Peter Frei (ancient historian)

Peter Frei, around 1975

Peter Frei (born December 2, 1925 in Winterthur ; † August 7, 2010 in Unterseen ) was a Swiss ancient historian .

Life

Peter Frei was born as the son of Jakob Frei, secondary school teacher, and Martha Frei, b. Kübler was born in Winterthur and grew up in Uhwiesen . He attended the canton school in Schaffhausen and from 1945 studied Classical Philology , Indo-European Studies and Ancient History at the University of Zurich . In 1953 he did his doctorate under Manu Leumann , his dissertation was published in 1958.

Between 1953 and 1955 he worked at the Thesaurus Linguae Latinae in Munich. After returning to Switzerland, he worked as a teacher at the Städtisches Gymnasium Biel (1956–1958) and at the canton school in Winterthur (1958–1968) until his habilitation . In 1962 he married the classical philologist Susanna Korsunsky. He completed his habilitation on the early history of Lycia in 1967 at the University of Zurich. A year later he was appointed assistant professor for ancient history, promoted to associate professor in 1970 and finally to full professor in 1986 .

His research focuses on the contacts between classical antiquity and the Orient, the history of Asia Minor and the administrative history of the Persian Empire and Imperium Romanum (including contributions to Roman Switzerland), as well as Byzantium. As a long-term project he undertook epigraphic and topographical field research in the area of Eskişehir (north-west Turkey ), the ancient Dorylaion . In 1995 he retired. In later years he also published a paper about the Zurich pastor, educator and scholar Konrad Klauser .

Frei was head of the Department of History from 1975 to 1977 and from 1975 to 1986 the Education Councilor of the Canton of Zurich. He was a member of the Austrian Academy of Sciences and the German Archaeological Institute . In 1995 he retired.

Works (selection)

• The inflection of Greek names in the 1st declination in Latin. Keller, Winterthur 1958.
• Investigations into the early history of Lycia. Habilitation thesis, Zurich 1967.
• with Klaus Koch : The imperial idea and imperial organization in the Persian Empire . Universitätsverlag, Freiburg 1984 and 1996.
• Conradus Clauserus Tigurinus (approx. 1515-1567), pastor, schoolboy, scholar. Beer, Zurich 1997.
• with Christian Marek : History of Asia Minor in Antiquity. Beck, Munich 2010.

Web links

• Beat Näf: Free, Peter. In: Historical Lexicon of Switzerland .
• Entry on Peter Frei in Kalliope