Henri Arnold Seyrig
Henri Seyrig Arnold ( born November 10, 1895 in Héricourt (Haute -Saône ), † January 21, 1973 in Neuchâtel ) was a French archaeologist, numismatist and historian. He was from 1929 the director of the Department of Antiquities in the French mandated territories of Lebanon and Syria and director of the Institut français d' you archéologie Proche -Orient in Beirut.
Life
Seyrig was the son of Abel Seyrig ( garde général Forestry ) and Julia de Lacroix in an upper-class, Calvinist family. His grandfather was the engineer Théophile Seyrig. In that time the German Alsace he first attended a German school in Mulhouse, later he went to the Protestant boarding school École des Roches in Normandy. His English education received Seyrig 1913 in Oxford.
During the First World War Seyrig was used as a soldier of the French army at Verdun and was awarded the Croix de Guerre. In 1917 he was transferred to the Turkish front in Salonika and came there with the ancient world in touch.
After studying at the Sorbonne in Victor Bérard (1864-1931) he was the Agrégation 1922 and won a contest as a member of the École française d' Athènes in Greece, where he remained seven years, and in 1928 became its general secretary.
1929 Seyrig was appointed on the recommendation of the archaeologist René Dussaud as the successor of Charles Virolleaud to the " Directeur général des Antiques de Syrie et du Liban " in Beirut. Syria and Lebanon were French since 1922 mandated territories. Seyrig wrote the the " High Commissioner for Syria and Lebanon," on November 7, 1933, adopted Antiquities Act and its implementing regulations ( Réglement sur les Antiques ), created rules for the division of finds and presented the excavation licenses. In Beirut ( Musée National de Beyrouth, 1942) and Damascus ( Musée national de Damas, 1936), he contributed to the founding of museums in and to the regional museums in As - Suwayda in the Hauran, Palmyra, Aleppo ( 1931) and Latakia. The major international projects of archeology in Baalbek, Palmyra and Krak des Chevaliers he made each that the modern settlement was ousted in favor of the excavations.
After the French capitulation in June 1940 in Europe and before the British occupation of Syria and Lebanon in June 1941 Seyrig went first to Mexico and then on to New York and worked for the Forces Françaises Libres. After the war, he returned to Beirut and was twenty years as director of the "Institut français d' you archéologie Proche -Orient " ( IFAPO ). Seyrig now had close ties with research institutions in the U.S. and was 1964-1969 repeatedly visiting scientist at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton. In 1967 he retired and moved from Beirut to Switzerland, his successor in Beirut was Daniel Schlumberger.
Seyrig 1930 Hermine de Saussure had married. The daughter Delphine Seyrig, later an actress and director, was born in Beirut in 1932.
Seyrig in 1952 a member of the Académie des Inscriptions et Belles Lettres. The numismatist honored him in 1952 with the Archer M. Huntington Medal in 1961 and the Medal of the Royal Numismatic Society.
Seyrig had a large collection of Byzantine lead seals, which is now in the Cabinet des Médailles in Paris, several antiques from his own were donated to the Louvre in Paris.
Writings (selection )
- Antiquites syriennes. Series 2-6. Geuthner, Paris 1934-1966.
- Cachets d'archives de quelques villes publiques de la Syrie romaine. Beirut 1940.