Johanna Mestorf

Johanna Mestorf ( born April 17, 1828 in Bramstedt / Holstein, † July 20, 1909 in Kiel ) was a German archaeologist Prehistoric and led one of the first women in the Kingdom of Prussia, the title of professor.

Life and career

Johanna was the fourth of nine children of Jacob Heinrich Mestorf physician, in addition to his medical work also devoted himself to archeology. When he died in 1837, Mestorf moved with her mother Sophia Catherine Georgina Born grains to Itzehoe, where she attended the girls' secondary school Blöckersches Institute. 1849 she moved to Sweden as an educator, where she also learned to Nordic languages ​​. In 1853 she returned to Germany and traveled several times in the following years as a companion of an Italian countess to France and Italy. From 1859 she lived in Hamburg, began there in 1867, a job as a secretary for foreign correspondence to. She managed alongside their work, to acquire self-taught extensive archaeological knowledge.

From 1863 Johanna Mestorf translated important works of Scandinavian archeology into German. In addition, she wrote from the 1860s as well as archaeological and ethnographic fiction articles and essays. In 1868, her volunteer work began on patriotic antiquities museum in Kiel. On November 5, 1873 she was the curator for the 1891 and appointed to its director. So it was after Amalie Buchheim in Schwerin one of the first museum directors in Germany. In 1899, her 71st birthday, her the title of an honorary professor at the University of Kiel, was the first woman in Prussia awarded. Ten years later, she received an honorary doctorate from the Faculty of Medicine of the University. Already in 1891 she was made an honorary member of the Berlin Society for Anthropology, Ethnology and Prehistory, and was appointed a corresponding member in 19 international scientific societies. Focus of her research was the history of Schleswig-Holstein, they coined the terms of the single grave culture of the north German / Southern Scandinavian region of the Corded Ware culture, superb jackets for outstanding representative rectangle coats and bog body for the finds of human bodies and body parts from bogs. Johanna Mestorf was instrumental in that the Danewerk and many more find sites could be examined at an early stage and permanent.

Writings (selection )

  • Archaeological Congress in Bologna. Records. Meissner, Hamburg, 1871.
  • The international archaeological and anthropological Congress in Stockholm on August 7 to 16 1874 - seventh meeting. Meissner, Hamburg 1874
  • The international anthropologists and archaeologists Congress in Budapest from 4 to 11 September 1876 - eighth meeting. Meissner, Hamburg 1876.
  • The patriotic antiquities Schleswig -Holstein. Address to our countrymen. Meissner, Hamburg 1877.
  • Prehistoric antiquities of Schleswig -Holstein. In memory of the fiftieth anniversary of the museum patriotic antiquities in Kiel. Meissner, Hamburg 1885.
  • Catalogue located in the Germanic Museum prehistoric monuments. Rosenberg'sche collection. Germanic Museum, Nuremberg 1886.
  • Urn cemeteries in Schleswig -Holstein. Meissner, Hamburg 1886
  • From the stone age. Graves without stone chamber below ground level. In: Reports of Anthropol. Association in Schleswig -Holstein. Lipsius & Tischer, Kiel 1892, pp. 9-24, ISSN 0179-9703
  • Bog bodies. In: Report of the museum Patriotic antiquities at the University of Kiel. Volume 42, Kiel 1900
  • Homes of older Neolithic period in the Kiel Föhrde. Lipsius & Tischer, Kiel 1904. (The publishing along with Karl Albert Weber)
  • Johanna Mestorf: A guide by the Schleswig- Holstein Museum Patriotic antiquities in Kiel. Dr. Schmidt & Klaunig, Kiel 1909.
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