Maria Höfner

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Maria Höfner (born October 11, 1900 in Linz , † November 5, 1992 in Graz ) was an Austrian orientalist with a focus on Arabic and Ethiopian studies . She is considered to be one of the world's most important representatives and co-founders of Sabaean Studies (science of ancient South Arabia ). She worked as an adjunct professor in Tübingen (1954–1964) and as a full professor in Graz (1964–1971) and dealt with a wide range of philological , epigraphic , linguistic , lexicographical and religious-historical issues.

Life

The oldest ancestors of Maria Höfner can be traced back to the 17th century in Lower Austria . She herself was born in Linz , attended elementary school from 1906 to 1910 and the girls' secondary school in Salzburg from 1911 to 1919 . After graduating from school in 1920, she began studying mathematics and physics at the Karl-Franzens University in Graz . Soon, however, she switched to the subjects of Ancient History and Semitic Philology , with her Semitic lecturer Nikolaus Rhodokanakis , a respected Sabaean and epigraphist , having a particularly formative influence. Accordingly, her doctorate took place in 1932 on an ancient South Arabian topic, the dissertation was entitled "The Sabaean Inscriptions of the South Arabian Expedition in the Art History Museum in Vienna".

In 1939 Höfner qualified as a professor at the University of Vienna for the subject “Semitic Philology with special emphasis on Old South Arabic and the Ethiopian languages” and in 1940 was appointed lecturer. In 1944 she switched to Enno Littmann at the Eberhard Karls University of Tübingen as a research assistant , where she received various teaching assignments from 1948 onwards. In 1952 she was qualified as a professor in Tübingen, where she was appointed adjunct professor in 1954 and scientific counselor in 1960 . Her research focus in Tübingen was clearly on Old South Arabic, as her two colleagues Rudi Paret and Otto Rössler were able to cover the remaining areas of Oriental Studies. In 1964, Höfner was finally appointed full professor to succeed Ernst Weidner to the professorship for Orient Studies at the University of Graz, which she held until her retirement in 1971. Subsequently, the professorship was not filled again, but Höfner continued her academic work even in retirement. In 1992 she died of a brain hemorrhage. Her academic students include Walter W. Müller , who was a professor in Marburg from 1975 to 2001, and Roswitha Germana Stiegner, who continued to represent Arabic studies in Graz as a research assistant after 1971.

Since her student days, Maria Höfner lived with the animal psychologist Theodora Mayer, who supported her research with auxiliary work and died in the same month as the orientalist. Together, apart from their scientific work, the two campaigned vehemently for animal welfare .

Researches

The focus of Höfner's research was on the philology and epigraphy of the old South Arabian region, but she never managed to travel to Yemen , which she mainly explored , initially for political reasons, later due to her advanced age. In the linguistic field, she achieved particular academic fame beyond the borders of Sabaean Studies through her detailed “Old South Arabic grammar”, which appeared in the series “Porta linguarum orientalium” in 1943 and for a long time was the only comprehensive grammar of the Old South Arabic language group . In addition, Maria Höfner dealt with the northern Ethiopian language world. After the death of her colleague in 1958, she continued the publication of the "Dictionary of the Tigrē Language", begun in 1956 with Enno Littmann , until the work was completed in 1962. In 1951 she translated the Feteh Mahārī , a book on tribal law and tribal customs of the Mansa ' from the Tigrē language , which the Swedish missionary Karl Gustaf Rodén had already edited in the original language. Their plan to develop a dictionary for the Old South Arabic languages ​​also led to the establishment of a separate commission of the Austrian Academy of Sciences in 1943 , but Höfner never carried it through due to the effort involved.

In the epigraphic field, she primarily published a large number of inscriptions from the ancient South Arabian region, often together with Nikolaus Rhodokanakis or Karl Mlaker during her time in Vienna. The estate of inscription copies and other findings of the orientalist and explorer Eduard Glaser , which the latter had collected between 1882 and 1894 on four trips to southern Arabia, offered a wealth of material . In 1908 all of the original material was acquired by the Austrian Academy of Sciences and later, administered and organized by Höfner, came with her to Tübingen and finally to Graz. In 1944 she recorded the entire estate in a directory, from 1944 to 1981 the individual inscriptions were published, translated and commented on in a fourteen-part series of publications. She compiled several of these volumes herself, and transferred some more to two of her students. She also edited the inscriptions published as photographs by Carl August Rathjens in detail in a monograph. Another important publication by Höfner on inscription was the epigraphic sections of the volume Contributions to the Historical Geography of Pre-Islamic South Arabia , which Höfner published in 1952 together with the geographer Hermann von Wissmann . She was also involved in the Corpus des Inscriptions et Antiquités sud-arabes . In the archaeological field, she was mainly active through various research reports in the archive for oriental research and discussions of excavation publications.

Another main area of ​​interest of Maria Höfner was the religious history of ancient South Arabia and neighboring regions. For example, she contributed to the first volume of the Dictionary of Mythology , published in 1965, with the extensive chapters “The Tribal Groups of Northern and Central Arabia”, “Southern Arabia” and “The Semites of Ethiopia”, which were largely organized according to keywords. In 1970 her contribution "The pre-Islamic religions of Arabia" appeared together with Hartmut Geses' remarks on the ancient Syrian religion and Kurt Rudolph's chapter on the Mandaeans as volume 10.2 in the series The Religions of Mankind . Höfner contributed overview articles on Arabic topics to various reference works, the Reallexikon für Antiquity and Christianity (article “Arabia”), the Handbuch der Orientalistik (Volume 1,3, article “The South Arabic of Inscriptions and Living Dialects”), the “Biblical -historischen short dictionary "(article" Saba, Sabäer "), religion in past and present (3rd edition, article" Minäer und Sabäer "), the lexicon for theology and church (2nd edition, article" Saba ', Serabit ") and Kindler's Literature Lexicon (essays on Old South Arabic and Tigrē literature; slightly revised, published in Kindler's New Literature Lexicon).

Honors and scientific importance

From 1969 Höfner was a corresponding member of the Austrian Academy of Sciences and she also received the gold medal from the city of Graz. Shortly before her death, the Center for Yemeni Studies in Sanaa made her an honorary member. For the 80th birthday of Maria Höfner, the University of Graz published a commemorative publication. On the occasion of her 90th birthday, a South Arabia symposium was held, the contributions of which, however, could only appear after her death and were therefore presented as part of a memorial.

With her diverse research contributions, Maria Höfner made a significant contribution to the development of the science of ancient South Arabia (Sabaean Studies) and can be considered a pioneer in this field. Many of their research results are still valid today and have been confirmed by subsequent studies. In the scientific environment she was known (as one of the few female orientalists and because of her importance for Sabaean studies) as an allusion to the biblical figure of the same name under the name "Queen of Sheba".

Fonts (selection)

  • The Sabaean inscriptions of the South Arabian Expedition in the Kunsthistorisches Museum in Vienna. Dissertation, Graz 1932. Published in two parts in the Wiener Zeitschrift für die Kunde des Morgenlandes (Volume 40, 1933, pp. 1–36; Volume 42, 1935, pp. 31–66).
  • Old South Arabic grammar (= Porta linguarum orientalium. Volume 24). Harrassowitz, Leipzig 1943. Reprint, Zeller, Osnabrück 1976, ISBN 3-535-01595-2 .
  • The Eduard Glaser Collection. Directory of the Glaser estate, other South Arabian material inventory and a collection of other Semitic inscriptions (= Austrian Academy of Sciences. Philosophical-Historical Class: Session Reports. Volume 222, Treatise 5). Brno, Munich / Vienna 1944.
  • as translator: The Feteh Maḥārī. Manners and Laws of Mansa '. Translated from KG Rodén's Tigrē text (= treatises of the Academy of Science and Literature Mainz. Humanities and social science class. Born 1951, number 8). Publishing house of the Academy of Sciences and Literature in commission from Franz Steiner, Mainz / Wiesbaden 1952.
  • with Hermann von Wissmann : Contributions to the historical geography of pre-Islamic South Arabia (= treatises of the Academy of Sciences and Literature Mainz. Humanities and social science class. Born 1952, number 4). Publishing house of the Academy of Sciences and Literature in commission from Franz Steiner, Mainz / Wiesbaden 1952.
  • until 1958 with Enno Littmann : Dictionary of the Tigrē language: Tigrē – German – English (= publications of the Oriental Commission. Volume 11). Steiner, Wiesbaden 1956–1962.
  • with Josep Maria Solà-Solé: Eduard Glaser Collection. Volume 2: Inscriptions from the area between Mārib and the Ǧōf (= Austrian Academy of Sciences. Philosophical-Historical Class: Session Reports. Volume 238, Treatise 3). Böhlau, Graz / Vienna / Cologne 1961.
  • as editor: Carl Rathjens : Sabaeica. Part III: Editing of the old South Arabic inscriptions published by Carl Rathjens in Sabaeica I and II in illustrations, as well as some other inscription stones collected by him (= messages from the Museum of Ethnology in Hamburg. Volume 28). On commission at Appel, Hamburg 1966.
  • with Hartmut Gese and Kurt Rudolph : The religions of Old Syria, Altarabia and the Mandaeans (= The religions of mankind . Volume 10,2). Kohlhammer, Stuttgart 1970.
  • as editor: Eduard Glaser Collection. Part 8: Inscriptions from Ṣirwāḥ, Ḫaulān (1st part) (= Austrian Academy of Sciences. Philosophical-historical class: session reports. Volume 291, treatise 1). Publishing house of the Austrian Academy of Sciences, Vienna 1973.
  • as editor: Eduard Glaser Collection. Part 12: Inscriptions from Ṣirwāḥ, Ḫaulān (2nd part). With an appendix by Walter W. Müller (= Austrian Academy of Sciences. Philosophical-Historical Class: Session Reports. Volume 304, Treatise 5). Publishing house of the Austrian Academy of Sciences, Vienna 1976.
  • Document dictionary for the Corpus Inscriptionum Semiticarum . Part 4: Inscriptiones ḥimyariticas et sabaeas (= Austrian Academy of Sciences. Philosophical-Historical Class: Session Reports. Volume 363. / = Publications of the Arab Commission. Volume 2). Publishing house of the Austrian Academy of Sciences, Vienna 1980.
  • as editor: Eduard Glaser Collection. Part 14: Sabaean inscriptions (last episode) (= Austrian Academy of Sciences. Philosophical-Historical Class: Session Reports. Volume 378). Publishing house of the Austrian Academy of Sciences, Vienna 1981.

Web links

literature

  • Roswitha Germana Stiegner (Ed.): Al-Hudhud. Festschrift Maria Höfner on her 80th birthday. Karl-Franzens-University, Graz 1981 (with list of publications on pp. XV – XXIII).
  • Alfred Janata, Roswitha Germana Stiegner: Research on South Arabia in Austria. In: Alfred Janata (Ed.): Yemen. In the land of the Queen of Sheba. Museum für Völkerkunde Vienna December 16, 1989 - June 10, 1990. Federal Ministry of Science and Research, Vienna 1989, ISBN 3-900926-03-4 , pp. 55–62.
  • Walter W. Müller : Maria Höfner (October 11, 1900– November 5, 1992). In: Archive for Orient Research . Volume 40/41, 1993/1994, pp. 331-334.
  • Roswitha Germana Stiegner (Ed.): Updated articles on the 1st International Symposium South Arabia Interdisciplinary at the University of Graz with short introductions to linguistic and cultural history. In Memoriam Maria Höfner. Leykam, Graz 1997, ISBN 3-7011-7329-X (Honors Höfner by Roswitha Germana Stiegner, pp. XXIII-XXX, and Walther W. Müller, pp. XIX-XXII).
  • Roswitha Germana Stiegner: Höfner, Maria. In: Brigitta Keintzel, Ilse Korotin (ed.): Scientists in and from Austria. Life-work-work. Böhlau, Vienna / Cologne / Weimar 2002, ISBN 3-205-99467-1 , pp. 294-299.
  • Hofner, Marie [!]. In: Ilse Korotin (ed.): BiografıA. Lexicon of Austrian Women. Volume 1: A-H. Böhlau, Vienna / Cologne / Weimar 2016, ISBN 978-3-205-79590-2 , p. 1335 f.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b Al-Hudhud. In: Roswitha Germana Stiegner (Ed.): Al-Hudhud. Festschrift Maria Höfner on her 80th birthday. Karl-Franzens-University, Graz 1981, p. IX – XI, here p. IX.
  2. ↑ a b c d Walter W. Müller : Maria Höfner (October 11, 1900– November 5, 1992). In: Archive for Orient Research . Volume 40/41, 1993/1994, pp. 331-334, here p. 331.
  3. ↑ Roswitha Germana Stiegner: Maria Hofner. “Queen of Sheba '” and “Lady of the Animals”. In: Same (Ed.): Updated articles on the 1st International Symposium on South Arabia Interdisciplinary at the University of Graz with short introductions to the history of language and culture. In Memoriam Maria Höfner. Leykam, Graz 1997, ISBN 3-7011-7329-X , pp. XXIII-XXX, here p. XXIV.
  4. ↑ Höfner, Marie. In: Ilse Korotin (ed.): BiografıA. Lexicon of Austrian Women. Volume 1: A-H. Böhlau, Vienna / Cologne / Weimar 2016, ISBN 978-3-205-79590-2 , p. 1335 f., Here p. 1335.
  5. ^ Walter W. Müller : Maria Höfner (October 11, 1900– November 5, 1992). In: Archive for Orient Research . Volume 40/41, 1993/1994, pp. 331-334, here p. 334.
  6. ^ Alfred Janata, Roswitha Germana Stiegner: Research on South Arabia in Austria. In: Alfred Janata (Ed.): Yemen. In the land of the Queen of Sheba. Federal Ministry for Science and Research, Vienna 1989, ISBN 3-900926-03-4 , pp. 55–62, here p. 61.
  7. ↑ Roswitha Germana Stiegner: Maria Hofner. “Queen of Sheba '” and “Lady of the Animals”. In: Same (Ed.): Updated articles on the 1st International Symposium on South Arabia Interdisciplinary at the University of Graz with short introductions to the history of language and culture. In Memoriam Maria Höfner. Leykam, Graz 1997, ISBN 3-7011-7329-X , pp. XXIII-XXX, here pp. XXVI f.
  8. ^ Walter W. Müller : Maria Höfner (October 11, 1900– November 5, 1992). In: Archive for Orient Research . Volume 40/41, 1993/1994, pp. 331-334, here p. 332.
  9. ^ Walter W. Müller : Maria Höfner (October 11, 1900– November 5, 1992). In: Archive for Orient Research . Volume 40/41, 1993/1994, pp. 331-334, here p. 333.
  10. ↑ After Höfner's death, the materials were returned to the Austrian Academy of Sciences in Vienna. See Roswitha Germana Stiegner: Höfner, Maria. In: Brigitta Keintzel, Ilse Korotin (ed.): Scientists in and from Austria. Life-work-work. Böhlau, Vienna / Cologne / Weimar 2002, ISBN 3-205-99467-1 , pp. 294–299, here p. 295 f.
  11. ↑ Roswitha Germana Stiegner (Ed.): Al-Hudhud. Festschrift Maria Höfner on her 80th birthday. Karl Franzens University, Graz 1981.
  12. ↑ Roswitha Germana Stiegner (Ed.): Updated articles on the 1st International Symposium on South Arabia Interdisciplinary at the University of Graz with short introductions to the history of language and culture. In Memoriam Maria Höfner. Leykam, Graz 1997, ISBN 3-7011-7329-X .
  13. ↑ Roswitha Germana Stiegner: Höfner, Maria. In: Brigitta Keintzel, Ilse Korotin (ed.): Scientists in and from Austria. Life-work-work. Böhlau, Vienna / Cologne / Weimar 2002, ISBN 3-205-99467-1 , pp. 294–299, here p. 296 f.
  14. ↑ Höfner, Marie. In: Ilse Korotin (ed.): BiografıA. Lexicon of Austrian Women. Volume 1: A-H. Böhlau, Wien / Köln / Weimar 2016, ISBN 978-3-205-79590-2 , p. 1335 f., Here p. 1335 (for further evidence see the bibliography).
personal data
SURNAME Hofner, Maria
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Austrian Sabaean
DATE OF BIRTH October 11, 1900
PLACE OF BIRTH Linz
DATE OF DEATH 5th November 1992
Place of death Graz