Necrologie

Necrologie

Necrologie

Necrologie

The extensive bibliography of Friedrich Wilhelm Freiherr von Bissing (1873-1956) lists 621 numbered items, documenting over six decades of Egyptological productivity. Widely unknown to Egyptologists and ancient historians, however, are a handful of publications by F.W. von Bissing, printed between 1914 and 1917, in which he defends the German occupation of Belgium to a French-speaking audience using the pseudonym “Anacharsis le jeune.“ This name refers to the antagonist in the novel Les Voyages du jeune Anacharsis en Grèce (1787) by the French antiquarian Jean-Jacques Barthélemy (1716-1795), which reached the status of, what might be called, a Bildungsroman in the late 18th and 19th century in Europe. Furthermore, F.W. von Bissing is the author of numerous political writings published between 1915 and 1922 for a German-speaking audience under his own name, mostly dealing with the relationship between the German Empire and Belgium during World War I.; later with the political situation in post-war Germany.—This study tries to shed light on F.W. von Bissing's pamphlets, writings, letters and political background and non-academic activities in the last years of the Kaiserreich and the early Weimar Republic until his retirement from the chair at the university in Utrecht in 1926