Hoofdartikel Fritz Rudolf
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93248_BIOR_2010-1-2_01 08-06-2010 17:25 Pagina 5 5 FRITZ RUDOLF KRAUS IN ISTANBUL (1937-1949) 6 HOOFDARTIKEL The letters narrowly escaped being destroyed. Feeling that he had not much longer to live, Kraus had intended to have the letters, together with the family photo albums, destroyed and FRITZ RUDOLF KRAUS IN ISTANBUL (1937-1949) removed by the dustman. Fortunately, one of his students, AND THE DEVELOPMENT OF ANCIENT NEAR Marten Stol, by then almost a retired professor himself and EASTERN STUDIES IN TURKEY Kraus’s executor, persuaded him not to do so and to donate the collection to the library. You never knew, he reasoned, whether Jan SCHMIDT someone in the future might find them interesting. Kraus let himself be persuaded and so the letters, that is most letters, Fritz Rudolf Kraus (1910-1991), professor of Assyriology at Lei- found their way to the library. A small number of them, namely den University from 1953 until his retirement in 1980, was born those exchanged with old school-friends, were donated to in Spremberg in eastern Germany. He was the son of a Jewish Kraus’s old gymnasium and were later moved to the Geheimes textile manufacturer who had married the daughter of family of Protestant farmers. Kraus studied Oriental languages, obtained Staatsarchiv in Berlin. So far only some of these — they have his doctorate in 1935 but two years later he felt forced to leave not yet been sorted — have come to light. The photographs, his native country where, as a ‘half-Jew’ under the Nazi regime, four of which are printed here, were brought to the strongroom he was barred from an academic career. He moved to Istanbul of the Netherlands Institute for the Near East (NINO) in Lei- where his ‘Doktorvater’ and mentor Benno Landsberger had den, where they still are. In what follows, I will go into some arranged a job for him at the Archeological Museum as cata- more detail than I did earlier and will especially concentrate on loguer of its huge collection of cuneiform texts. Later he also an important topic documented in the letters, namely Kraus’s taught classes at Istanbul University. During the twelve years work in the Archaeological Museum in Istanbul, the historical he was to stay in Turkey, he remained in contact with Lands- background of its collections and the way in which Kraus and berger, who had been appointed professor in Ankara, with other colleagues, and, in the first place, with his family in Spremberg. his German colleagues contributed to the development of the Every fortnight he sent a detailed message home, describing his academic study of the Ancient Near East in Turkey. But first: daily life, the curious aspects of Turkish culture, his homesick- who was Kraus? And what are the letters about? ness, and his frustrations as a foreigner in an environment alien to the strict values of his native Prussia. Shortly before his death Biography Kraus donated a large collection of his letters to the library of Fritz Rudolf Kraus4) — Rudolf to his family — was born Leiden University. This article explores the content of the let- ters written by Kraus during his Istanbul period. Particular in Spremberg, a town north-east of Dresden and not far from attention is paid to his work and his contribution to the estab- the (present) Polish border, in 1910. His father, Siegfried lishment of Assyriology as an academic discipline in Turkey. Kraus, was a textile manufacturer born into a Jewish family Kraus wrote well and had a good eye for bizarre details as will in Vienna. He came to Germany when he was seventeen years be clear from a few letters quoted in extenso. old, was baptized and married Ilse Karge, who was descended from a Protestant family of farmers settled in Silesia. By the Introduction time the letters begin, Siegfried Kraus was major partner in the textile factory of Michelsohn & Ascher established in While cataloguing the Turkish manuscripts kept in the Lei- 1 Spremberg. Two sons were born: Fritz Rudolf and Werner. den University Library between 1998 and 2003, ) my atten- For his secondary education, Rudolf, clearly the intellectual of tion was drawn by one of the librarians to some Turkish let- the family, went to schools in Spremberg, Berlin, Görlitz and ters outside the Oriental collection. They had been found in a 2 Templin — the school in the latter town was the prestigious collection of letters donated to the library ) in 1990 by the Joachimsthaler Gymnasium, mentioned in his letters. Later he retired Professor of Assyriology, Fritz Rudolf Kraus, who was studied Semitic and Oriental languages in Munich (during the to die a year later. These, the librarian rightly presumed, might summer semester of 1928 and the winter semester of 1929- be of interest for my catalogue. I had, by way of trial, some 30) and Semitic languages in Leipzig. To his aunt Else Schnur folders brought to me in the reading room, and from that in Vienna he later wrote that the term ‘anti-Semitic’ had moment I was hooked. The content of the letters I saw was inspired him to these studies.5) In the latter university, perhaps utterly fascinating, not least because of Kraus’s personal and highly entertaining style of writing. A substantial part of the 4) Biographical data, not derived directly from the contents of the corre- letters covered the years 1937 to 1949, when Kraus lived in spondence, are based on M. Stol, “In Memoriam F.R. Kraus”, in Bibliotheca Istanbul. These letters give a lively picture of the daily life of Orientalis XLVIII, 3/4 (Leiden, mei-juli 1991), pp. 329-335. A number of an immigrant — but fugitive is perhaps a more suitable term other obituaries cover more or less the same ground: K.R. Veenhof, “Fritz Rudolf Kraus (21.3.1910 – 19.1.1991)”, in Archiv für Orientforschung here — in that city during difficult times. After reading more XXXVIII/XXXIX (1991-2), pp. 262-5; D.O. Edzard, “Fritz Rudolf Kraus, of the correspondence, I conceived the idea of publishing a 21.3.1910 – 19.1.1991”, in Zeitschrift für Assyriologie 81 (1991), pp. 1-3; selection of the letters. Together with Ludmila Hanisch of Gerhard Heuer, “Fritz Rudolf Kraus” * 21.3.1910 † 19.3 [!]. 1991’, in Alma Berlin, a colleague who is a specialist in the history of Orien- Mater Joachimica. Zeitschrift der Vereinigung Alter Joachimsthaler e.V. 71 (1991), pp. 1928-31; and M. Stol, “Fritz Rudolf Kraus, 21 maart 1910 – 19 tal studies in Germany, I am now busy preparing the edition. januari 1991”, in Koninklijke Nederlandse Akademie van Wetenschappen. At a conference in Germany, I presented a first summary paper Levensberichten en herdenkingen 1992 (Amsterdam 1993), pp. 33-7. on the letters for a panel organised by Ludmila Hanisch.3) 5) „[…] 1927 in Wien […] habe ich Deinen Ältesten restlos bewundert. Seine Bemerkung, ich würde als halber Jude wahrscheinlich ein Antisemit werden, war der Hauptgrund für meinen Entschluß, semitische Sprachen zu 1) So far three volumes have been published in Leiden. studieren: in meinem ehrlichen Bestreben, k e i n Antisemit zu werden, war 2) They are classified as BPL 3273. ich in meiner unberatenen Gymnasiastennaivität, von dem pseudowissen- 3) “Exil im Orient – Die Briefe von Fritz Rudolf Kraus aus Istanbul, schaftlichen Worte „Antisemit“ verführt, darauf gekommen, die Beschäfti- 1937-1949”, in Ludmila Hanisch (ed.), Der Orient in akademischer Optik; gung mit Semiticis sei der wirkliche Gegensatz von Antisemitismus. Die Beiträge zur Genese einer Wissenschaftsdisziplin. Orientwissenschaftliche semitischen Sprachen haben mich dann zur Assyriologie gebracht.“ Letter Hefte 20 (Halle (Saale) 2006), pp. 145-153. of 18.9.1949 (in sub-file 6/II). 93248_BIOR_2010-1-2_01 08-06-2010 17:25 Pagina 6 7 BIBLIOTHECA ORIENTALIS LXVII N° 1-2, januari-april 2010 8 the most important centre of cuneiform studies in Germany universities, had fled their country or had been imprisoned in since 1878, he was enrolled from 29 April 1930 until 15 April concentration camps. Soon afterwards Schwartz heard about 1935. Among his teachers were Fritz Hommel, Benno Lands- the academic reform in Turkey. Consulting a Swiss colleague, berger, Theo Bauer, Gotthelf Bergsträsser, Johannes Friedrich Albert Malche, professor of Pedagogics at the University of and Paul Koschaker, with most of whom he kept in touch by Geneva, who had been acting as adviser to the Turkish gov- letter after he had left Germany. Apart from ancient ernment in educational matters, Schwartz brought up the ques- Mesopotamian languages, he learnt Arabic, Turkish (from tion of whether it would be possible for at least some of the Herbert Duda, mentioned in the letters and also a correspon- dismissed academics to find shelter in Turkey. The matter was dent), Egyptian and Coptic. Kraus wrote a dissertation on taken up with the Turkish minister of Education, Re≥it Galip. Babylonian prognostic texts under Landsberger, who was to Negotiations went off well, and soon 30 German professors, remain a mentor and friend — though substitute father is per- most of them Jews or ‘half-Jews’, were contracted by the min- haps a better term; the German Doktorvater nicely indicates ister in July 1933, and more were to follow. In all, some 144 what he was for Kraus — and obtained his doctorate in 1935. academics with their families eventually found refuge in Shortly afterwards Landsberger, a Jew, was dismissed from Turkey, but not all of them stayed on if they found better posi- the University of Leipzig and was able to escape when he was tions in other countries.6) appointed professor in Ankara at the newly founded Faculty By another coincidence, historians of the ancient Near East for Linguistics, History and Geography.