Emeri Johannes van Donzel (5 July 1925, in

Nieuwstadt Nieuwstadt () () is a city in the Dutch province of Limburg. It is a part of the municipality of Echt-Susteren, and lies about 5 km north of Sittard. Nieuwstadt received city rights in 1277. History It was first mentioned in 1242 as "Novo ...

− 29 October 2017, in

Wassenaar Wassenaar (; population: in ) is a Municipalities of the Netherlands, municipality and Dorp (town), town located in the Provinces of the Netherlands, province of South Holland, on the western coast of the Netherlands. An affluent suburb of The ...

) was a Dutch historian of the

Middle East The Middle East ( ar, الشرق الأوسط, ISO 233: ) is a geopolitical region commonly encompassing Arabia (including the Arabian Peninsula and Bahrain), Asia Minor (Asian part of Turkey except Hatay Province), East Thrace (Europ ...

, with particular interests in

Ethiopia Ethiopia, , om, Itiyoophiyaa, so, Itoobiya, ti, ኢትዮጵያ, Ítiyop'iya, aa, Itiyoppiya officially the Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia, is a landlocked country in the Horn of Africa. It shares borders with Eritrea to the ...

and the interaction between the Islamic world and Christianity. He served as director of the

Netherlands Institute for the Near East The Netherlands Institute for the Near East (Dutch: ''Nederlands Instituut voor het Nabije Oosten''; colloquially known by its abbreviation: NINO) is an institution for the advancement of the study of the Ancient Near East, Mesopotamia, Anatolia, a ...

, and editor-in-chief of the '' Encyclopaedia of Islam''. He received the ''Akademiepenning'' of the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences, an honorary doctorate from the

University of Hamburg The University of Hamburg (german: link=no, Universität Hamburg, also referred to as UHH) is a public research university in Hamburg, Germany. It was founded on 28 March 1919 by combining the previous General Lecture System ('' Allgemeines Vo ...

, and the medal of an Officer in the Order of Oranje-Nassau.

References

1925 births 2017 deaths Dutch orientalists Historians of the Middle East Officers of the Order of Orange-Nassau People from Echt-Susteren {{Netherlands-historian-stub