Charles Howard Carter, professor of history at Tulane University and a noted specialist on Spanish and European diplomacy in the 16th and early 17th centuries, died unexpectedly on March 24, 1990, at the age of 62.

Dr. Carter was born in Baker, OR, in 1927. He attended Willamette University and the University of Chicago before receiving his B.S. degree in 1957 from Columbia University, where he was Phi Beta Kappa. He subsequently earned master's and Ph.D. degrees in history from Columbia, doing research for his dissertation with the aid of Gilder and Lydig Traveling Fellowships and a Fulbright grant. He taught at Long Island University in 1959, at the University of Oregon from 1961 to 1963, and from 1963 until his death at Tulane, where he specialized in Spanish and English history during the period 1450 to 1650.

His dissertation was the basis of his widely acclaimed Secret Diplomacy of the Hapsburgs, 1598–1625, which received the Charles F. Ansley award. Dr. Carter also wrote a stimulating manual, The Western European Powers, 1500–1700, which discussed the various types of sources, collections, and repositories that can be drawn upon in the study of early modern diplomatic history.

Dr. Carter was also editor of a distinguished festschrift, From the Renaissance to the Counter-Reformation: Essays in Honor of Garrett Mattingly, to which he contributed a paper entitled, "The Ambassadors of Early Modern Europe: Patterns of Diplomatic Representation in the Early 17th Century," and of an abridged and revised edition of C.J. Burckhardt's Richelieu: His Rise to Power.

During his many years at Tulane, Dr. Carter was an energetic and active teacher of both graduate and undergraduate students. Active in university affairs, he was a vigorous chair of the History Department from 1975 to 1978. He was also a member of the American Historical Association, the English Historical Association, the Renaissance Society of America, and the Southern Historical Association. He will be remembered both as an innovative scholar and a dedicated teacher, and will be sorely missed by his students, colleagues, and friends.

Charles T. Davis
Tulane University