journal. 20 (2): 220–222. doi:10.1017/S0956618X18000133. ISSN   0956-618X.