Werner Peek

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Werner Peek (born June 6, 1904 in Bielefeld ; † February 13, 1994 ibid) was a German classical philologist and epigraphist .

Life

Werner Peek, the son of the elementary school teacher Heinrich Peek, studied classical philology and ancient history at the Universities of Münster and Göttingen . At the University of Berlin , he was in 1929 with a dissertation on the inscriptions traditional Isis -Hymnus doctorate ( hymn in Isim Andrius ; published under the title The Isishymnus of Andros and related texts , Berlin 1930). The emeritus Ulrich von Wilamowitz-Moellendorff had inspired him for this work , who also influenced Peek's further career through recommendations. For 1930/1931 Peek received a travel grant from the German Archaeological Institute , which enabled him to spend longer periods in Greece and Asia Minor. He established close contacts with the German Archaeological Institute in Athens, which lasted his entire life. In 1942 he was appointed a corresponding member of the DAI.

After his stay in Greece, Peek worked as a lecturer in Classical Philology and Ancient History at the University of Berlin, where the ancient historian Wilhelm Weber became his mentor. Wilamowitz had recommended his pupil in a letter as "[s] one last great hope". During the time of National Socialism , Peek was involved in various Nazi organizations. On January 1, 1934, he was accepted into the NSDAP ( membership number 3.398.293), from 1936 he was a consultant in the staff of the Reich Youth Leadership . In Greece in 1938, Peek co-founded and headed the local Hitler Youth .

Peek completed his habilitation in 1937 ; from then on he taught as a university lecturer and since 1944 as an associate professor at the Berlin University. In 1948 he moved to the Brandenburg State University in Potsdam , and in 1951 as a professor of Classical Philology ( Latin Studies ) at the University of Halle , where he worked until his retirement in 1969. In 1982 he moved to his hometown Bielefeld and worked for some time as an honorary professor at the university there . In 1994 he died of old age, shortly before the age of 90, as the last Wilamowitz student. His collection of antique vases, his collection of manuscripts and copies, and his private library had already been sold. Today his estate is mainly in the holdings of the Saxon State and University Library in Dresden .

Services

Werner Peek's main field of work was Greek epigraphy. Early on he made the plan to replace the outdated collection of Georg Kaibel's Greek grave epigrams ( Epigrammata Graeca ex lapidibus conlecta , 1878). After more than twenty years of preparation - the delays were also due to the Second World War - the first volume of Greek verse inscriptions appeared in 1955 , which contains over 2000 grave inscriptions from all periods of antiquity. The other volumes have remained unpublished to this day. However, Peek put his research results down in numerous essays. He remained scientifically active into old age.

Another focus of his work was the late antique epic poet Nonnos von Panopolis , to whom Peek dedicated the monograph Critical and Explanatory Contributions to the Dionysiacs of Nonnos (Berlin 1969) and the four-volume lexicon to the Dionysiacs of Nonnos (Hildesheim 1968–1975).

Peek's achievements as a researcher were honored by being awarded the GDR National Prize (1961) and by being accepted into numerous scientific academies. He was a full member of the Saxon Academy of Sciences (since 1959) and the Academy of Sciences in Berlin (since 1964), a corresponding member of the Heidelberg Academy of Sciences (since 1963) and an external member of the Academy of Athens (since 1977).

Antique Collection Peek

His private "Antique Collection Peek", almost 70 ceramic vessels, was acquired by the Archaeological Museum of the Westphalian Wilhelms University at the end of the 1980s . From this collection, a skyphos from the 6th century BC, the trophy for the winner of the marathon run at the 1st Modern Olympic Games in 1896, Spyridon Louis , was returned to its country of origin in December 2019 and is now in the Museum of the History of the ancient Olympic Games exhibited in Olympia.

literature

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ For his father Heinrich Wilhelm Ernst Peek (1878–1959) see his personal card at the library for research on the history of education .
  2. ↑ Quoted from Wolfgang Weber: Priester der Klio. Historical and social studies on the origin and career of German historians and on the history of historical science 1800–1970 , Tübingen 1977. p. 76.
  3. ↑ Michael Buddrus, Total Education for Total War: Hitler Youth and National Socialist Youth Policy , Volume 1, Munich 2003, p. 1196.
  4. ↑ a b Isolde Stark , Elisabeth Charlotte Welskopf and Ancient History in the GDR , Wiesbaden 2005, p. 51.
  5. ↑ Olaf Kappelt , Braunbuch DDR , Berlin 1981, p. 322.
  6. ↑ Uvo Hölscher , Currents in German Greek Studies in the Twenties . In: Hellmut Flashar , Sabine Vogt (editor), Classical Studies in the 20s , Wiesbaden 1995, p. 66.
  7. ↑ Reinhard Stupperich , The Antiques of the Werner Peek Collection , Münster 1990 (Boreas supplement 6).
  8. ↑ Werner Peek: Greek verse inscriptions. Volume 1: Grave Epigrams. Berlin 1955.
  9. ↑ Westfälische Wilhelms-Universität Münster news portal from November 14, 2019: WWU returns ancient marathon trophy to Greece , accessed on December 25, 2019
personal data
SURNAME Peek, Werner
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German classical philologist and epigraphist
DATE OF BIRTH June 6, 1904
PLACE OF BIRTH Bielefeld
DATE OF DEATH February 13, 1994
Place of death Bielefeld