Peter Wilhelm Forchhammer

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Peter Wilhelm Forchhammer (born October 23, 1801 in Husum , † January 8, 1894 in Kiel ) was a German classical philologist , archaeologist and liberal politician.

Peter Wilhelm Forchhammer

Origin and occupation

Forchhammer's parents were the teacher and future school principal Johann Ludolph Forchhammer and his wife Margaretha Elisabeth . After the early death of his father in 1810, Peter Wilhelm Forchhammer was brought up on the farm of a relative together with his sons by a private tutor . Later, after attending school in Tondern, he came to the Katharineum in Lübeck , which he attended until graduation at Easter 1821. From 1821 he devoted himself to “classical studies” in Kiel, later he went to Leipzig for a while . After a short stay in Copenhagen , where his brother Georg Forchhammer was a geology professor, he prepared for his doctorate in Kiel and also worked as a private tutor. He received his doctorate in 1828 and qualified as a professor a year later . First he worked in Kiel as a private lecturer . In 1836 he was appointed associate professor and in 1842 full professor. Along with Otto Jahn, he was the first to offer archaeological courses in Kiel.

Scientific work

In the years 1830 to 1834 and from 1838 to 1840 Forchhammer undertook research trips to the Mediterranean. In the process, he realized that studying the language and scripts of the Greeks and Romans would not be enough. In addition, there has to be a preoccupation with sculptures and monuments, but also with geography and the climate.

Forchhammer's earlier writings were purely historical or antiquarian, but since his travels he has also tried to consider topography , mythology and archeology. This is how the topography of Athens was created in 1841 . In 1850, together with the later British Vice Admiral Thomas Abel Brimage Spratt, he created a map of the plain of Troy and annotated it. His most important book dedicated to mythology appeared in 1837 “Hellenika. Greece in the new the old. ”In this book he presented a theory of the origins of Greek myths . Here too, climatic and geographic aspects play a central role. The “enduring” and “ancient” were formative cultural elements for Forchhammer. Numerous similar works followed. So he dealt with the legends of Troy or the founding of Rome . Even when later authors criticized his theories, they revived science. Forchhammer himself held fast to them. His last work “ Homer , his language and the battlefields of the gods and heroes. One last word in explaining the Iliad ”from 1893 was based on his theories.

He caused a stir in 1837 with his book “The Athens and Socrates. The legal and the revolutionary. ”While almost all other scholars had sided with Socrates , he interpreted the behavior of the Athenians as legal and the death sentence as fair.

Forchhammer has also worked intensively in the field of classical philology. In 1864, for example, he presented a comprehensive work on Aristotle .

Forchhammer tried beyond the circle of scientists to arouse interest in classical scholars: after his return from Greece in 1840, Forchhammer promoted the establishment of a museum for plaster casts of ancient works of art. In 1842 he was able to open the museum in Kiel Castle in the presence of King Christian VIII . The collection from that time eventually became the basis of the collection of antiquities that is shown today in the Kunsthalle Kiel . He was a member of the Society of German Natural Scientists and Doctors .

Political activity

Forchhammer's life was politically active in the liberal sense. He was also associated with the national movement. In 1844 he was one of the founders of the “ First Kiel Men's Gymnastics Club ”. With recourse to Aristotle, he tried in his little book on Democrats of 1849 to “ennoble” political views. The revolution of 1848 did he explicitly welcomed, but at the same time he called for a moderation in action. In particular, Forchhammer fought for the independence of Schleswig and Holstein . After the German-Danish War of 1863 and the German War of 1866 , he initially rejected the incorporation of the two duchies into Prussia . After the establishment of the German Empire , he accepted this development. From 1867 to 1873 he was a Liberal (left center) in the Prussian House of Representatives . Between 1870 and 1873 he was a member of the Reichstag . From 1876, Forchhammer represented the Christian Albrechts University in Kiel in the Prussian manor house .

In 1872 Forchhammer married a daughter of his childhood friend Wilhelm Olshausen .

Awards

Fonts

Scientific work
  • The Athenians and Socrates. The legal and the revolutionary . Nicolai, Berlin 1837 ( digitized version )
  • Hellenika: Greece, in the new the old. With a copper tablet and a map of Boeotia . Nicolai, Berlin 1837 ( digitized version )
  • Topography of Athens . Schwer, Kiel 1841
  • Aristotle and the exoteric speeches . Homann, Kiel 1864
  • The founding of Rome . CF Mohr, Kiel 1868
  • About the purity of architecture based on the origin of the four main architectural styles . 2nd increased edition, Homann, Kiel 1875
  • Explanation of the Iliad based on the topical and physical peculiarities of the Trojan plane shown in the original map by Spratt and Forchhammer. A contribution to the settlement of the Homeric question . 2nd unchanged edition, Lipsius & Tischer, Kiel 1888
  • Prolegomena to mythology as a science and lexicon of the language of myths . Haeseler, Kiel 1891
  • Homer. His language, the battlefields of his heroes and gods in the Troas. One last word on the explanation of the Iliad . Tischer, Kiel 1893
Political Writings
  • Democrats booklet . Nicolai, Berlin 1849
  • The states of Schleswig-Holstein are described in several pieces of files . Brönner, Frankfurt a. M. 1850
  • State and unitary state . Academic bookshop, Kiel 1866 (digitized version)

literature

Web links

Wikisource: Peter Wilhelm Forchhammer  - Sources and full texts

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Hermann Genzken: The Abitur graduates of the Katharineum in Lübeck (grammar school and secondary school) from Easter 1807 to 1907. Borchers, Lübeck 1907 ( digitized version ), no. 113
  2. Dietrich Willers: Troja und die Troas ( Memento of the original from October 24, 2008 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.stub.unibe.ch
  3. ^ Gustav Thaulow : The Kiel Art Museum. Kiel 1853, partial reprint in: Christa Geckeler (Ed.): Memories of Kiel in Danish times 1773/1864. Husum Druck- und Verlagsgesellschaft, Husum 2012, pp. 33–35.
  4. Christa Geckeler (Ed.): Memories of Kiel in the Danish time 1773/1864. Husum Druck- und Verlagsgesellschaft, Husum 2012, p. 249.
  5. Members of the Society of German Natural Scientists and Doctors 1857
  6. ^ Stenographic reports on the negotiations of the German Reichstag. I. legislative period, II. Session 1871. Volume 1, Berlin 1871, p. XIV ( digitized version ). Stenographic reports on the negotiations of the German Reichstag. I. legislative period, III. Session 1872. Volume 1, Berlin 1872, p. XV ( digitized version ). Stenographic reports on the negotiations of the German Reichstag. I. legislative period, IV. Session 1873. Volume 1, Berlin 1873, p. XIV ( digitized version )
  7. Berliner Philologische Wochenschrift 11 (1892), S. Sp. 1475