Van Mildert Professor of Divinity Divinity is Simon Oliver, who took up the appointment in 2015. Van Mildert Professor of Divinity The Van Mildert Professor of Divinity is one of the oldest chairs at Durham University. The chair is named in honour of Bishop William Van Mildert, one of the founders of the university. The holder of the Van Mildert chair, which is jointly funded by the university and Durham Cathedral, is also a residentiary canon at the cathedral and member of its Chapter, thus one of the requirements of post holder is to be an Anglican priest or a minister in another church in
Plato von Ustinov from Cracow and cannon-caster of Negus Tewodros II of Ethiopia, who was converted to Protestantism by missionaries of the St. Chrischona Pilgrim Mission. Her mother was the Ethiopian court-lady Katharina Hall (1850–1932), also known as Welette-Iyesus, who was of mixed Ethiopian-German origin, the daughter of the German painter (1813–1868) and court-lady Isette-Werq in Gondar, daughter of an Ethiopian general named Meqado (active before the mid-19th century). Ustinov and Magdalena Hall had five children. Among them were their eldest son Jona von Ustinov (father of British-Russian actor Peter Ustinov), Tabitha von Ustinow, Peter (Petja) von Ustinow (1895–1917, killed in action in