Alfred Philippson

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Alfred Philippson (born January 1, 1864 in Bonn ; died March 28, 1953 there ) was a German geographer .

biography

education and profession

Alfred Philippson was the youngest son of the rabbi and publicist Ludwig Philippson and his second wife Mathilde. The historian Martin Philippson was his brother.

Philippson studied in Bonn and Leipzig Geography , geology , mineralogy and economics . In 1886 he was given a doctorate by Ferdinand Freiherr von Richthofen at the University of Leipzig with the dissertation Studies on Watersheds . After completing his studies in paleontology in Munich , Philippson began his first trip to Greece in 1887. Philippson received his habilitation in 1891 with his work The Peloponnese - An Attempt at Regional Studies on a Geological Basis . On December 15 he gave his inaugural lecture and was admitted to Bonn as a private lecturer in 1892. However, he did not receive the title "Professor" until 1899.

In the last decade of the 19th century, Philippson toured northern Greece (1893), Constantinople , the Aegean Islands (1896) and Russia (1897). Before he was appointed to the full professorship for geography at the University of Bern in 1904, further research trips followed through Asia Minor . After a stopover at the University of Halle-Wittenberg , he returned to Bonn in 1911.

Philippson's efforts were aimed at expanding and further developing geography as a scientifically equivalent branch of geography. By systematically expanding the library, map collection and seminar rooms until his retirement in 1929, Philippson created one of the most modern geographic institutes in Germany in Bonn.

family

In 1892 Alfred Philippson married Lina Anna Simoni . From this marriage there were four children. After the early death of Lina Anna Simoni in 1906, Philippson married Margarete Kirchberger in 1919 .

Pursuit and return

In 1933 Philippson was banned from teaching, after which he was only able to publish his publications abroad. In 1938 his passport was revoked. Because of his friendship with Sven Hedin , Philippson initially remained unmolested. In July 1941, the Bonn Gestapo confiscated Philippson's house and assigned him with his wife Margarete and daughter Dora to a small apartment in the house of the Jewish lawyer Wollstein. In 1941/42 he tried to get an entry permit for Switzerland. On June 8, 1942, he was deported to Theresienstadt with his wife Margarete and daughter Dora . Sven Hedin sat down (also at the request of colleagues and relatives of Philippsons) with the Nazis on behalf of his friend and former fellow student. His interventions led to his classification as "A-Prominent" and to easing the family's detention so that they could ultimately survive the concentration camp. From October 1942 on, Philippson wrote his memoirs How I became a geographer in Theresienstadt . The daughter Dora only escaped deportation to an extermination camp because she had to look after her sick father. On April 20, 1945, however, all family members received a “request” from the SS camp management to be ready for “enlistment” in a “transport”. Before that happened, Theresienstadt was handed over to the Red Cross on May 3, 1945 and then liberated by the Red Army . Because the camp was subsequently quarantined , it took several months for her to be released.

Dora, Margarete and Alfred Philippson returned to Bonn on July 10, 1945.

Correspondence with Sven Hedin after his return

Alfred Philippson's college friend Sven Hedin

The Swede Sven Hedin exchanged letters with Alfred Philippson for decades and regularly sent him food parcels to the Theresienstadt concentration camp. On May 29, 1946, Alfred Philippson wrote to him (literal quote, abbreviated): “My dear Hedin! The opening of the letter post abroad gives me the opportunity to write to you ... We often think with heartfelt gratitude of our lifesaver, to whom it is solely to be attributed that we survived the terrible time of three years of confinement and hunger in the Theresienstadt concentration camp alive in mine Age a real miracle. You know that we few survivors were finally liberated a few days before our impending gas death . We, my wife, daughter and I were then brought back to our almost half-destroyed hometown on July 9/10, 1945 in a bus from the city of Bonn ... "

Sven Hedin replied on June 19, 1946 (literal quote, abbreviated): “… I cannot describe the joy I experienced when I received your lovely letter of May 29 the day before yesterday! It sounds like a fairy tale! Recently, as the Russians were getting closer and closer, I was very afraid for you, your dear wife and your daughter, that your life was in great danger and that all the residents of Theresienstadt would disappear without a trace. For these reasons, letters and mailings were out of the question. And so suddenly your fabulous letter came and I and my sister Alma were suddenly happy to know that you, post dead discrimina rerum, were saved and without danger! It was too good to learn that our efforts had not been in vain. During these difficult years we had over a hundred similar, unfortunate people who were dragged to Poland to rescue, but in the vast majority of cases we did not succeed. We were able to help some Norwegians. My home in Stockholm was turned into a kind of information and assistance office and I had excellent help from Dr. Paul Grassmann, press attaché at the German legation in Stockholm. He didn't spare any effort to be active in humanitarian work either. But in almost no case has it been as happy as your, dear old friend! And how nice that you are back in Bonn.… ”(Previously unpublished letters from the Riksarkivet in Stockholm, file: Sven Hedins Arkiv, Korrespondens, Tyskland, 487; there is the entire correspondence, which contains further information about Alfred Philippson. )

The names and fates of the more than one hundred deported Jews, for whose release Sven Hedin campaigned, have not yet been researched. The names and fates of the Norwegians are known (see Sven Hedin ).

The last years in Bonn

Without being able to move into his old house again, Alfred Philippson resumed his publishing activities at the age of 81 and in November 1945 he was given a renewed license to teach.

Alfred Philippson died on March 28, 1953 at the age of 89, his wife Margarete Philippson also died in 1953. The daughter Dora Philippson could no longer teach as a teacher because of her permanently damaged health. Until shortly before the end of her life in 1980, she campaigned for the reconciliation of Jews and Christians in the Bonn synagogue community , in the Jewish Women's Association and in the Bonn Society for Christian-Jewish Cooperation .

Functions

  • Chairman of the Geography Expert Committee in the Notgemeinschaft der Deutschen Wissenschaft founded in 1920 (1920–1928)
  • Chairman of the Central Committee of the German Geographers' Day (1921–1925)
  • Foundation and organization of the Association of German University Professors in Geography (1925–1929)

Awards and prizes (selection)

  • Carl Ritter Medal (1899)
  • Member of the Leopoldina (1907)
  • Honorary doctorate from the University of Athens (1912)
  • Secret Government Council (1915)
  • Golden Ferdinand von Richthofen Medal (1933) (together with Erich von Drygalski and Sven Hedin)
  • Honorary doctorate from Bonn University (1946)
  • Entry in the "Golden Book" of the city of Bonn (1947)
  • Gustav Steinmann Medal (1947)
  • Federal Cross of Merit (1952)

Since February 6, 2006, the lecture hall of the Geographical Institute of the University of Bonn has been named Alfred Philippsons.

Fonts

  • The Greek landscapes. Four volumes, Klostermann, Frankfurt am Main 1950–1959.
  • Studies on watersheds. Diss. 1886.
  • The Mediterranean, its geographical and cultural characteristics. 1904, 4th edition 1922.
  • Europe. 1906 with Prof. Dr. Ludwig Neumann, Volume of Sievers' General Regional Geography.
  • Basics of General Geography. Three volumes, 1920–1924.
  • How I became a geographer. 1942/1996, ISBN 3-416-02620-9 .
  • Land and sea of ​​the Greeks. 1946.
  • The climate of Greece. 1948.
  • Handbook of regional geology: Asia Minor. In: Handbook of Regional Geology , Volume 22, 1968.

literature

  • Johanna Philippson: The Philippsons, a German-Jewish Family 1775-1933. In: Leo Baeck Institute Yearbook. 7 (1962): 95-118 (English).
  • Astrid Mehmel: “How I became a geographer” - aspects of Alfred Philippson's life. In: Geographische Zeitschrift 82, 1994, pp. 116-132.
  • Astrid Mehmel, Claudia Hermes: Alfred Philippson - Memoirs of a Geographer - Looking beyond his Judaism . In: Construction New York LX 16, August 5, 1994, pp. 4-5.
  • Astrid Mehmel: German revision policy in geography after the First World War. In: Geographische Rundschau 9, September 1995, pp. 498–505.
  • Hans Böhm, Astrid Mehmel: Alfred Philippson: How I became a geographer. Recorded in the Theresienstadt concentration camp between 1942 and 1945. Edited and commented on by Hans Böhm and Astrid Mehmel. Bonn 1996. Extended edition Bonn 2000.
  • B. Brandenburg, Astrid Mehmel: Margarete Kirchberger, married Philippson. In: 100 Years of Women's Studies: Women at the Rheinische Friedrich-Wilhelms-Universität Bonn. Edited by Annette Kuhn u. a. Dortmund 1996, pp. 156-159.
  • Astrid Mehmel: Dora Philippson. In: 100 Years of Women's Studies: Women at the Rheinische Friedrich-Wilhelms-Universität Bonn . Edited by Annette Kuhn u. a. Dortmund 1996, pp. 200-204.
  • Hans Böhm: Alfred Philippsons Encounters with Greece 1887-1934. In: Ernst Trapp (ed.): 3000 years of Greek culture . St. Augustin 1997, pp. 145-171.
  • Astrid Mehmel: Alfred Philippson (January 1, 1864 - March 28, 1953) - a German geographer. In: Ashkenaz. Journal of the History and Culture of the Jews . Vol. 8, Issue 2, 1998, pp. 353-379.
  • Astrid Mehmel:  Philippson, Alfred. In: New German Biography (NDB). Volume 20, Duncker & Humblot, Berlin 2001, ISBN 3-428-00201-6 , p. 399 f. ( Digitized version ).
  • Sabine Richter: Scientific papers in the archive of the Geographical Institute of the University of Bonn. Finding aids on the estates of Carl Troll and Alfred Philippson. Asgard, Sankt Augustin 2004. (= Colloquium Geographicum 27) ISBN 3-537-87427-8
  • Josef Niesen : Bonn Personal Lexicon. Bouvier, Bonn 2007, ISBN 978-3-416-03159-2 , p.

Web links

Commons : Alfred Philippson  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Alfred Philippson

Dora Philippson

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ State Archive Basel-Stadt Signature: PD-REG 3a 42988 ( [1] )
personal data
SURNAME Philippson, Alfred
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German and Jewish geographer
DATE OF BIRTH January 1, 1864
PLACE OF BIRTH Bonn
DATE OF DEATH March 28, 1953
Place of death Bonn