Education
University of Reading.
University of Reading.
She was known for her work on the families Cichlidae and Sciaenidae. She worked with Charles Tate Regan, another ichthyologist and taxonomist. She received her Bachelor"s degree and Board of Education Certificate in Teaching in 1921 from Reading University, and then worked as a teacher before being employed by the King"s College of Household and Social Science as a part-time demonstrator, spending most of her time on research.
She met Charles Regan and was employed by him as his assistant until hired by the Museum as Assistant Keeper in 1935.
She was appointed Deputy Keeper of Zoology in 1958, and retired in 1961. She served as the senior scientist in the Fish Section of the British Museum (Natural History) for almost 50 years, and was known internationally as an authority on several diverse groups of fishes.
She was best known for her work describing African Rift lake cichlids, but she published extensively on other groups as well. She used laboratory study and extended field trips to research her current areas of study, and often relied on interviews with local people to understand the behaviours, forms and food potential of fishes.
One example of the influence of Regan and Trewavas is that of the thirteen currently named genus categories of Lake Malawi mbuna, two are attributed to Regan and six to Trewavas.
Later in life she mentored prominent researcher Ad Konings, who has continued many of her areas of study. When her eyesight failed she insisted that he accept her stereo microscope as a gift so he could continue her work with African cichlids. Many fellow ichthyologists honoured Trewavas by naming newly discovered species after her.
Even during her lifetime, more fish species had received the specific epithet trewavasae ("of Trewavas") or ethelwynnae ("of Ethelwynn") than were named after most other modern fish researchers, underscoring the importance of her contribution to the field: Eustomias trewavasae Norman, 1930 Glyptothorax trewavasae Hora, 1938 Petrochromis trewavasae Poll, 1948 Symphurus trewavasae Chabanaud, 1948 Garra trewavasai Monod, 1950 Labeotropheus trewavasae Fryer, 1956 Garra ethelwynnae Menon, 1958 Neolebias trewavasae Poll & Gosse, 1963 Atrobucca trewavasae Talwar & Sathirajan, 1975 Protosciaena trewavasae (Chao & Miller, 1975) Linophryne trewavasae Bertelsen, 1978 Gobiocichla ethelwynnae Roberts, 1982 Phenacostethus trewavasae Parenti, 1986 Aulonocara ethelwynnae Meyer, Riehl & Zetzsche, 1987 Tylochromis trewavasae Stiassny, 1989 Triplophysa trewavasae Mirza & Ahmad, 1990 Johnius trewavasae Sasaki, 1992 Rhynchoconger trewavasae Ben-Tuvia, 1993 Trewavasia carinata Davis, 1887 After her death, the memory of her contributions remained.
Posthumous honorific names are, as of 2009: Copadichromis trewavasae Konings, 1999 Etia Schliewen & Stiassny, 2003 Placidochromis trewavasae Hanssens, 2004.
She was elected an Honorary Foreign Member of the American Society of Ichthyologists and Herpetologists in 1946, and awarded an honorary Doctor of Science degree by Stirling University in 1986.