Ernst Herzfeld

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Ernst Herzfeld
Kurangun rock relief

Ernst Emil Herzfeld (born July 23, 1879 in Celle ; † January 21, 1948 in Basel ) was a German archaeologist from the Middle East , an ancient orientalist and epigraphist . He was a co-founder of the Near East and Islamic archeology, architecture and art history and the founder of Iranian archeology.

Life

Ernst Herzfeld (1879–1948) Dr. phil., professor, archaeologist, ancient orientalist, epigraphist, founder of Iranian archeology. Grave in the Hörnli cemetery, Riehen, Basel-Stadt
Grave in the Hörnli cemetery , Riehen, Basel-Stadt

Herzfeld was born as the son of the Prussian chief medical officer Joseph Herzfeld (1836-1916), who came from the province of Posen . His mother was Margarethe Rosenthal (1853–1922).

He first attended the Domgymnasium in Verden (Aller) and the Joachimsthalsche Gymnasium in Berlin and completed a year of military service . Then he took a study of architecture at the TH in Berlin (Charlottenburg) on (with a degree there in 1903). This was followed by studies in Assyriology and art history at the universities in Munich and Berlin.

As early as 1903 to 1906 he worked as an excavation architect for the orientalists Friedrich Delitzsch and Walter Andrae in Assur . In 1907 he did his doctorate with Eduard Meyer and Reinhard Kekulé von Stradonitz with the only 32-page dissertation Pasargadae . Recordings and studies on Persian archeology (Tübingen 1907). Even before his doctorate he made his first major trip to the Orient in 1905/06 to Kurdistan , Luristan , Persepolis and Pasargadae. In 1907/8 he traveled with Friedrich Sarre to Mesopotamia between the Euphrates and the Tigris . Their diverse findings led to the four-volume work Archaeological Journey in the Euphrates and Tigris Region (1911–1920).

As early as 1909, he completed his habilitation in historical geography at the Friedrich-Wilhelms-Universität Berlin, then Herzfeld taught there as a private lecturer , was appointed associate professor in 1917 and then full professor for archeology of the Orient in 1918 . In 1920 he became a full professor of regional and ancient studies of the Orient and director of the seminar for regional and ancient studies of the Orient.

From then on, Herzfeld devoted himself to the historical, topographical and archaeological exploration of the Middle East on his numerous expeditions and was best known for the excavations in Samarra carried out together with the art historian Friedrich Sarre from 1911 to 1914 . Here he discovered a protohistoric layer under the Arab cultural layer. An entire stage of development of the Mesopotamian culture was named after her.

Herzfeld worked in Pasargadai for six months in 1928 , supported by Friedrich Krefter , who was his assistant for many years from then on. 1931 to 1934/35 he led the excavations of the University of Chicago Oriental Institute in Persepolis.

At the beginning of 1935, Herzfeld returned from these excavations to his chair in Berlin, but was shortly afterwards suspended due to the National Socialist race laws, as his grandparents were Jewish, and forcibly retired from Prussian university service. Herzfeld did not return to his homeland Germany from his next excavation campaign in Persepolis, but instead emigrated to the USA after a short stay in England. In 1936, while he was living in London, Herzfeld was appointed professor at the prestigious Institute for Advanced Study at Princeton , where he taught until his retirement in 1944. At the same time he took on a teaching position at the Institute of Fine Arts at New York University .

After the Second World War , Herzfeld traveled to the Middle East again. In Cairo he fell seriously ill at the end of 1947 and died on January 21, 1948 in Basel . He was buried in the Hörnli cemetery.

Herzfeld was u. a. Member of the Royal Asiatic Society , the British Academy , the Instituut Kern (Leiden), the Académie Arabe de Damas, the Medieval Academy of America and the Archaeological Survey of India .

plant

Although many of Herzfeld's theses were already criticized by contemporaries and are now considered obsolete, at the same time he undeniably made great contributions to the exploration of the ancient Orient.

His international reputation was based primarily on his extensive language skills and his research into numerous ruin sites and his excavations, for example from 1911 to 1913 in Samarra and from 1931 to 1934 at the Persepolis residence . His main areas of research included orientalistic-philological, historical, archaeological and architectural studies, in particular the Stone, Copper and Bronze Ages in Iraq and Iran , the cultures of the Hittites , Babylonians , Assyrians and Achaemenids . In addition, he devoted himself extensively to problems of Parthian and Sassanid archeology, the genesis of Islamic art , Islamic architecture as well as epigraphy and numismatics of the Achaemenid, Sassanid and Islamic periods.

Until 1921, Herzfeld concentrated on the emergence of Islamic art and examined its peculiarity and originality; He was probably the first to consider not only the purely art-historical and formal aspects. Rather, the historical and ecological conditions were in the foreground for him, i.e. the relationship between people and their environment. His most important works include his essay from 1910, The Genesis of Islamic Art and the Mschatta Problem, which is often cited to this day .

Herzfeld was strongly influenced

... from Riegel's idealistic replies to a materialistic art theory developed at the time ...

He took a kind of deterministic position, according to which the conquered countries had foreseen the ' nascent art of Islam ' (according to Herzfeld himself). However, his investigations were based on only a few original findings. It must also be borne in mind that the Orient was only newly discovered in its time .

Herzfeld carried out fundamental and extensive field research in Cilicia , traveled in 1908 to India, Syria (1908, 1910 and 1914), Paikuli and Kurdistan (1910, 1913 and 1923), to Turkey and Iran (1916-17), to Afghanistan (1924 ) and repeatedly to Iran (1923–35). In 1908, due to the archaeological and historical conditions of ancient Persian art, Herzfeld was able to prove that the representation of the sculptures and the palace at Pasargadae belong to the time of Cyrus II . He also dated all other monuments to this period.

In 1924, Herzfeld discovered the most important ancient Elamite rock carvings from Kurangan, high above the Fahlian River, on the ancient Susa - Persepolis military road , which ran in 330 BC. Chr. Alexander the Great used on the way to southern Iran. The now heavily weathered rock relief, a place of worship, is located near the village of Setolan, between Basht and Nurabad and was carved into the rock of a hilltop. It shows a procession of worshipers, which has only survived in fragments (dated around 2000 BC)

From 1931 to 1934, Herzfeld led the important excavations in the Achaemenid residence of Persepolis, which European travelers of the 18th and 19th centuries had already described, for the Oriental Institute of the University of Chicago, one of the most important research centers for the ancient Orient. Herzfeld was the first to systematically research the extensive terrace area here.

Herzfeld led less extensive excavations in Cilicia ( Ayathekla and Korykos ) (1907) and Pasargadae (1928). In Kurdistan, Herzfeld discovered some rock graves which he attributed to Median princes.

Herzfeld has also dealt with the Urartians and the classification of their art. He was of the opinion that the Urartian craftsmanship of that time was of worldwide importance. Herzfeld found in Assyrian art, especially metallurgy , numerous traits related to the Urartian, which other scholars such as the famous American antiquarian Henri Frankfort (1897–1954) interpreted as Assyrian. For him, Urartian art was only a provincial variety of Assyrian art.

estate

Ernst Herzfeld's extensive estate (approx. 30,000 documents, including letters, diaries, photographs, excavation diaries) has been in the archives of the Freer Gallery of Art in Washington, DC since 1946 . Documents are also in the Oriental Institute in Chicago, the Metropolitan Museum of New York and in Berlin. The archive in the Freer Gallery includes a. also all documents on Herzfeld's excavations in Samarra , Pasargadae and Persepolis .

Fonts

  • Pasargadae. Studies on Persian archeology. In: Klio . Vol. 8, 1908, pp. 1-68 ( online ).
  • Samarra. Recordings and studies on Islamic archeology. Behrend & Co., Berlin 1907 ( online ).
  • A journey through Lūristān, Arabistān and Fārs. In: Dr. A. Petermann's communications from Justus Perthes' geographical institute. Vol. 53, 1907, ZDB -ID 205966-6 , pp. 49-63 and pp. 73-90.
  • with Friedrich Sarre : Iranian rock reliefs. Recordings and examinations of monuments from ancient and middle Persian times. 2 volumes. Wasmuth, Berlin 1910.
  • with Friedrich Sarre: Archaeological trip in the Euphrates and Tigris regions (= research on Islamic art. Vol. 1, 1-4, ZDB -ID 538766-8 ). 4 volumes. Reimer, Berlin 1911–1920.
  • First preliminary report on the Samarra excavations. Published by the General Administration of the Royal Museums. With a foreword by Friedrich Sarre. Dietrich Reimer, Berlin 1912.
  • At the gateway to Asia. Rock monuments from Iran's heroic days. Dietrich Reimer et al., Berlin 1920.
  • The wall decoration of the buildings of Samarra and its ornamentation (= research on Islamic art. Vol. 2, 1 = the excavations of Samarra. Vol. 1). Dietrich Reimer, Berlin 1923.
  • Paikuli. Monument and Inscription of the Early History of the Sasanian Empire (= Research on Islamic Art. Vol. 3, 1–2). 2 volumes. Dietrich Reimer et al., Berlin 1924.
  • The paintings of Samarra (= research on Islamic art. Vol. 2, 3 = The excavations of Samarra. Vol. 3). Dietrich Reimer, Berlin 1927.
  • The prehistoric pottery of Samarra (= research on Islamic art. Vol. 2, 5 = the excavations of Samarra. Vol. 5). Dietrich Reimer, Berlin 1930.
  • with Samuel Guyer : Meriamlik and Korykos. Two Christian ruins of the rough Cilicia (= Monumenta Asiae Minoris antiqua. Vol. 2 = Publications of the American Society for Archaeological Research in Asia Minor. Vol. 2, ZDB -ID 972862-4 ). Longmans, Green & Co, London et al. 1930.
  • A New Inscription of Xerxes from Persepolis (= Studies in Ancient Oriental Civilization. Vol. 5, ISSN  0081-7554 ). University of Chicago Press, Chicago IL 1932 ( online ).
  • as editor: Iranian Monuments. Row 1: Prehistoric Monuments. Dietrich Reimer, Berlin 1932–1933;
    • Delivery 1 = Volume A: Stone Age hill near Persepolis. Part 1. 1932;
    • Delivery 2 = Volume A: Stone Age hill near Persepolis. Part 2. 1932;
    • Delivery 3/4 = Volume B: Niphauanda. Part 1. 1933.
  • Archaeological history of Iran (= The Schweich Lectures of the British Academy. 1934, ZDB -ID 796736-6 ). Milford, London 1935.
  • Old Persian inscriptions (= archaeological messages from Iran. Supplementary volume 1). Dietrich Reimer, Berlin 1938.
  • Iran in the Ancient East. Archaeological studies presented in the Lowell Lectures at Boston. Oxford University Press, London et al. 1941 (Reprinted. Hacker, New York NY 1988, ISBN 0-87817-308-0 ).
  • Zoroaster and his world. 2 volumes. Princeton University Press, Princeton NJ 1947 (Reprinted. Octagon Books, New York NY 1974).
  • History of the city of Samarra (= research on Islamic art. Vol. 2, 6 = The excavations of Samarra. Vol. 6). Eckhardt & Messtorff, Hamburg 1948.
  • The Persian Empire. Studies in Geography and Ethnography of the Ancient Near East. Edited from the estate by Gerold Walser . Steiner, Wiesbaden 1968.

literature

Web links

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personal data
SURNAME Herzfeld, Ernst
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Herzfeld, Ernst Emil (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German ancient orientalist (Iranologist)
DATE OF BIRTH July 23, 1879
PLACE OF BIRTH Celle
DATE OF DEATH January 21, 1948
Place of death Basel