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Kuno Meyer

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Kuno Meyer
Kuno Meyer
Kuno Meyer
Born(1858-12-20)20 December 1858
Free and Hanseatic City of Hamburg
Died11 October 1919(1919-10-11)(aged 60)
Leipzig,Germany
OccupationAcademic
NationalityGerman

Kuno Meyer(20 December 1858 – 11 October 1919) was a German scholar, distinguished in the field ofCelticphilology and literature. His pro-German stance at the start ofWorld War Iin the United States was a source of controversy. His brother was the distinguished classical scholar,Eduard Meyer.

Meyer was considered first and foremost a lexicographer among Celtic scholars but is known by the general public in Ireland rather as the man who introduced them toSelections from Ancient Irish Poetry(1911).[1][2]

He founded and edited four journals devoted to Celtic Studies,[2]published numerous texts and translations of Old and Middle Irish romances and sagas, and wrote prolifically, his topics ranging to name origins and ancient law.[3]

Early life

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Born inHamburg,he studied there at theGelehrtenschule of the Johanneum.[4]He spent two years inEdinburgh,Scotland,as a teenager (1874–1876) learningEnglish.[5][1]

From 1879, he attended theUniversity of Leipzig,where he was taught Celtic scholarship byErnst Windisch.He received his doctorate for his thesisEine irische Version der Alexandersage,an Irish version of theAlexander Romance,in 1884.[6]

Lecturer

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He then took up the post of lecturer inTeutonic languagesat the new University College,Liverpool,the precursor of theUniversity of Liverpool,which was established three years earlier.[7]While at Liverpool, he was appointed to the post of MacCallum Lecturer at theUniversity of Glasgow.He held this post for three years, delivering his first lectures in 1904.[8]He was among those who called for the establishment of a permanent lectureship inCeltic Studiesat Glasgow.

He continued to publish onOld Irishand more general topics on theCeltic languages,as well as producing textbooks forGerman.In 1896, he founded and edited jointly with Ludwig Christian Stern, the prestigiousZeitschrift für celtische Philologie.He also co-foundedArchiv für celtische Lexicographiein 1898 withWhitley Stokes,producing 3 volumes from 1900 to 1907.[9]

In 1903, Meyer founded theSchool of Irish Learningin Dublin, and the next year created its journalÉriuof which he was the editor. Also in 1904, he became Todd Professor in the Celtic Languages at theRoyal Irish Academy.In October 1911, he followedHeinrich Zimmeras Professor of Celtic Philology atFriedrich Wilhelm Universityin Berlin; the following year, a volume ofMiscellanywas presented to him by pupils and friends in honour of his election, and he was made a freeman of bothDublinandCork.[10]

First World War

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At the outbreak of theFirst World War,Meyer left Europe for the United States of America, where he lectured atColumbia University,University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign,and elsewhere.[a][11]A pro-German speech he gave in December 1914 toClan na GaelonLong Islandcaused outrage in Britain and some factions among the Irish, and as a result, he was removed from the roll of freemen in Dublin and Cork and from his Honorary Professorship of Celtic at Liverpool. He also resigned as Director of the School of Irish Learning and editor ofÉriu.[12]

Harvard Universityalso had extended an invitation to Meyer to lecture on campus, but it subsequently "disinvited" him on in the fall of 1914 on account of Meyer's pro-German activity.[13][14]

Meyer nevertheless accepted candidacy for the post of exchange professor at Harvard, at the recommendation of German professors there. However, when the April 1915 issue ofThe Harvard Advocateawarded first prize to an anti-German satirical poem "Gott mit Uns" written by an undergraduate, Meyer sent the university (and the press) a letter of protest, rebuking the faculty members who served as judges for failure to exercise neutrality. Meyer also declined his candidacy for the exchange professorship in the letter. In a reply, PresidentAbbott Lawrence Lowellsaid, in explaining Harvard's policy, that freedom of speech includes pro-German and pro-Allied voices alike.[15][16][7]

Later life

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He was injured in a railway collision in 1915 and met 27-year-old Florence Lewis while he was recovering in a California hospital. They married shortly afterwards.[17][18]Florence went to Germany in 1916, Meyer in 1917. In 1919 Florence and her daughter went to Switzerland. He died inLeipzig.

Legacy

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Posthumously, in 1920, Meyer's name was restored, both by Dublin and Cork, in their Rolls of Honorary Freemen. The restoration happened on 19 April 1920 in Dublin, whereSinn Féinhad won control of the City Council three months before, rescinding the decision taken in 1915 by theIrish Parliamentary Party.[19]

In 1965, the Gaelic League and theIrish Presspetitioned the restoration as they were unaware that it had already occurred.[1]

Meyer was regranted the Freedom of the City of Cork, as follows: "Re-elected 14th May, 1920, and order of Council of the 8th January, 1915, expunging his name from the roll rescinded".[20]

Also in 1920, Meyer was described by his acquaintanceDouglas Hyde,Celtic philologist and later president of the Republic of Ireland, as "one of the most lovable men who ever existed, and himself undoubtedly in love with Ireland". Hyde credited him with advancing the goals of theGaelic Leaguewhen the question arose whether to allow the teaching of the Irish language in the Intermediate Education of Ireland. [21]

W. T. Cosgrave,later president of theIrish Free State,as a Dublin councilman, had strenuously opposed the removal of Meyer's name from Dublin's Freemen roll in the first place. Cosgrave wrote in a letter that Meyer was recognized as "the greatest Celtic authority since the death ofWhitley Stokes"and that he has" done more for Irish scholarship and Irish national glory than any other living man ".[22][23]

In 2004, on the centenary of the publication ofÉriu,Proinsias Mac Cana described Kuno Meyer as a "great" scholar, in "brilliant" partnership withJohn Strachanas the first editors ofÉriu,his predecessors in that position. Meyer is among those credited with playing a crucial role in fostering native Irish Celtists in the initial phases ofÉriuand the School of Irish Learning, and when the editorship overÉriulater passed to the succeeding generation of Irish scholars, tantamount to the fulfilment of the "primary intention of Meyer and his associates".[24]

Selected bibliography

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Festschrift

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  • Miscellany presented to Kuno Meyer by some of his friends and pupils on the occasion of his appointment to the chair of Celtic philology in the University of Berlin;ed. by Osborn Bergin and Carl Marstrander. Halle: M. Niemeyer, 1912.

Notes

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  1. ^Ó Lúing 1991,p. 169: "Gertrude Schoepperlehad arranged for a long stay at Urbana University in Illinois ".

References

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  1. ^abc Murphy, Maureen (November 1994), "(Review) Kuno Meyer, 1858–1919: a biography, by Seán Ó Lúing",Irish Historical Studies,29(114), Cambridge University Press: 268–270,doi:10.1017/S0021121400011731,JSTOR30006758,S2CID163224784
  2. ^abBest (1923),p. 182.
  3. ^ Titley, Alan (October 1994), "(Review) King Kuno",Books Ireland(162), Cambridge University Press: 188–189,JSTOR20626621
  4. ^Rines, George Edwin, ed. (1920)."Meyer, Kuno".Encyclopedia Americana.
  5. ^Ó Lúing (1991),p. 1.
  6. ^ Meyer, Kuno (1884).Eine Irische version der Alexandersage(Thesis).
  7. ^abReynolds, Francis J., ed. (1921)."Meyer, Kuno".Collier's New Encyclopedia.New York: P. F. Collier & Son Company.
  8. ^"Sgeul na Gàidhlig | The Gaelic story at the University of Glasgow".Archivedfrom the original on 27 March 2019.Retrieved7 March2021.
  9. ^Ó Lúing (1991),pp. 21, 249.
  10. ^Ó Lúing (1991),pp. 172–3.
  11. ^Ó Lúing (1991),pp. 168–9.
  12. ^Ó Lúing (1991),pp. 170–3, 178–9.
  13. ^"A War Poem and Its Consequences".Harvard Alumni Bulletin.17(30): 235–6. 5 May 1915.Archivedfrom the original on 17 December 2019.Retrieved14 June2016.
  14. ^Bethell, John T. (1998),Harvard Observed: An Illustrated History of the University in the Twentieth Century,Harvard University Press, p. 70,ISBN9780674377332
  15. ^One or more of the preceding sentences incorporates text from a publication now in thepublic domain:Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1922). "Lowell, Abbott Lawrence".Encyclopædia Britannica(12th ed.). London & New York: The Encyclopædia Britannica Company.
  16. ^"The Meyer incident".The Harvard Graduates' Magazine.24(93): 235–6. September 1915.Retrieved31 March2011.
  17. ^Ó Lúing (1991),pp. 195, 212.
  18. ^"CELT: Kuno Meyer".Archivedfrom the original on 30 October 2005.Retrieved31 March2006.
  19. ^"Freedom of the City of Dublin".Archived fromthe originalon 9 August 2016.Retrieved3 January2015.
  20. ^"Your Council » Freedom of the City".Archivedfrom the original on 19 January 2013.Retrieved19 June2016.
  21. ^Hyde, Douglas(June 1920), "Canon Peter O'Leary and Dr. Kuno Meyer",Studies: An Irish Quarterly Review,9(34): 297–301,JSTOR30082987
  22. ^Cosgrave, W. T.(17 July 1915)."Kuno Meyer".The Vital Issue (Issues and Events).3(3): 5.Retrieved16 November2018.(reprint of Cosgrave's letter dated 8 February 1915)
  23. ^Ó Lúing (1991),pp. 173, 175.
  24. ^ Mac Cana, Proinsias (2004), "Ériu 1904–2004",Ériu,54(–1): 1–9,doi:10.3318/ERIU.2004.54.1.1,JSTOR30007360
Bibliography
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