Thomas Lionel Hodgkin (3 April 1910 – 25 March 1982) was an English Marxist historian of Africa, who was described by The Times at his death of having done "more than anyone to establish the serious study of African history" in the UK.
[2] Hodgkin was an exhibitioner at Winchester and from 1928 to 1932 a classics scholar at Balliol College, Oxford, where he also held a Higgs Memorial scholarship in English.
[4] A senior demyship at Magdalen College, Oxford, 1932–33, enabled him to travel; he spent the years on John Garstang's archaeological dig at Jericho.
[2] Returning to London, where he stayed with his father's cousin, Margery Fry, and joined the Communist Party, Hodgkin briefly tried training as a schoolteacher, before entering adult education.
[1] In 1939, declared ineligible for military service on medical grounds (he suffered from narcolepsy), Hodgkin became a Workers' Educational Association tutor in north Staffordshire.