Gotthelf Bergsträsser

Gotthelf Bergsträsser.

Gotthelf Bergsträsser (5 April 1886, Oberlosa, Plauen – 16 August 1933, near Berchtesgaden) was a German linguist specializing in Semitic studies, generally considered to be one of the greatest of the twentieth century. Bergsträsser was initially a teacher of classical languages before deciding to approach Semitic.[1]

He was a professor at Istanbul University during World War I, when he was an officer in the German army stationed in Turkey. While there, he studied the spoken dialects of Arabic and Aramaic in Syria and Palestine. One of his most well known works is the 29th (and final) edition of Wilhelm Gesenius' Hebrew Grammar (1918–1929), which remained incomplete, containing only phonology and morphology of the verb. Also widely admired was his Introduction to the Semitic Languages (1928, English 1983). These brought him international fame as a scholar. His last position was professor of Semitic languages at the University of Munich.

Bergsträsser mostly engaged in the study of Arabic, focusing on the history of the text of the Qur'an. Bergsträsser left many of his planned works unfinished (including the rest of his Hebrew grammar and his grammar of spoken Aramaic), when he disappeared while mountaineering in Bavaria in 1933.

He was also a historian of Islamic law as evinced by his Grundzüge des islamischen Rechts (Basics of Islamic Law), which was edited and published post-humously by the famous scholar of Islam, Joseph Schacht (Columbia University). Schacht says that Bergsträsser died on the 16th of August in 1933.[2] He covers topics such as the indigenous history of Islamic law, contractual law, personal law, family law, criminal law, business law, inheritance law, procedural law, etc.[3]

Bergsträsser was an outspoken anti-Nazi, and helped to save German Jewish scholars.

Bibliography

  • Die Negationen im Kur'an (1911)
  • Hunain ibn Ishaq und seine Schule. Sprach- und literaturgeschichtliche Untersuchungen zu den arabischen Hippokrates- und Galen-Übersetzungen (1913)
  • Verneinungs- und Fragepartikeln und Verwandtes im Kur'an (Leipzig, 1914; 1968)
  • Sprachatlas von Syrien und Palästina (1915)
  • Neuaramäische Märchen und andere Texte aus Malula (1915). Contains transcription and German translation.
  • Neue meteorologische Fragmente des Theophrast. Arabisch und deutsch (1918/19)
  • Zum arabischen Dialekt von Damaskus. Phonetik und Prosatexte (1924)
  • Hunain ibn Ishaq. Über die syrischen und arabischen Galen-Übersetzungen (1925). Contains Arabic text and German translation.
  • Einführung in die semitischen Sprachen. Sprachproben und Grammatische Skizzen (1928; 1963 ISBN 3-19-005024-4)
  • Plan eines Apparatus Criticus zum Koran (München, 1930)
  • Die Geschichte des Korantexts with O. Pretzl in Theodor Nöldeke, Geschichte des Qorans (Leipzig 1938; 1961)
  • Nichtkanonische Koranlesarten im Muhtasab des ibn Ginni (München, 1933)
  • Phonogramme im neuaramäischen Dialekt von Malula (1933)
  • Grundzüge des islamischen Rechts (edited and published by Joseph Schacht, 1935)

References

  1. ^ Meyerhof, Max (May 1936). "Gotthelf Bergsträsser (1886-1933)". Isis. 25 (1): 60–62. doi:10.1086/347061.
  2. ^ Schacht, Joseph (1935). G. Bergsträsser´s Grundzüge Des Islamischen Rechts. Berlin und Leipzig: Walter De Gruyter & Co. p. VII.
  3. ^ Hamza, Dudgeon. "Translation of The Table of Contents From Grundzüge Des Islamischen Rechts". Academia. Academia.edu. Retrieved 26 January 2019.

External links


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