Jakob Gronovius

Jakob Gronovius (* October 20, 1645 in Deventer, † October 15, 1716 in Leiden ) was a classical scholar, archaeologist, historian and geographer.

Life

Jacob Gronovius (also Gronow / Gronov ) studied from 1658 with his father Johann Friedrich Gronovius in Leiden Philology ( literae humaniores ) and Jura. In 1668 he traveled to England to study at Oxford and Cambridge. There he met his father's friends, the orientalist and theologian Edward Pococke (1604-1691), the theologian John Pearson (1612-1686) and the philologist Méric Casaubon (1599-1661) know. 1670 refused Gronovius from a call to Deventer, because he preferred to travel. Thus followed a 1671 trip to Paris. There he met, with the two Orientalists Barthélemy d' Herbelot de Molainville (1625-1695) and Melchisédech Thévenot ( c. 1620-1692 ), the philologist Henri Valois ( 1603-1676 ) and the writer Jean Chapelain together.

In 1672 he visited together with the envoys of the States-General Adriaan Pats Spain, then he traveled nor the Tuscany. There Gronivius received at the instigation of the Grand Duke Cosimo de Medici, a professor of Greek at the University of Pisa. After two years he went to Venice and Padua, and returned to Germany in 1675 after suffering back. From there Gronovius went to Deventer to take up his maternal heritage. 1679 he took over his father's professorship of Greek language and history at the University of Leiden, which he held until his death. 1702 he was a geographer at the academy in Leiden, appeals to Kiel and Padua he refused. He also participated in the organizational tasks of the Leiden University and was in the years 1703/1704 and 1711/1712 rector of the Alma Mater. Gronovius died in 1716 in Leiden, in grief over the death of his youngest daughter.

Family

His father Johann Friedrich Gronovius (1611-1671) was born in Hamburg and studied in Leipzig, Jena, Altdorf, Leiden and Groningen, his mother Adelheid Tennuyl ( Germanized for Alida th Nuyl ) came from Deventer. There, the father received in 1643 a professor of eloquence and history, in 1658 he was appointed professor at the University of Leiden for a professorship of the Greek language and history.

On May 5, 1680 Gronovius Anna van Vreden Burch ( 1652-1732 ) married in Rotterdam. With her he had four children: Alida (1683-1729) Jan Frederik (1686-1762), Abraham (1695-1775) and Clara Wilhelmina ( 1697-1716 ).

His eldest son Jan Frederik Gronovius, a doctor of medicine, law scholar and a well-known botanist; the second oldest, Abraham, was a philologist and librarian at the University of Leiden.

Work

Jakob Gronovius was regarded as choleric and streitsüchig how his violent confrontations with the antiquarian Rafaello Fabretti (1618-1700), the philologist Jacob Perizonius (1651-1715), the theologian John Le Clerc (1657-1736), the jurist and antiquarian Lorenz Beger ( 1653-1705) prove, among other things. Its merit is to have emerged with the publication of the Thesaurus Graecarum Antiquitatum in twelve volumes approximately as strong as the thesaurus Antiquitatum Romanarum the Gleichgewichtigkeit of Greek antiquities, although the actual rediscovery of Greece had not even used. Its compilation was indeed arranged thematically according to Flavio Biondo concept, but it was based on the idea that religion, mythology, art, philosophy, poetry, science and customs of antiquity were ultimately influenced largely Greek. By reprinting in his Thesaurus Gronovius made ​​these early archaeological writings of interested experts again more easily accessible and therefore available for antiquarian research. Concerns of the Thesaurus has been to portray through the collections of the best treatises the exemplarity of antiquity. Therefore, they have long been considered indispensable tool for the study of antiquity.

Works

• Gemmae et sculpturae Antiquae depictae from Leonardo Augustino Senensi addita earum enarratione. Amsterdam 1685.
• Abrahamic Gorlaei Antverpiani Dactyliothecae, seu annulorum sigillarium ... pars prima, cum explicationibus Jacobi gronovii. Suffering 1695th
• Abrahamic Gorlaei Antverpiani Dactyliothecae. Pars Secunda, seu variarum gemmarum ... cum succincta singularum explicatione Jacobi gronovii. Suffering 1695th
• Thesaurus Graecarum Antiquitatum, in quo continentur effigies virorum ac foeminarum Illustrium ... adjecta brevi descriptione singulorum ..., vols 1-3, Leiden 1697-1698.
• Thesaurus Graecarum Antiquitatum, continens libros erudite & operose by varias aetates scriptos .... vols 4-12/2, Leiden 1699-1702.