Neilson Carel Debevoise (November 8, 1903 – December 10, 1992) was an American historian of ancient

Mesopotamia Mesopotamia ''Mesopotamíā''; ar, بِلَاد ٱلرَّافِدَيْن or ; syc, ܐܪܡ ܢܗܪ̈ܝܢ, or , ) is a historical region of Western Asia situated within the Tigris–Euphrates river system, in the northern part of the F ...

and

Iran Iran, officially the Islamic Republic of Iran, and also called Persia, is a country located in Western Asia. It is bordered by Iraq and Turkey to the west, by Azerbaijan and Armenia to the northwest, by the Caspian Sea and Turkmeni ...

, and subsequently a

military intelligence Military intelligence is a military discipline that uses information collection and analysis approaches to provide guidance and direction to assist commanders in their decisions. This aim is achieved by providing an assessment of data from a ...

officer.. Born in 1903 in

Jersey City Jersey City is the second-most populous city in the U.S. state of New Jersey, after Newark.University of Illinois The University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign (U of I, Illinois, University of Illinois, or UIUC) is a public land-grant research university in Illinois in the twin cities of Champaign and Urbana. It is the flagship institution of the University ...

, where he completed his doctoral dissertation, "Parthian Problems", under the supervision of Albert Ten Eyck Olmstead in 1929. In 1938, he published ''A Political History of Parthia'', a seminal history of the

Parthian Empire The Parthian Empire (), also known as the Arsacid Empire (), was a major Iranian political and cultural power in ancient Iran from 247 BC to 224 AD. Its latter name comes from its founder, Arsaces I, who led the Parni tribe in conque ...

. He joined the US

Military Intelligence Service The Military Intelligence Service ( ja, アメリカ陸軍情報部, ''America Rikugun Jōhōbu'') was a World War II U.S. military unit consisting of two branches, the Japanese American unit (described here) and the German-Austrian unit based ...

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 opposin ...

; in the course of the war he was posted in

Egypt Egypt ( ar, مصر , ), officially the Arab Republic of Egypt, is a transcontinental country spanning the northeast corner of Africa and southwest corner of Asia via a land bridge formed by the Sinai Peninsula. It is bordered by the Mediter ...

. He continued his work in intelligence in the postwar period, abandoning his academic career—his last journal contribution was published in 1947—and he worked for the

Department of State The United States Department of State (DOS), or State Department, is an executive department of the U.S. federal government responsible for the country's foreign policy and relations. Equivalent to the ministry of foreign affairs of other nati ...

and the

National Security Council A national security council (NSC) is usually an executive branch governmental body responsible for coordinating policy on national security issues and advising chief executives on matters related to national security. An NSC is often headed by a na ...

into the 1960s. Little is known of his activities in this capacity, though he was a member of the

Operations Coordinating Board The Operations Coordinating Board (OCB) was a committee of the United States Executive created in 1953 by President Eisenhower's Executive Order 10483 and tasked with oversight of United States covert operations. Eisenhower simultaneously gave secr ...

in 1954–58. He died in

Harrisburg, Pennsylvania Harrisburg is the capital city of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, United States, and the county seat of Dauphin County. With a population of 50,135 as of the 2021 census, Harrisburg is the 9th largest city and 15th largest municipality in Pe ...

, on December 10, 1992. Debevoise's ''Political History of Parthia'' was the first comprehensive history of the Parthian Empire to be written since

George Rawlinson George Rawlinson (23 November 1812 – 6 October 1902) was a British scholar, historian, and Christian theologian. Life Rawlinson was born at Chadlington, Oxfordshire, the son of Abram Tysack Rawlinson and the younger brother of the famous A ...

's ''The Sixth Great Oriental Monarchy'' (1873), published 65 years previously. It became the standard work on the topic,. and was translated into

Persian Persian may refer to: * People and things from Iran, historically called ''Persia'' in the English language ** Persians, the majority ethnic group in Iran, not to be conflated with the Iranic peoples ** Persian language, an Iranian language of the ...

in 1963. In 2008, Valery P. Nikonorov published a Russian translation of the ''Political History'' with an extensive bibliographical supplement on scholarship on the empire since 1938. In his introduction to the translation, Nikonorov calls Debevoise's work "totally unique for its time", and praises the book for its "high scientific level" and "breadth of coverage and depth of interpretation"..

Works

* *

References

Sources

* * * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Debevoise, Neilson Carel 1903 births 1992 deaths Historians of Iran United States Department of State officials United States National Security Council staffers University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign alumni Military personnel from New Jersey Writers from Jersey City, New Jersey American expatriates in Egypt