Octavius ​​Clason

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Octavius ​​Clason , also Oktavius ​​Clason , pseudonym FO Colans (born December 26, 1843 in Hamburg , † March 18, 1875 in Rome ) was a German ancient historian , classical philologist and university professor .

Life

Afinger M Clason Bonn.jpg Afinger N Clason Bonn.jpg
His parents' grave medallions
in the old cemetery in Bonn

Octavius ​​Clason came to Hamburg as the son of the cotton merchant Nis Clason (1806–1881) and his wife Henriette Margarethe, nee. Vles (1806–1861), and was baptized Protestant. When he was six months old, his parents moved to Jutland , Denmark , where his father had acquired a farm in 1840, which he named Clasonsburg with royal permission . There the young Octavius ​​spent the first six years of his childhood.

In May 1850 the entire family moved to Bonn . After Clason had received elementary education through private tuition, he was accepted into the third class of the Bonn grammar school in the fall of 1857, where he passed the school leaving examination in 1862. In the winter semester of 1862/63 he enrolled at the University of Bonn for the subjects of Classical Philology and History, where Heinrich von Sybel immediately accepted him into the Department of History. After one semester, Clason moved to Göttingen , where he was a member of Georg Waitz's historical seminar for three semesters . He returned to Bonn for the winter semester of 1864/65. In order to acquire Prussian citizenship, he did military service as a one-year volunteer and then resumed his studies in Bonn.

When the German War broke out (June 14, 1866) between Prussia and Austria, Clason was activated as a cavalry officer. He took part in the battles of Hühnerwasser , Münchengrätz and Königgrätz and stood with his division shortly before Vienna . After the end of the war (August 1866) he returned to Bonn, continued his studies and was awarded a Dr. phil. PhD . He dedicated his doctoral thesis on a Paris manuscript of the letters of the Symmachus De Symmachi epistularum Codice Parisino specimen prius to his father. In his résumé, he especially thanked the Bonn professors Otto Jahn and Clemens Theodor Perthes .

From 1870 to 1871 he took part in the Franco-German War as a lieutenant . He then went to the University of Rostock and completed his habilitation there in 1871. As a private lecturer, he held lectures on Roman history. His research focused mainly on the history of the early and middle republic . On February 14, 1874, he was appointed associate professor of Roman philology, antiquity and history in Rostock and received a travel grant that enabled him to stay in Rome. There he collected copies of Latin inscriptions, with which he laid the basis for the epigraphic collection of the University of Rostock. He could no longer use the material himself, because on March 18, 1875 he died of typhus . His library was auctioned in Bonn in 1879.

Under the pseudonym FO Colans , Clason also wrote two dramas: Tiberius (performed in 1873) and Jugurtha .

Fonts (selection)

  • De Symmachi epistularum Codice Parisino . Bonn 1867 (dissertation).
  • Plutarch and Tacitus: A Source Inquiry . Berlin 1870.
  • Tacitus and Suetonius: A comparative study with regard to the mutual sources . Rostock 1870.
  • Critical discussions about the Roman state . Three notebooks, Rostock 1871.
  • Roman history. Volume 4 and 5 . Tübingen 1873–1876 (as a continuation of Albert Schwegler's Roman history ).
  • A Sallust manuscript from the Rostock University Library . Leipzig 1874.

literature

  • Gustav Emil Lothholz:  Clason, Octavius . In: Allgemeine Deutsche Biographie (ADB). Volume 4, Duncker & Humblot, Leipzig 1876, p. 276.
  • Gerhard Oberkofler, Peter Goller (editor): Alfons Huber, letters (1859-1898). A contribution to the history of the Innsbruck Historical School around Julius Ficker and Alfons Huber . Innsbruck 1995, p. 361

Web links

Wikisource: Octavius ​​Clason  - Sources and full texts

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Clason mentions the date in the vita of his dissertation: De Symmachi epistularum codice Parisino specimen prius . Bonn 1867, S. 45: VII Kal (endas) Ianuarias anni h (uius) s (aeculi) XXXXIIII , the seventh day of the Lothholz in the year 1844. before the Kalends of January (January 1) general German biography specified Year of birth 1844 is a mistake.
  2. ↑ Catalogus Professorum Rostochiensium (accessed on March 14, 2011)
personal data
SURNAME Clason, Octavius
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Clason, Octavius; FO Colans (pseudonym); Clason, Johann Friedrich Octavius
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German ancient historian, classical philologist and university professor
DATE OF BIRTH December 26, 1843
PLACE OF BIRTH Hamburg
DATE OF DEATH March 18, 1875
Place of death Rome