Berthold Laufer

Berthold Laufer (born October 11, 1874 in Cologne , † September 13, 1934 in Chicago ) was a German anthropologist , sinologist and East Asian researcher.

family

Berthold Laufer was the son of Cologne-based parents Max and Eugenie Laufer, nee Schlesinger. The paternal grandparents - Salomon and Johanna Laufer - belonged to the Jewish faith to: They celebrated their 50th wedding anniversary in the synagogue of Krotoschin .

His brother Heinrich Laufer († July 10, 1935) worked for many years as a physicist in Cairo. Berthold Laufer and Bertha Hampton got married in the USA.

Life

From 1884 to 1893 Berthold Laufer attended the Friedrich-Wilhelm-Gymnasium in Cologne. From 1893 he studied Sinology with Wilhelm Grube at the University of Berlin and Malay with Georg von der Gabelentz at the University of Leipzig, where Laufer received his doctorate in 1897 with a dissertation on the critical analysis of a Tibetan text. He also studied Buddhism with Otto Franke , Tibetan with Georg Huth and Japanese with Rudolf Lange.

In 1898 Laufer emigrated to the USA , encouraged by Franz Boas . At that time - from 1896 to 1900 - Boas was the assistant scientific director of the anthropological department at the American Museum of Natural History . After returning from two expeditions, Laufer worked in the museum as an assistant for ethnology from 1904 to 1906. From 1905 to 1907 he taught anthropology and East Asian languages at Columbia University . Berthold Laufer worked as curator for anthropology at the Field Museum of Natural History in Chicago from 1908 until his suicide . Laufer left behind more than 450 publications, an extensive private library , correspondence, notes on work in progress and collector's items in two museums. However, he did not leave any papers with personal information.

Expeditions

Berthold Laufer took part in four expeditions to the Orient:

1898 to 1899: Jesup North Pacific Expedition to Sakhalin Island and the Amur region of Eastern Siberia
1901 to 1904: Jacob H. Schiff expedition to China - financed by Jacob Henry Schiff .
1908 to 1910: Leader of the Blackstone expedition to Tibet and China
and then 1923: Marshall Field Expedition to China.

Award

1930: Member of the National Academy of Sciences
June 16, 1931: Honorary Doctorate from the University of Chicago .

Publications

author

The Decorative Art Of The Amur Tribes . Publications Of The Jesup North Pacific Expedition , Vol. 4. The American Museum of Natural History, New York 1902.
Jade . A Study in Chinese Archeology and Religion. Field Museum of Natural History, Chicago 1912.
Chinese Clay Figures. Part I: Prolegomena on the History of Defensive Armor. Field Museum of Natural History, Chicago 1914.
The Beginnings of Porcelain in China . Field Museum of Natural History, Chicago 1917.
Introduction of Tobacco into Europe . Field museum of natural history, Chicago 1924.
Ivory in China . Field Museum of Natural History, Chicago 1925.
The Giraffe in History and Art . Field Museum of Natural History, Chicago 1928.
Geophagy , Publications of the Field Museum of Natural History. Anthropological Series, Vol. 18, No. 2, (1930), pp. 99, 101-198.
Paper and Printing in Ancient China . The Caxton Club, Chicago 1931.

Translations

The novel of a Tibetan queen . Book decorations based on Tibetan templates drawn by Albert Grünwedel . Verlag Otto Harrassowitz , Leipzig 1911.
Milaraspa. Tibetan texts. Folkwang-Verlag , Hagen 1922.

Editions

Hartmut Walravens (ed.): Smaller writings by Berthold Laufer. Part I: Publications from the period from 1894 to 1910. 2 vol. Steiner, Stuttgart 1998 ISBN 978-3-515-02128-9
Hartmut Walravens (ed.): Smaller writings by Berthold Laufer. Part II: Publications from the period from 1911 to 1925. 2 vol. Steiner, Stuttgart 1998 ISBN 978-3-515-02651-2
Hartmut Walravens (ed.): Smaller writings by Berthold Laufer. Part II: Publications from the period 1925 to 1934. Steiner, Stuttgart 1998 ISBN 978-3-515-03688-7

bibliography

Journal of the American Oriental Society . Vol. LIV, pp. 352-362.

literature

Bennet Bronson: Berthold Laufer . In: Stephen E. Nash et al. Gary M. Feinman (Ed.): Curators, Collections, and Contexts: Anthropology at the Field Museum (= Fieldiana. Anthropology, New Series, No. 36 / Field Museum of Natural History, Publication No. 1525). Field Museum of Natural History, Chicago 2003, pp. 117-126. ( PDF file; 674 kB ( Memento from March 18, 2009 in the Internet Archive ))
KS Latourette: Biographical Memoir . National Academy of Sciences of the USA 1936. Bibliography: pp. 56-58. ( PDF file; 1.28 MB )
Hartmut Walravens: Laufer, Berthold. In: New German Biography (NDB). Volume 13, Duncker & Humblot, Berlin 1982, ISBN 3-428-00194-X , p. 710 f. ( Digitized version ).

Web links

Wikisource: Berthold Laufer - Sources and full texts

Literature by and about Berthold Laufer in the catalog of the German National Library
SUB Goettingen

Remarks

^ Smaller writings: East Asian contributions from the University of Cologne. Publications from the period 1894 to 1910 . Volume 1, Biographical, accessed December 1, 2011
↑ On his suicide and the alleged destruction of personal files Bennet Bronson, Berthold Laufer , in: Curators, Collections, and Contexts , Field Museum of Natural History, Chicago, 2003, pp. 117–126.
↑ Literature: Laufer's Guide to the Objects of the Ship Expedition in the American Museum of Natural History, New York (Southwest Gallery / Chinese Hall) and the Catalog of Chinese Rubbings from Field Museum , Hoshien Tchen u. M. Wissensh Starr (text), Hartmut Walravens (ed.), Fieldiana Anthropology , New Series , No. 3, Publication 1327, Chicago, Field Museum of Natural History, 1981.

personal data
SURNAME	Laufer, Berthold
BRIEF DESCRIPTION	German East Asian researcher
DATE OF BIRTH	October 11, 1874
PLACE OF BIRTH	Cologne
DATE OF DEATH	September 13, 1934
Place of death	Chicago

[1] Smaller writings: East Asian contributions from the University of Cologne. Publications from the period 1894 to 1910 . Volume 1, Biographical, accessed December 1, 2011

[2] On his suicide and the alleged destruction of personal files Bennet Bronson, Berthold Laufer , in: Curators, Collections, and Contexts , Field Museum of Natural History, Chicago, 2003, pp. 117–126.

[3] Literature: Laufer's Guide to the Objects of the Ship Expedition in the American Museum of Natural History, New York (Southwest Gallery / Chinese Hall) and the Catalog of Chinese Rubbings from Field Museum , Hoshien Tchen u. M. Wissensh Starr (text), Hartmut Walravens (ed.), Fieldiana Anthropology , New Series , No. 3, Publication 1327, Chicago, Field Museum of Natural History, 1981.