Karl Ludwig Lehrs (January 14, 1802 – June 9, 1878), was a German classical scholar. Born at

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 named ...

, he was Jewish, but in 1822 he converted to

Christianity Christianity is an Abrahamic monotheistic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus of Nazareth. It is the world's largest and most widespread religion with roughly 2.38 billion followers representing one-third of the global pop ...

. In 1845 he was appointed professor of ancient

Greek Greek may refer to: Greece Anything of, from, or related to Greece, a country in Southern Europe: *Greeks, an ethnic group. *Greek language, a branch of the Indo-European language family. **Proto-Greek language, the assumed last common ancestor ...

philology Philology () is the study of language in oral and writing, written historical sources; it is the intersection of textual criticism, literary criticism, history, and linguistics (with especially strong ties to etymology). Philology is also defin ...

Königsberg University 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 named ...

, a post he held until his death.

Work

His most important works are: *'' De Aristarchi Studiis Homericis'' (1833), which laid a new foundation for Homeric

exegesis Exegesis ( ; from the Ancient Greek, Greek , from , "to lead out") is a critical explanation or interpretation (logic), interpretation of a text. The term is traditionally applied to the interpretation of Bible, Biblical works. In modern usage, ...

(on the Aristarchean lines of explaining

Homer Homer (; grc, Ὅμηρος , ''Hómēros'') (born ) was a Greek poet who is credited as the author of the ''Iliad'' and the ''Odyssey'', two epic poems that are foundational works of ancient Greek literature. Homer is considered one of the ...

from the text itself) and textual criticism. *'' Quaestiones Epicae'' (1837). *'' De Asclepiade Myrleano'' (1845). *'' Herodiani Scripta Tria emendatiora. Accedunt Analecta'' (1848). The three treatises which are the object of this study are Περὶ μονήρους λέξεως, Περὶ Ἰλιακῆς προσωιδίας, and Περὶ διχρόνων. *'' Populäre Aufsätze aus dem Altertum'' (1856, Second much enlarged edition, 1875), his best known work. *'' Horatius Flaccus'' (1869), in which, on aesthetic grounds, he rejected many of the odes as spurious. *'' Die Pindarscholien'' (1873). Lehrs was a man of decided opinions; his enthusiasm for everything Greek caused him to insist on the undivided authorship of the ''

Iliad The ''Iliad'' (; grc, Ἰλιάς, Iliás, ; "a poem about Ilium") is one of two major ancient Greek epic poems attributed to Homer. It is one of the oldest extant works of literature still widely read by modern audiences. As with the ''Odysse ...

'';

comparative mythology Comparative mythology is the comparison of myths from different cultures in an attempt to identify shared themes and characteristics.Littleton, p. 32 Comparative mythology has served a variety of academic purposes. For example, scholars have used ...

and the symbolical interpretation of myths he regarded as a species of sacrilege.

Notes

References

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Lehrs, Karl 19th-century German writers 19th-century German male writers German classical scholars University of Königsberg faculty Converts to Christianity from Judaism 19th-century German Jews Levites Writers from Königsberg 1802 births 1878 deaths