Herbert Jankuhn (8 August 1905 – 30 April 1990) was a German archaeologist of Prussian Lithuanian heritage who specialized in the archaeology of

Germanic peoples The Germanic peoples were historical groups of people that once occupied Central Europe and Scandinavia during antiquity and into the early Middle Ages. Since the 19th century, they have traditionally been defined by the use of ancient and e ...

. He is best known for his excavations at the

Viking Age The Viking Age () was the period during the Middle Ages when Norsemen known as Vikings undertook large-scale raiding, colonizing, conquest, and trading throughout Europe and reached North America. It followed the Migration Period and the Germ ...

site of

Hedeby Hedeby (, Old Norse ''Heiðabýr'', German ''Haithabu'') was an important Danish Viking Age (8th to the 11th centuries) trading settlement near the southern end of the Jutland Peninsula, now in the Schleswig-Flensburg district of Schleswig-Holst ...

, and for his instrumental role in the publishing of the second edition of the ''

Reallexikon der Germanischen Altertumskunde ''Germanische Altertumskunde Online'', formerly called ''Reallexikon der Germanischen Altertumskunde'', is a German encyclopedia of the study of Germanic history and cultures, as well as the cultures that were in close contact with them. The first ...

''. Jankuhn joined the

Nazi Party The Nazi Party, officially the National Socialist German Workers' Party (german: Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei or NSDAP), was a far-right political party in Germany active between 1920 and 1945 that created and supported t ...

, SS and SA in the 1930s.

Early life and education

Herbert Jankuhn was born in Angerburg, East Prussia, Germany on 8 August 1905. His paternal grandfather was Lithuanian, and his mother was a Masur. Spending his youth in

Mitau Jelgava (; german: Mitau, ; see also other names) is a state city in central Latvia about southwest of Riga with 55,972 inhabitants (2019). It is the largest town in the region of Zemgale (Semigalia). Jelgava was the capital of the united ...

and

Tilsit Sovetsk (russian: Сове́тск; german: Tilsit; Old Prussian: ''Tilzi''; lt, Tilžė; pl, Tylża) is a town in Kaliningrad Oblast, Russia, located on the south bank of the Neman River which forms the border with Lithuania. Geography So ...

, Jankuhn studied

Germanistics The asterisk ( ), from Late Latin , from Ancient Greek , ''asteriskos'', "little star", is a typographical symbol. It is so called because it resembles a conventional image of a heraldic star. Computer scientists and mathematicians often voc ...

, history, philology and physical exercise at the universities of

Königsberg Königsberg (, ) was the historic Prussian city that is now Kaliningrad, Russia. Königsberg was founded in 1255 on the site of the ancient Old Prussian settlement ''Twangste'' by the Teutonic Knights during the Northern Crusades, and was name ...

Jena Jena () is a German city and the second largest city in Thuringia. Together with the nearby cities of Erfurt and Weimar, it forms the central metropolitan area of Thuringia with approximately 500,000 inhabitants, while the city itself has a po ...

and

Berlin Berlin ( , ) is the capital and List of cities in Germany by population, largest city of Germany by both area and population. Its 3.7 million inhabitants make it the European Union's List of cities in the European Union by population within ci ...

. Having studied under Max Ebert and Carl Schuchhardt, Jankuhn received in PhD in archaeology at the University of Berlin in 1931. Jankuhn was strongly influenced by Wilhelm Unverzagt and Albert Kiekebusch, both of whom where critical of the settlement archaeology theories of

Gustaf Kossinna Gustaf Kossinna (28 September 1858 – 20 December 1931) was a German philologist and archaeologist who was Professor of German Archaeology at the University of Berlin. Along with Carl Schuchhardt he was the most influential German prehisto ...

Early career

Jankuhn completed his habilitation at the

University of Kiel Kiel University, officially the Christian-Albrecht University of Kiel, (german: Christian-Albrechts-Universität zu Kiel, abbreviated CAU, known informally as Christiana Albertina) is a university in the city of Kiel, Germany. It was founded in ...

in 1935. Since 1930, Jankuhn had conducted excavations at the

settlement of

. From 1938, with the help of

Ahnenerbe The Ahnenerbe (, ''ancestral heritage'') operated as a think tank in Nazi Germany between 1935 and 1945. Heinrich Himmler, the ''Reichsführer-SS'' from 1929 onwards, established it in July 1935 as an SS appendage devoted to the task of promot ...

, Jankuhn organized the excavations at Hedeby into one of the largest archaeological projects in the world. The results of his excavations at Hedeby were initially published in 1936, and have since been republished in numerous revised editions. Jankuhn's work at Hedeby greatly impressed

Heinrich Himmler Heinrich Luitpold Himmler (; 7 October 1900 – 23 May 1945) was of the (Protection Squadron; SS), and a leading member of the Nazi Party of Germany. Himmler was one of the most powerful men in Nazi Germany and a main architect of th ...

, leader of the

Schutzstaffel The ''Schutzstaffel'' (SS; also stylized as ''ᛋᛋ'' with Armanen runes; ; "Protection Squadron") was a major paramilitary organization under Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party in Nazi Germany, and later throughout German-occupied Europe duri ...

, with whom Jankuhn became friendly. Jankuhn eventually joined both the

, the Schutzstaffel, and became Head of the Excavation and Archaeology Department Ahnenerbe in 1940. During

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposing ...

, Jankuhn travelled across German-occupied Europe, where he reported to the

Sicherheitsdienst ' (, ''Security Service''), full title ' (Security Service of the '' Reichsführer-SS''), or SD, was the intelligence agency of the SS and the Nazi Party in Nazi Germany. Established in 1931, the SD was the first Nazi intelligence organization ...

on the reliability of scholars in occupied countries. Jankuhn was made an associate professor at the University of Kiel in 1940. In the summer of 1942, Jankuhn followed

5th SS Panzer Division Wiking The 5th SS Panzer Division Wiking (german: 5. SS-Panzerdivision Wiking) or SS Division Wiking was an infantry and later an armoured division among the thirty-eight Waffen-SS divisions of Nazi Germany. It was recruited from foreign volunteer ...

into the

Crimea Crimea, crh, Къырым, Qırım, grc, Κιμμερία / Ταυρική, translit=Kimmería / Taurikḗ ( ) is a peninsula in Ukraine, on the northern coast of the Black Sea, that has been occupied by Russia since 2014. It has a pop ...

to conduct excavations at

Mangup , settlement_type = Historic settlement , image_skyline = Mangup Fortress2.jpg , imagesize = 250px , image_caption = Ruins of the Gate of the Citadel at Mangup , pushpin_map = Crimea , pushpin_re ...

, capital of the

Crimean Goths The Crimean Goths were Greuthungi-Gothic tribes who remained in the lands around the Black Sea, especially in Crimea. They were the longest-lasting of the Gothic communities. Their existence is well attested through the ages, though the exact p ...

. From 1942 to 1943, Jankuhn was Professor at the

University of Rostock The University of Rostock (german: link=no, Universität Rostock) is a public university located in Rostock, Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, Germany. Founded in 1419, it is the third-oldest university in Germany. It is the oldest university in continen ...

. He spent the last years of the war as an intelligence officer in 5th SS Panzer Division Wiking, which surrendered to the

United States Army The United States Army (USA) is the land warfare, land military branch, service branch of the United States Armed Forces. It is one of the eight Uniformed services of the United States, U.S. uniformed services, and is designated as the Army o ...

Bavaria Bavaria ( ; ), officially the Free State of Bavaria (german: Freistaat Bayern, link=no ), is a state in the south-east of Germany. With an area of , Bavaria is the largest German state by land area, comprising roughly a fifth of the total lan ...

in 1945.

Post-war career

Jankuhn was imprisoned from 1945 to 1948. After his release from prison, Jankuhn was forbidden from teaching, but nevertheless continued to teach and research privately. He returned to Kiel in 1949 in to work on restoring museums destroyed during

. He subsequently served as a guest lecturer at the universities of

Hamburg (male), (female) en, Hamburger(s), Hamburgian(s) , timezone1 = Central (CET) , utc_offset1 = +1 , timezone1_DST = Central (CEST) , utc_offset1_DST = +2 , postal ...

and Kiel. From the 1950s onward, Jankuhn played an instrumental role in reviving the field of settlement archaeology, and advocated an interdisciplinary approach to the study of

prehistory Prehistory, also known as pre-literary history, is the period of human history between the use of the first stone tools by hominins 3.3 million years ago and the beginning of recorded history with the invention of writing systems. The use ...

. Since 1956, Jankuhn served as associate professor, and from 1959 professor of prehistory and

protohistory Protohistory is a period between prehistory and history during which a culture or civilization has not yet developed writing, but other cultures have already noted the existence of those pre-literate groups in their own writings. For example, in ...

at the

University of Göttingen The University of Göttingen, officially the Georg August University of Göttingen, (german: Georg-August-Universität Göttingen, known informally as Georgia Augusta) is a public research university in the city of Göttingen, Germany. Founded ...

. During this time, Jankuhn founded and led a number of scholarly organizations, and edited several scholarly publications. From 1968, Jankuhn was instrumental in the publishing of the second edition of the ''

'' (1969-2008). He advocated broadening the scope of the series to include not only

, but also

Celts The Celts (, see pronunciation for different usages) or Celtic peoples () are. "CELTS location: Greater Europe time period: Second millennium B.C.E. to present ancestry: Celtic a collection of Indo-European peoples. "The Celts, an ancien ...

, Slavs,

Sarmatians The Sarmatians (; grc, Σαρμαται, Sarmatai; Latin: ) were a large confederation of ancient Eastern Iranian equestrian nomadic peoples of classical antiquity who dominated the Pontic steppe from about the 3rd century BC to the 4th cen ...

and other peoples of ancient north-central Europe. Jankuhn retired from the University of Göttingen in 1973.

Selected works

* ''Gürtelgarnituren der älteren römischen Kaiserzeit im Samland'', 1932 * ''Die Wehranlagen der Wikingerzeit zwischen Schlei und Treene'', 1935 * ''Haithabu – eine germanische Stadt der Frühzeit'', 1938 * ''Gemeinschaftsform und Herrschaftsbildung in frühgermanischer Zeit'', 1939 * ''Die Ausgrabungen in Haithabu (1937–1939)'', 1943 * ''Haithabu – Ein Handelsplatz der Wikingerzeit'', 1956 * ''Die Römische Kaiserzeit und die Völkerwanderungszeit'', 1966 * ''Einführung in die Siedlungsarchäologie'', 1977

References

Sources

* *

External links

Herbert Jankuhn
at the website of the Kiel Directory of Scholars {{DEFAULTSORT:Jankuhn, Herbert 1905 births 1990 deaths University of Rostock faculty German archaeologists German editors German people of Lithuanian descent German people of Slavic descent Germanic studies scholars Humboldt University of Berlin alumni People from Węgorzewo People from East Prussia SS officers University of Jena alumni University of Kiel alumni University of Kiel faculty University of Königsberg alumni University of Göttingen faculty Waffen-SS personnel Ahnenerbe members 20th-century archaeologists Nazi Party members