Deutsche Morgenländische Gesellschaft

Deutsche Morgenländische Gesellschaft
Deutsche Morgenländische Gesellschaft · Public domain · source
Name	Deutsche Morgenländische Gesellschaft
Formation	1845
Headquarters	Leipzig
Location	Germany
Fields	Oriental studies
Publications	Zeitschrift der Deutschen Morgenländischen Gesellschaft

Contents

Deutsche Morgenländische Gesellschaft is a learned society founded in 1845 in Leipzig dedicated to the study of Asia, North Africa, and related regions through philology, history, archaeology, and religious studies. The society has long connected scholars associated with institutions such as the Universität Leipzig, the Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin, the Universität Heidelberg, the Universität Göttingen and the Universität München, and has produced periodicals, monographs, and conference proceedings influential for researchers working on Islam, Judaism, Christianity, Sanskrit, Hebrew, Arabic and Persian studies. Its membership and networks have intersected with figures from the British Museum, the École pratique des hautes études, the Collège de France, the Austrian Academy of Sciences and the Royal Asiatic Society.

History

The society was established amid mid‑19th century intellectual currents that included scholars linked to the Deutsches Reich era universities and patrons connected to the Zollverein and the cultural centers of Leipzig, Berlin and Vienna. Founding participants and early correspondents included researchers influenced by the philological methods of Wilhelm von Humboldt, comparative projects associated with Franz Bopp, and manuscript collectors in the tradition of Alexander von Humboldt and Max Müller. Throughout the 19th century the society interacted with explorers and diplomats such as Heinrich Barth, Richard Francis Burton and Josiah Conder and with orientalists engaged in archaeological campaigns alongside institutions like the British Oriental Society and the École française d'Extrême-Orient. During the periods of the German Empire, the Weimar Republic, the Third Reich and post‑1945 Federal Germany, the society negotiated continuities and disruptions affecting members from the Universität Wien, the Jagiellonian University, the University of Oxford, and the University of Cambridge. In the late 20th century it reoriented relations with scholars from the University of Tokyo, the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, the University of Chicago and the American Oriental Society.

The society's governance has typically included an executive committee with presidents drawn from universities such as the Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin, the Universität Heidelberg and the Universität Leipzig and from museum directors at the Pergamonmuseum and the Staatliche Museen zu Berlin. Membership categories encompass ordinary members, corresponding members, and honorary members from institutions including the Austrian Academy of Sciences, the Royal Society of Antiquaries of Ireland, the Royal Asiatic Society, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and the Max Planck Society. Notable affiliate scholars have included philologists, epigraphists, and historians affiliated with the School of Oriental and African Studies, the Collège de France, the École des langues orientales, the Universität Zürich and the Universiteit Leiden. The society also maintains liaison relationships with foundations and libraries such as the Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin, the Bodleian Library, the Bibliothèque nationale de France and the Vatican Library.

Central to the society's output is its flagship periodical, the Zeitschrift der Deutschen Morgenländischen Gesellschaft, which has published articles on topics connected to manuscripts held at the British Library, the Bodleian Library, the Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin and collections from the Vatican Library. Contributors have included specialists on Arabic paleography, Syriac studies, Coptic texts, Sanskrit grammar, Pali literature, Hebrew exegesis and Ottoman archival materials. The society has sponsored monograph series that intersect with publishers and presses such as Walter de Gruyter, Brill, Cambridge University Press and Oxford University Press, and has supported critical editions of works connected with manuscript traditions studied by scholars like Gertrud Rédei, Heinrich Zimmer, Albert von Le Coq and Karl Heinrich Graf. Research themes have ranged from epigraphy involving inscriptions catalogued by the Deutsches Archäologisches Institut to numismatic studies related to collections at the British Museum and the State Hermitage Museum.

The society organizes regular meetings, symposia and international congresses that bring together participants associated with the International Association for Oriental Studies, the Union Académique Internationale, the European Association of Middle Eastern Studies and university departments at the University of Oxford, the Sorbonne, the Universität Hamburg and the Universität Tübingen. Past conferences have featured panels on manuscript preservation involving staff from the British Library, debates on philological method involving scholars from the University of Cambridge and archaeological reports from expeditions linked to the Deutsches Archäologisches Institut and the Austrian Archaeological Institute. The society maintains regular correspondence and joint sessions with organizations such as the Royal Asiatic Society and the American Oriental Society.

While not primarily a museum, the society has amassed bibliographic holdings and manuscript catalogues that complement the collections of the Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin, the Bayerische Staatsbibliothek, the Bodleian Library and the Bibliothèque nationale de France. Its library resources support scholarship on manuscripts housed at the Vatican Library, the British Museum, the Hermitage Museum and regional archives in Istanbul, Cairo and Tehran. The society's archival materials document correspondence with figures such as Max Müller, Wilhelm Gesenius, Friedrich Delitzsch and later 20th‑century colleagues at the Institute for Advanced Study and the Max Planck Institute for the History of Science.

The society has influenced the development of Oriental studies across European and global institutions including the Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin, the Universität Leipzig and the University of Chicago, shaping curricula and philological standards adopted by the School of Oriental and African Studies and the École pratique des hautes études. It has been praised for fostering international collaborations with the Royal Asiatic Society, the American Oriental Society and the Austrian Academy of Sciences, while scholars associated with postcolonial critique—drawing on work by Edward Said and researchers from the Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique—have critiqued aspects of its 19th‑ and early 20th‑century alignments. Debates have engaged historians and philologists at institutions such as the University of Oxford, the Harvard University, the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and the University of Cape Town concerning representation, provenance and the ethics of manuscript collection.

Category:Learned societies of Germany