Claire Préaux

Claire Préaux (born December 21, 1904 in Liège ; † March 28, 1979 in Ixelles ) was a Belgian classical philologist and ancient historian . She is considered to be an outstanding representative of classical studies in her home country.

Life

Claire Préaux grew up in Brussels and trained as a teacher at the École Normale Emile André . This was followed by a degree in Classical Philology at the Université libre de Bruxelles (ULB). In 1927 she received her doctorate with the thesis Sentiments de famille dans l'Égypte gréco-romaine, d'après les papyrus and already laid the basis for the further focus of her career, dealing with the papyri and ostraca of Greco-Roman Egypt. In 1939 the habilitation followed there (Agrégation de l'enseignement supérieur) . The monumental work on the economy of Ptolemaic Egypt follows the findings of Michael Rostovtzeff regarding a monarchically controlled economy in Egypt. In 1978 she elaborated this opinion again in detail in a monograph on Hellenistic Egypt, but expressly rejects Johann Gustav Droysen's model of a Hellenistic mixed culture. In 1944 Préaux became a full professor at the ULB. In addition to Greco-Roman Egypt , Préaux also dealt with Greek literature and cultural history. In the monograph ?? La ?? lune dans la pensée grecque , she worked out the Greeks' relationship with the moon , covering the subject from natural sciences to socio-cultural and psychological aspects. In 1953 she was awarded the Francqui Prize , the highest Belgian science award. She was a member of several scientific academies, including the Académie des inscriptions et belles-lettres , the Belgian Académie royale and the Saxon Academy of Sciences , the British Academy and an honorary doctorate from several universities.

literature

• Jean Bingen et al. (Ed.): Le monde grec. Pensée, littérature, histoire, documents. Homages to Claire Préaux. Édition de l'Université de Bruxelles, Brussels 1975.
• Jean Bingen: Claire Préaux (1904–1979). In: Mario Capasso (Ed.): Hermae. Scholars and Scholarship in Papyrology. Serra, Pisa 2007, ISBN 978-88-427-1442-2 , pp. 287-294 (with picture).
• Heinz Heinen : Preaux, Claire. In: Peter Kuhlmann , Helmuth Schneider (Hrsg.): History of the ancient sciences. Biographical Lexicon (= The New Pauly . Supplements. Volume 6). Metzler, Stuttgart / Weimar 2012, ISBN 978-3-476-02033-8 , Sp. 1015-1017.

Web links

• December 21, 1904– December 21, 2004. 100 ^e anniversaire de la naissance de Claire Préaux (French, with biography and list of publications)