Helmut Wilsdorf

Helmut Wilsdorf (born May 9, 1912 in Berlin ; † November 16, 1996 in Dresden ) was a German educator and Montanethnographer.

Live and act

Grave site of the Wilsdorf family in Papstdorf (Saxon Switzerland)

Wilsdorf studied Oriental Studies at the Universities of Bonn and London from 1931 to 1932 and then until 1939 at the University of Leipzig History. From 1939 to 1946 he worked as a publishing editor in the Pam publishing house of the Kant Society in Leipzig and from 1940 to 1945 did his military service in an interpreter training department. From 1946 to 1952 he worked as a study assessor or teacher at the Extended Secondary School Geschwister Scholl and then until 1959 at the preparatory college of the Bergakademie in Freiberg . In 1948 he passed his state examination in history, Greek and German.

As an ethnologist , Wilsdorf became senior assistant in 1959 and head of department at the Institute for Folklore at the TU Dresden in 1961 , where he remained active until he retired in 1977. He published numerous books and articles on mining folklore. He was instrumental in the Agricola Memorial Edition (AGA) .

Honors

• 1966 Portable silver medal for the “ best worker in uranium mining” in Jáchymov
• 1982 Johannes R. Becher Medal
• 1986 Winckelmann Medal
• 1988 Leibniz Medal of the Academy of Sciences of the GDR in silver
• Medal of the Technical Museum Prague

Works

• Miners and smelters in antiquity up to the end of the Roman Republic: their economic, social and legal situation. In: Freiberger Forschungshefte, Series D, H1, Academy, Berlin 1952 (dissertation, 1953)
• Georg Agricola and his time. , Berlin 1956 (= Volume 1 of the Agricola commemorative edition)
• Mining, forest, rafts: Investigations into the history of rafting in the service of mining and the mining transport problem. With Walther Herrmann and Kurt Löffler, Academy, Berlin 1960, In: Freiberger Forschungshefte, 28
• Miners and smelters in German-language studies from 1945 to 1964: a montane ethnographic bibliography. With Herta Uhlrich, Academy, Berlin 1966, In: Montanethnographische Forschungen, Vol. 1, publications of the Institute for German Folklore; Vol. 40
• Mines and ironworks from the Agricola period. With Werner Quellmalz, In: Georg Agricola: Selected works. , Erg.-Bd. 1, Hüthig, Heidelberg 1971
• Documents on the history of coal mining in the Haus der Heimat. , Freital 1976
• On the history of the Erzgebirge mountain brotherhoods and miners' associations. In: Glückauf, H. 23/24, Folklorezentrum Erzgebirge / Vogtland, Schneeberg 1986
• Mining and mining - a cultural history. Leipzig: Edition Leipzig 1987 (= cultural history of mining , Glückauf, Essen 1987)
• The historic Ore Mountains miner's habit. In: Glückauf, H. 33/35, Folklorezentrum Erzgebirge / Vogtland, Schneeberg 1988
• The last layer: mining burial customs. With Steffen Brock, edited by Götz Altmann, Heimatland Sachsen, Chemnitz 1994

literature

• Helmut Wilsdorf, Franz Kirnbauer: Helmut Wilsdorf - Mining history and mining ethnography; a bibliography for his 65th birthday. Montan-Verlag, 1977
• Michael Martischnig: Folklorist in the German Democratic Republic today. (= Communications of the Institute for Contemporary Folklore, Special Volume 4) Self-published by the Austrian Museum for Folklore, Vienna 1990, pp. 26–28 ISBN 3-900359-46-6
• Götz Altmann : Dr. Helmut Wilsdorf - an antiquity and Montan ethnographer of the 20th century. In: Michael Simon u. a. (Ed.): On the history of folklore. People - programs - positions. Dresden 2002, pp. 277–289. ISBN 3-935712-05-7

Web links

• Literature by and about Helmut Wilsdorf in the catalog of the German National Library
• Literature by and about Helmut Wilsdorf in the Saxon Bibliography