Occupation Translator, scholar Name Donald Matheson | Died January 14, 1979 | |
Born 20 June 1896 ( 1896-06-20 ) Titles Order of the British Empire |
Donald Macleod Matheson (occasionally only MacLeod Matheson) CBE (1896–1979) was Secretary to the National Trust from 1934 to 1945. Active within the Traditionalist School as a translator and author, he founded The Matheson Trust for the study of comparative religion.
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Life
Born into an aristocratic Scottish family, Matheson was educated at Balliol College, Oxford. After serving in the artillery during World War I, he held the post of Secretary to the National Trust, which with the years earned him an appointment as CBE in 1945. Matheson was a close friend of G. E. H. Palmer (author and translator of the Eastern Orthodox text, the Philokalia). He worked as a Director for John Smedley until his retirement in 1967. Matheson maintained associations with Perennialist authors for many years, and his translations of French works by Schuon and Burckhardt were published in the UK, India and Pakistan. Some of his translations were made in collaboration with Buddhist scholar Marco Pallis.