Leonie Zuntz (1908–1942) was a German

Hittitologist Hittitology is the study of the Hittites, an ancient Anatolian people that established an empire around Hattusa in the 2nd millennium BCE. It combines aspects of the archaeology, history, philology, and art history of the Hittite civilisation. ...

who settled in Britain in 1934 as refugee scholar at Somerville College, Oxford. She was included in the '' Black Book'', the list of British residents to be arrested after a Nazi invasion of Great Britain in 1940.

Life

Leonie Zuntz was from a family of Jewish descent, although her grandfather Nathan Zuntz (1847–1920) had converted to Christianity. In the 1920s she was romantically involved with

Elias Joseph Bickerman Elias Bickerman (July 7, 1897 O.S. in Russia – August 31, 1981 in Jerusalem), also spelled as Bickermann or Bikerman, was a leading scholar of Greco-Roman history and the Hellenistic world. Biography Bickerman was born in Kishinev, then ...

. In the late 1920s, while studying at

Munich Munich ( ; german: München ; bar, Minga ) is the capital and most populous city of the German state of Bavaria. With a population of 1,558,395 inhabitants as of 31 July 2020, it is the third-largest city in Germany, after Berlin and Ha ...

, she befriended the orientalist Fritz Rudolf Kraus. After gaining her doctorate, she emigrated to England in 1934. Settling in Oxford, she taught German at

Somerville College Somerville College, a constituent college of the University of Oxford in England, was founded in 1879 as Somerville Hall, one of its first two women's colleges. Among its alumnae have been Margaret Thatcher, Indira Gandhi, Dorothy Hodgkin, ...

and worked for

Oxford University Press Oxford University Press (OUP) is the university press of the University of Oxford. It is the largest university press in the world, and its printing history dates back to the 1480s. Having been officially granted the legal right to print books ...

. In 1934-5 she introduced

Oliver Gurney Oliver Robert Gurney (28 January 1911 – 11 January 2001) was an English Assyriologist from the Gurney family and a leading scholar of the Hittites. Early life Gurney was born in London in 1911, the son of Robert Gurney, a zoologist, and a ...

to Hittite. She committed suicide in 1942, at 12, Norham Gardens, Oxford, and died at the Radcliffe Infirmary. Her estate was administered by Anna Edith Zuntz, a widow."ZUNTZ Leonie of 12 Norham-gardens Oxford spinster died at the Radcliffe Infirmary Oxford" in ''Wills and Administrations 1942 (England and Wales)'' (1943), p. 531

Works

* ''Die hethitischen Ortsadverbien arha, parā, piran als selbständige Adverbien und in ihrer Verbindung mit Nomina und Verba'', Speyer a. Rh. : Pilger-Druckerei, 1936

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Zuntz, Leonie 1908 births 1942 deaths Hittitologists German Assyriologists Jewish emigrants from Nazi Germany to the United Kingdom Suicides in Oxford Fellows of Somerville College, Oxford 1942 suicides