Jane Dieulafoy

Jane Dieulafoy, ca.1895

Jane Dieulafoy (born June 29, 1851 as Jane Henriette Magre in Toulouse , † May 25, 1916 in Pompertuzat near Toulouse) was a French archaeologist and author.

Life

Jane Henriette Magre was the youngest of six children; her father died shortly after she was born. She was the only one of her sisters to attend a private school in Auteuil , where she received a varied education. In late 1869 or early 1870, she met Marcel Dieulafoy , a railway engineer who was also from Toulouse and had worked in Algeria . They married on May 11, 1870.

When the Franco-German War broke out a little later , Marcel Dieulafoy signed up as an engineer for the French army. Jane insisted on accompanying him and taking part in all missions of her husband's unit in soldier clothing. After the end of the war they made many trips together, especially to Egypt and the Middle East , which Marcel particularly fascinated. Jane published several travelogues during this period and began working on historical novels . It was around this time that Marcel decided to devote his life to exploring the ancient Orient .

1881–82 they undertook their first research trip to Persia . Jane Dieulafoy published her notes from this trip in Le Tour du Monde magazine on her return to Paris . Marcel tried to get a contract to research the Persian city of Susa . In 1884 they went there again, this time on an official archaeological expedition. Until 1886, they jointly led the excavations in Susa.

After their return to Paris they took care of the accommodation of the finds they had brought with them in the Louvre . Jane Dieulafoy had taken the habit of cutting her hair short and wearing men's clothes on her travels in the Orient; she kept this habit in France and caused quite a stir. While Marcel Dieulafoy was accepted into the Académie des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres , Jane protested that the Institut de France did not accept women.

In 1895 she was awarded the Cross of the Legion of Honor for her achievements in Persia, but also for her services in the Franco-German War.

In 1888 Jane Dieulafoy published her diary of the excavations as a book, and in 1887 her travelogue La Perse, la Chaldée et la Susiane was published. In 1890 she published her first play Parysatis . It is set in Susa at the time of the Achaemenid Empire and is about Parysatis , Darius II's wife . The piece earned Jane Dieulafoy praise from the Académie française and was set to music in 1902 by Camille Saint-Saëns . In the following years she wrote four novels until she finally decided to devote herself to travel literature after her numerous trips to Spain and Portugal.

In 1914 Jane and Marcel Dieulafoy moved to Morocco , where Marcel was entrusted with building the railway from Fès to Meknes . In addition, they began again archaeological research at the Hassan II Mosque in Casablanca . Since Marcel had little time besides his work as an engineer, Jane directed the excavations largely independently.

In April 1915, Jane fell ill with dysentery and had to be taken to France. After only a brief hiatus, she insisted on going back to work in Morocco. However, her health deteriorated drastically as soon as she arrived, so she and Marcel drove back to France. Jane Dieulafoy died on May 25, 1916 of complications from her illness.

Publications

Non-fiction

• 1887: La Perse, la Chaldée et la Susiane
• 1888: A Suse, journal des fouilles 1884–1886
• 1901: Aragon et Valence
• 1908: Castille et Andalousie
• 1920: Isabelle la Grande

Plays and novels

• 1890: Parysatis
• 1893: Rose d'Hatra
• 1893: L'oracle
• 1984: Brother Pélage
• 1897: Déchéance

literature

• Eve and Jean Gran-Aymeric: Jane Dieulafoy. Une vie d'homme . Perrin, Paris 1990, ISBN 2-262-00875-2 .
• Natascha Ueckmann: Women and Orientalism: Travel texts by French-speaking women authors of the 19th and 20th centuries . JB Metzler, Stuttgart / Weimar 2001, ISBN 3-476-45271-9 .
• Getzel M. Cohen, Martha Sharp Joukowsky: Breaking Ground: Pioneering Women Archaeologists . University of Michigan Press, Michigan 2004, ISBN 0-472-11372-0 , pp. 34-67 ( excerpt from Google Books ).
• Amanda Adams: Ladies of the Field: Early Women Archaeologists and Their Search for Adventure . Greystone Books, Vancouver 2010, ISBN 978-1-5536543-3-9 , pp. 41-63 ( excerpt from Google Books ).