Josef Wiesehöfer (born April 5, 1951 in Wickede,

North Rhine-Westphalia North Rhine-Westphalia or North-Rhine/Westphalia, commonly shortened to NRW, is a States of Germany, state () in Old states of Germany, Western Germany. With more than 18 million inhabitants, it is the List of German states by population, most ...

) is a German classical scholar and former professor of

Ancient history Ancient history is a time period from the History of writing, beginning of writing and recorded human history through late antiquity. The span of recorded history is roughly 5,000 years, beginning with the development of Sumerian language, ...

at the Department of Classics of the

University of Kiel Kiel University, officially the Christian Albrecht University of Kiel, (, abbreviated CAU, known informally as Christiana Albertina) is a public research university in the city of Kiel, Germany. It was founded in 1665 as the ''Academia Holsator ...

. Wiesehöfer obtained his doctorate at the

University of Münster The University of Münster (, until 2023 , WWU) is a public research university located in the city of Münster, North Rhine-Westphalia in Germany. With more than 43,000 students and over 120 fields of study in 15 departments, it is Germany's ...

in 1977 with a thesis on the Persian Great King

Darius I Darius I ( ; – 486 BCE), commonly known as Darius the Great, was the third King of Kings of the Achaemenid Empire, reigning from 522 BCE until his death in 486 BCE. He ruled the empire at its territorial peak, when it included much of West A ...

and the pretender to the throne

Gaumata Bardiya or Smerdis ( ; ; possibly died 522 BCE), also named as Tanyoxarces (; ) by Ctesias, was a son of Cyrus the Great and the younger brother of Cambyses II, both Persian kings. There are sharply divided views on his life. Bardiya either ...

. After completing his dissertation, Wiesehöfer worked for nine years as a research assistant to Ruth Altheim-Stiehl in Münster, followed by three years at the Fernuniversität Hagen. In 1988, he completed his

habilitation Habilitation is the highest university degree, or the procedure by which it is achieved, in Germany, France, Italy, Poland and some other European and non-English-speaking countries. The candidate fulfills a university's set criteria of excelle ...

at the

University of Heidelberg Heidelberg University, officially the Ruprecht Karl University of Heidelberg (; ), is a public university, public research university in Heidelberg, Baden-Württemberg, Germany. Founded in 1386 on instruction of Pope Urban VI, Heidelberg is List ...

with a study on the early

Hellenistic period In classical antiquity, the Hellenistic period covers the time in Greek history after Classical Greece, between the death of Alexander the Great in 323 BC and the death of Cleopatra VII in 30 BC, which was followed by the ascendancy of the R ...

. In 1989, he was appointed professor of Ancient history at the University of Kiel, where he worked until his retirement in 2016. Wiesehöfer gained international renown primarily through his work on pre-Islamic Persia under the Achaemenid, Seleucid, Arsacid and Sasanian dynasties, which has been published in numerous languages, including English, French and Italian. Wiesehöfer is committed to reintegrating the study of the

Ancient Near East The ancient Near East was home to many cradles of civilization, spanning Mesopotamia, Egypt, Iran (or Persia), Anatolia and the Armenian highlands, the Levant, and the Arabian Peninsula. As such, the fields of ancient Near East studies and Nea ...

back into ancient history. In addition to ancient Iran, Wiesehöfer's research interests focus primarily on the contacts between the Greco-Roman world and its eastern neighbours. In 2006, he organised an international conference on the Greek author

Ctesias of Cnidus Ctesias ( ; ; ), also known as Ctesias of Cnidus, was a Hellenic civilization, Greek physician and historian from the town of Cnidus in Caria, then part of the Achaemenid Empire. Historical events Ctesias, who lived in the fifth century BC, was ...

, who wrote an influential work on the Achaemenid Empire in the 4th century BCE. Wiesehöfer is also active in the field of the history of science; in 2005, he edited an anthology on

Theodor Mommsen Christian Matthias Theodor Mommsen (; ; 30 November 1817 – 1 November 1903) was a German classical scholar, historian, jurist, journalist, politician and archaeologist. He is widely regarded as one of the greatest classicists of the 19th ce ...

. Wiesehöfer has published over 250 specialist articles in German and English and is (co-)editor of various publication series (e.g. Oriens et Occidens, Achaemenid History, Oikumene) and author of numerous monographs, among which ''Das antike Persien'' (Düsseldorf/Zurich 1993) is internationally regarded as a standard work and has been reprinted several times and translated into several languages, including English (''Ancient Persia'', London 1996). Wiesehöfer is a member of the board of the ''Corpus Inscriptionum Iranicarum'' (London), an ordinary member of the

German Archaeological Institute The German Archaeological Institute (, ''DAI'') is a research institute in the field of archaeology (and other related fields). The DAI is a "federal agency" under the Federal Foreign Office, Federal Foreign Office of Germany. Status, tasks and ...

and a corresponding member of the Philological-Historical Class of the

Göttingen Academy of Sciences and Humanities The Göttingen Academy of Sciences (name since 2023 : )Note that the German ''Wissenschaft'' has a wider meaning than the English "Science", and includes Social sciences and Humanities. is the oldest continuously existing institution among the eig ...

. He was a member of the Commission for Ancient History and Epigraphy (AEK) and principal investigator of the Kiel Graduate School Human Development in Landscapes. In 2012, he was accepted as a full member of the

Academia Europaea The Academia Europaea is a pan-European Academy of humanities, letters, law, and sciences. The Academia was founded in 1988 as a functioning Europe-wide Academy that encompasses all fields of scholarly inquiry. It acts as co-ordinator of Europe ...

Publications

Books

* ''Der Aufstand Gaumātas und die Anfänge Dareios' I.'' Bonn 1978. * ''Die Anfänge von Literalität und Textualität in Europa: Das Alphabet und die Folgen in griechischer Zeit''. Hagen 1987. * ''Ancient Persia''. London 1996. * ''Die „dunklen Jahrhunderte“ der Persis. Untersuchungen zu Geschichte und Kultur von Fārs in frühhellenistischer Zeit (330–140 v. Chr.)''. Munich 1994. * ''Iraniens, Grecs et Romains''. Paris 2005.

Selected papers

* ''Die 'Freunde' und 'Wohltäter' des Großkönigs''. In: ''Studia Iranica'' 9, 1980, pp. 7–21. * ''Geteilte Loyalitäten. Religiöse Minderheiten des 3. und 4. Jahrhunderts im Spannungsfeld zwischen Rom und dem sasanidischen Iran''. In: ''Klio'' 75, 1993, pp. 362–382. * ''"King of Kings" and "Philhellên": Kingship in Arsacid Iran''. In: Per Bilde etc. (eds.): ''Aspects of Hellenistic Kingship'', Aarhus 1996, pp. 55–66. * ''Dekadenz, Krise oder überraschendes Ende? Überlegungen zum Zusammenbruch der Perserherrschaft''. In: Helmut Altrichter u. a. (eds.): ''Das Ende von Großreichen'', Erlangen/Jena 1996, pp. 39–64. * ''Gebete für die ‚Urahnen‘ oder: Wann und wie verschwanden Kyros und Dareios aus der Tradition Irans?''. In: ''Electrum'' 6, 2002, pp. 111–117. * ''Rūm as Enemy of Iran''. In: Erich S. Gruen (ed.): ''Cultural Borrowings and Ethnic Appropriations in Antiquity'', Stuttgart 2005, pp. 105–120. * ''King, Court and Royal Representation in the Sasanian Empire.'' In: Antony Spawforth (ed.): ''The Court and Court Society in Ancient Monarchies'', Cambridge 2007, pp. 58–81. * ''The Late Sasanian Near East''. In: Chase Robinson (ed.): ''The New Cambridge History of Islam'' 1, Cambridge 2010, pp. 98–152. * ''Polybios und die Entstehung des römischen Weltreicheschemas''. In: Volker Grieb etc. (eds.): ''Polybios und seine Historien'', Stuttgart 2013, pp. 59–70. * ''Greek Poleis in the Near East and Their Parthian Overlords''. In: Adam Kemezis (ed.): ''Urban Dreams and Realities'', Boston/Leiden 2015, pp. 328–346. * ''Women of the Sassanid Dynasty (224-651 CE)''. In: Sabine Müller etc. (eds.): ''The Routledge Companion to Women and Monarchy in the Ancient Mediterranean World'', New York 2021, pp. 246–255.

References

Josef Wiesehöfer's personal page (German)
1951 births Living people German classical scholars Iranologists People from Soest (district) {{Germany-academic-bio-stub