Kurt Treu

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Kurt Treu (born September 15, 1928 in Karja on Saaremaa ; † June 6, 1991 in Vienna ) was a German classical philologist and papyrologist .

Live and act

Kurt Treu was the son of a priest of German descent on the island of Ösel near Estonia. In the course of the Second World War , the family had to leave their homeland in 1940 on German orders. Kurt Treu attended high school in Hohensalza and was deployed as an air force helper in the last years of the war . After the end of the war, he made a detour to Thuringia and graduated from high school in Dingelstädt . In the same year he began his studies at the University of Jena . He studied classical philology (especially with Friedrich Zucker and Karl Barwick ) and English (especially with Gustav Kirchner ). After completing his studies (diploma in 1952), Treu worked as a research assistant in the commission for the history of religion in late antiquity at the Berlin Academy of Sciences . In addition, he carried out his doctorate in Jena, which he achieved in 1956 with the dissertation Synesios Dion: Introduction and Commentary . His habilitation followed in 1963 at the Berlin Humboldt University . During these years he held various positions at the academy.

The founding of the Central Institute for Ancient History and Archeology in the course of the Academy reform in 1969 meant that Treu had to massively curtail his research on the history of religion: he remained the managing editor of the Greek Christian writers of the first centuries and of the texts and studies on the history of early Christian literature , but officially he was only allowed to spend a tenth of his working time on it. He was to spend the rest of his deputation on the “collective enterprise” of the central institute. Treu endeavored to keep his research free from state influence and as a result often came into conflict with his "loyal to the line" employees. After a dispute with the editor in charge, he resigned from editing the texts and investigations in 1987 . Although Treu was "internationally recognized" through his publications, as the Ministry for State Security had to admit, he was not able to accept any of the numerous offered memberships in academies, commissions and bodies. He was only allowed to give guest lectures in Uppsala (1969) and Austria (1972, 1976). His reputation abroad also prevented his appointment to a university post: only in 1977 he gave a lecture on ancient literature in an overview for students of German studies.

The political turning point in 1989 came like a liberation for Treu. But even after the end of the GDR, many doors remained closed to him: a lecture on Greek literature of Hellenism , which he had announced for the 1991 summer semester at the HU Berlin, was removed from the course catalog in advance by the chair of Greek studies. Kurt Treu intended to reissue the texts and studies that had been discontinued in 1990 ; but before that could happen, he died unexpectedly on June 6, 1991.

Kurt Treu is particularly known for his papyrological and religious history studies. His habilitation thesis The Greek Manuscripts of the New Testament in the USSR (1966; Texts and Studies 91) received great international attention. Treu came to papyrology late when he took over the publishing of the archive for papyrus research after the death of Friedrich Zucker . He published 14 episodes of this magazine from 1969 to 1989. One of his largest undertakings was the Corpus Greek literary papyri of Christian content II , the text of which Treu was able to complete shortly before his death. The work brought to print by Johannes Diethart was published posthumously in 1993.

The translations of Greek poets from the pen of Kurt Treus have also been widely read. He translated the letters of Alciphron and, together with his wife Ursula , an equally well-known classical philologist, the comedies of Menander , the animal stories of Aelian , the iambs of Herondas and the Deipnosophistai of Athenaeus . In 1988 they published the anthology Sweeter than love is nothing. Thoughts and Feelings of Greek Women .

Major papyrological works

  • Kurt Treu: Christian papyri [reviews]. In: Archives for Papyrus Research 19. 1969, 169–205; 20. 1970, 145-152; 1971, 21, 207-214; 22/23. 1974, 367-395; 24/25. 1976, 253-261; 26. 1978, 149-159; 27. 1980, 251-258; 28, 1981, 91-98; 1983, 29, 107-110; 30. 1984, 121-128; 1985, 31, 59-71; 32. 1986, 87-95; 34, 1988, 69-78; 35. 1989, 107-116.
  • Kurt Treu † - J. Diethart: Greek literary papyri of Christian content II . Vienna: Hollinek 1993. Text volume 141 p., Plate volume 110 figs. (Messages from the papyrus collection of the Austrian National Library [Papyrus Archduke Rainer] NS 17).

literature

  • Jürgen Dummer : Kurt Treu † . In: Gnomon (Journal) , Volume 66 (1994), pp. 380-383
  • Wolfgang Luppe, Wolfgang Müller, Günter Poetke: Obituary for Kurt Treu . In: Archives for Papyrus Research and Related Areas . Volume 38 (1992), pp. 4-6 (with picture)

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ The obituary in Gnomon 66 (1994), p. 381, incorrectly names the epigraphist Johannes Kirchner, who died in 1940 .
  2. ↑ Gnomon 66 (1994), p. 382.
personal data
SURNAME Faithful, Kurt
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German classical philologist
DATE OF BIRTH September 15, 1928
PLACE OF BIRTH Karja (Estonia)
DATE OF DEATH June 6, 1991
Place of death Vienna