Ludwig Ross

Gravestones of the Ross brothers in Bornhöved

Memorial bust in the library of the German Archaeological Institute Athens .

Ludwig Ross (born July 22, 1806 in Bornhöved , † August 6, 1859 in Halle an der Saale ) was a German classical archaeologist and philologist .

Life

Ludwig Ross's family came from northern Scotland. Ludwig's father, Colin Ross, was married to Juliane Auguste Remin and ran the Altekoppel farm in Ruhwinkel near Bornhöved. The marriage resulted in numerous children, including the painter Karl Ross and the orthopedist Gustav Ross .

Ludwig Ross studied Classical Philology at the Christian Albrechts University in Kiel . After being there with a thesis on Aristophanes ' comedy The Wasps doctorate was, he undertook since 1832 extensive study trips to Greece , West Asia Minor and Cyprus . He soon won the favor of King Otto I from the House of Wittelsbach , who ruled Greece from 1832 to 1862. Ross became royal commissioner ( Ephoros ) for the supervision of the ancient monuments and in 1837 first professor of archeology at the newly founded University of Athens . In 1836 appointed to the Prussian Academy of Sciences and in 1837 the Bavarian Academy of Sciences to the corresponding member. In 1843, under pressure from the locals, King Otto I had to dismiss many foreigners from senior civil service. This also applied to Ross. He returned to Germany and, with the help of his friend Alexander von Humboldt, was offered a professorship for Classical Archeology at the University of Halle in 1845 .

Ross was the first professor in Halle who could devote himself exclusively to archaeological research. His liberal attitude introduced him to the progressive circles of the city: In addition to Robert Franz and Max Duncker , his confidants also included the bookseller Carl Gustav Schwetschke , whose niece Emma Karoline Auguste, daughter of his brother Carl Ferdinand , he married. He had his house in Halle, today's listed Villa Ross , built in the Neumarktviertel in the years 1853-1854 in the classicistic style.

In 1850 he published a book about his travels through western Asia Minor, in which he campaigned for German colonists to be settled on the local coast.

Like his brothers Karl and Gustav, Ross was a Holstein patriot who campaigned for the independence of the duchy from the Danish kingdom. At the age of 40 he fell seriously ill with a spinal cord disease, and the failure of the Schleswig-Holstein War of Independence from 1848–1851 seems to have robbed him of his courage to live. He committed suicide in 1859 after a long illness.

His services to archeology are considerable: He carried out the first systematic excavations on the Acropolis of Athens , deviating from the then still usual procedure of looking for art objects, by paying attention to the context of the find.

Like most of the archaeologists of his time who had been trained as classical philologists, Ross also continued to study philology. In his work Italiker und Gräken. Did the Romans speak Sanskrit or Greek? from 1858 Ross put forward the thesis that the Latin language developed from Greek dialects . This contradicted the then (and now) state of language research; Ross turned against Theodor Mommsen's etymological studies, Indo-European studies and research on Sanskrit in particular . The linguist Leo Meyer rejected Ross' etymologies and summed up in a contemporary review:

"The whole thing is just a poor pasquill not only on linguistics, but on all science in general, and the worst part is that it comes from a professor at a German university."

On June 5, 2008 ( Lübecker Nachrichten ) and June 7, 2008 ( Segeberger Zeitung ), large articles about Ludwig Ross were published on the basis of a press conference by Fielmann AG, since 100 original letters from him had been found and acquired with the support of Fielmann AG. These letters were handed over to the Schleswig-Holstein State Library by the Mayoress of Bornhöved and are available there to the interested specialist public. In the library of the Athens Department of the German Archaeological Institute , a hermen-like bust was placed in memory of Ross.

Publications (selection)

• with Eduard Schaubert and Christian Hansen: The Acropolis of Athens according to the latest excavations. First division: the temple of Nike Apteros . Berlin, 1839 digitized version of the Heidelberg University Library
• Journeys in the Greek Islands of the Aegean Sea 4 volumes. Stuttgart, Tübingen 1840; 1843; 1845; 1852. Digital copies of the Heidelberg University Library
• The Theseion and the Temple of Ares in Athens . Halle, 1852 digitized version of the Heidelberg University Library
• Hellenika. Archive of archaeological, philological, historical and epigraphic treatises and essays . Halle magazine, only the 1846 year digitized version of the Heidelberg University Library
• Archaeological Essays . 2 volumes of text and table volume. Leipzig 1855/1861 Digital copies of the Heidelberg University Library
• Italians and Graecs. Did the Romans speak Sanskrit or Greek? Hall 1858 Google Books

literature

• Hans Rupprecht Goette , Olga Palagia (Ed.): Ludwig Ross and Greece. Files of the international colloquium, Athens, 2. – 3. October 2002 [International Archeology. Studia honoraria Volume 24]. Marie Leidorf, Rahden / Westf. 2005, ISBN 3-89646-424-8 .
• Andreas E. Furtwängler : Ludwig Ross in Halle. Aspects of a Path of Sorrows. In: Ludwig Ross and Greece. Files of the international colloquium, Athens, October 2-3, 2002 , Rahden 2005, pp. 275–280.
• Christoph Helm: Ludwig Ross and its importance for classical studies of the ancient world . Winckelmann-Gesellschaft, Stendal 2000 [Akzidenzen, 12].
• Ulf Kruse: The socialization of the archaeologist Ludwig Ross (1806-1859) in Holstein. In: Schleswig-Holstein 12, 2004, pp. 11–15. ISSN  0937-7247 .
• Ulf Kruse: Ludwig Ross (1806-1859). The Holsteiner and his family. A study of the history of culture, science and the region (= history series. Volume 6), Duisburg 2014, ISBN 978-3-941820-13-5 .
• Ina E. Minner: Eternally a stranger in a strange land - Ludwig Ross (1806-1859) and Greece. Biography . Bibliopolis, Möhnesee-Wamel 2006, ISBN 3-933925-82-7 .
• August Baumeister:  Roß, Ludwig . In: Allgemeine Deutsche Biographie (ADB). Volume 29, Duncker & Humblot, Leipzig 1889, pp. 246-253.

Web links

Commons : Ludwig Ross  - Collection of Images

• Literature by and about Ludwig Ross in the catalog of the German National Library
• Works by and about Ludwig Ross  in the German Digital Library
• Otto Jahn : Ludwig Roß in the Internet Archive

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Edith Feiner: Ross, Gustav . in: Schleswig-Holstein Biographical Lexicon . Volume 4. Karl Wachholtz Verlag, Neumünster 1976, p. 198
2. ^ Members of the previous academies. Ludwig Ross. Berlin-Brandenburg Academy of Sciences and Humanities , accessed on June 7, 2015 . 
3. ↑ Prof. Dr. Ludwig Roß , members of the Bavarian Academy of Sciences
4. ↑ Emma Karoline Auguste Schwetschke at Gedbas.genealogy.net
5. ↑ Tobias Frommelt: Villa Ross. In: Dieter Dolgner (Ed.): Historic villas in the city of Halle / Saale. Friends of the Buildings and Art Monuments Saxony-Anhalt eV, Halle (Saale) 1998, ISBN 3-931919-04-8 , page 34.
6. ^ Leo Meyer : Italiker and Gräken. Did the Romans speak Sanskrit or Greek . In: Journal for comparative linguistic research in the field of German, Greek and Latin . tape 7 , no. 5 . Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht , 1858, p. 394-400 , JSTOR : 40844603 (review).