A prolific author and leading authority on the history of the Baltic states in the 20th century has died, aged 72.

Professor John Hiden devoted the bulk of his career to summarising and interpreting the histories of Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia and contextualising their place in modern-day Europe.

Prof Hiden, who lectured for much of his career at the University of Bradford, lived in Guiseley and Burley -in-Wharfedale for more than 30 years, and was the driving force behind the creation of the Baltic Research Centre in the city in the late 1970s.

He went on to advise a variety of government departments and other agencies on policy in relation to the Baltic states.

Born in London in February 1940, Prof Hiden spent his early years at his grandparents’ home in Evesham, Worcestershire, after Nazi bombing destroyed the family flat in Acton.

After excelling at Acton County Grammar School, he went to Hull University in 1959 to study history.

On graduating, he enrolled at the School of Slavonic and European Studies in London to study for a doctorate, where his search for an appropriate topic led him to the Baltic states in the first half of the 20th century – an area in which little research work had been done.

In all, he wrote 15 histories. The first, The Weimar Republic, went into print in 1974 and became a standard textbook for those studying Germany in the years following the Armistice in 1918.

Subsequently, he focused more closely on the Baltic states, winning an award for his profile of Paul Schiemann (1876-1944), the Latvian politician and journalist who figured prominently in the struggle for independence in the first half of the 20th century.

He took up a lectureship in European History at the University of Bradford in 1979 where he was instrumental in 1988 in setting up the Baltic Research Centre.

Prof Hiden took early retirement from the university in the early 1990s, but his output on his pet subject only increased.

His credits include articles in scores of magazines, newspapers and academic publications across Europe, Scandinavia and the United States, and he was a frequent guest of the ambassadors of Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia at their respective London embassies.

Latterly, he received state awards from the Presidents of Estonia and Lithuania.

In his spare time he played clarinet and saxophone and enjoyed cinema.

Shortly before his death on August 10, he completed his first novel, Town And Gown. It went on sale last week.

Prof Hiden met his wife Juliet at an amateur theatre production of the show The King And I while studying in Hull. They married in 1964 and had two children, Hugo and Jessica.

As well as his wife and children, he leaves a grandson, Theo.

A funeral service took place at Lawnswood Cemetery, Leeds, yesterda