Friedrich Wilhelm Freiherr von Bissing im Blickpunkt ägyptologischer und zeithistorischer Forschungen: die Jahre 1914 bis 1926

Abstract

Abstract 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 Grece (1787) by the French antiquarian Jean-Jacques Barthelemy (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.