Ernst Kossmann

Ernst Heinrich Kossmann(31 January 1922 – 8 November 2003), often named asE. H. Kossmannin his books, was a Dutch historian. He was professor ofModern Historyat theUniversity of Groningenin the Netherlands. His magnum opus isThe Low Countries. History of the Southern and Northern Netherlands.

Life and work

Born inLeiden,Kossmann was the son of the erudite librarian F. H. Kossmann. He had two brothers. His twin brotherAlfredbecame a writer; his younger brother, Bernhard, played the violin professionally. The Kossmann family was of Jewish descent and they came from Germany before they settled in the Netherlands. Kossmann attended theGymnasium Erasmianumin Rotterdam. TheSecond World Warmeant an interruption of his education. He was arrested during a raid, was sent toVught concentration camp,and had to work for two-and-a-half years in Germany, together with his twin brother Alfred. The latter wrote a novel,De Nederlaag(The Defeat), that was based on their experiences during the war. After the war he studied History atLeiden Universityin the Netherlands. He graduated in 1950 and in the same year married his fellow student Johanna Putto.

After their marriage the couple went to Paris. In 1954 Kossmann obtained his Ph.D. from Leiden University, with a doctoral thesis entitledLa Fronde.In 1957 he went to London as professor of Dutch History and Institutions. In 1962 he became professor at theUniversity College London.In 1966 he became professor of Modern History at the University of Groningen. In 1981 he delivered hisHuizinga Lecturein thePieterskerkin Leiden. He retired as professor in 1987 and died in Groningen in 2003.

Kossmann was considered a writer with a refined style, and an erudite scholar. His intellectual outlook was sceptical, ironical, detached. He published several books in collaboration with his wife Johanna Kossmann-Putto. In an interview in 2007, his former studentFrank Ankersmitgives a description of him:

He had an unusually strong and fascinating personality -- I never met anyone even remotely coming close to what he was like. Just to give you an idea: he was all that one might associate withFrançois Guizot,very much aloof, very intelligent, both impossible to get close to and yet very much accessible and blessed with the rhetorical powers of a Pericles. If he had decided for a political career, the recent history of my country would have been completely different from what it is now. It rarely happened, but if he really felt that this was necessary he could raise a rhetorical storm blowing away everything and everybody. Indeed, when thinking of him, I never am sure what impressed me most, his scholarship or his personality. He was a truly wonderful man.

Kossmann became member of theRoyal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciencesin 1961 and resigned in 1966. He joined again as member in 1973.

Bibliography (selection)

• La Fronde(doctoral thesis). Leiden: Universitaire Pers, 1954 (In French)
• In Praise of the Dutch Republic. Some seventeenth-century attitudes(inaugural lecture University College London). London: Lewis 1963
• The Low Countries: 1780-1940(Oxford History of Modern Europe). Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1978, 790 pp.
• The Low Countries. History of the Southern and Northern Netherlands.Rekkem: Flemish-Netherlands Foundation Ons Erfdeel, 1987 (written by Dr. E.H. Kossmannn and Dr. J.A. Kossmann-Putto)
• Political thought in the Dutch Republic. Three Studies.Amsterdam: KNAW, 2000
• Over conservatisme[On Conservatism], Amsterdam: Athenaeum Polak & Van Gennep, 1981 (Huizinga Lectureof 1980)

Sources

• H.L. Wesseling,'Ernst Heinrich Kossmann, Leiden 31 januari 1922 - Groningen 8 november 2003',Jaarboek van de Maatschappij der Nederlandse Letterkunde 2004,p. 106-125 (in Dutch).
• File Ernst Kossmannin the Digital Library of Dutch Literature (DBNL), including online versions of some of his books.