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The Works of Jules Oppert.

By W. Muss-Arnolt.

Of the three great founders of Assyriology, Dr. EDWARD HINCKS, Sir HCRAWLINSON and Professor JULES OPPERT, the distinguished Paris academician is the only one who still carries on his researches with the same energy, perseverance and successful ingenuity which, in his earlier years, enabled him to outstrip many of his fellowworkers, EHINCKS having died at Killeleagh (Co. Down, Ireland) December 3, 1866, while Sir HCRAWLINSON has for many years. withdrawn from active work in his chosen field.

Professor JULES OPPERT was born of Jewish parents in Hamburg, July 9, 1825. He began to study law at Heidelberg; but soon turned his whole attention to Oriental languages, studying Sanskrit and Arabic in Bonn under CLASSEN and FFREYTAG; while he devoted himself to Zend and Old Persian in Berlin and Kiel. In 1847 he published at Berlin his first work entitled Das Lautsystem des Altpersischen. His discovery that in many cases the letters m and n had to be supplied before a following consonant in Old Persian, completed the knowledge of the Persian alphabet, thus perfecting the labors of GROTEFEND, BURNOUF, LASSEN and RAWLINSON. His subsequent contributions to our knowledge of the Persian language and literature are all based on this fundamental treatise.*

In the same year, 1847, OPPERT emigrated to France where the liberal Code Napoléon did not prevent his holding a professorship in a college or university. His treatise on the vowel system of Old Persian had made him favorably known to LETRONNE, BURNOUF, DE SAULCY and LONGPÉRIER, upon whose recommendations he was, in 1848, appointed Professor of the German language and litterature in the Lyceum at Laval, whence he was transferred in 1850 to Reims. At the same time OPPERT continued his studies in Sanskrit and Old Persian, and published in 1851 and the following year his work on the Achaemenian inscriptions. The favorable reception.

* See nos. 2, 92, 98, 110, 129, 164, 172, 208 and 225 of the bibliography. Beiträge zur semit. Sprachwissenschaft. II.

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accorded to this publication secured him, in the year 1851, from the French government an appointment on the staff of the scientific expedition sent out under the leadership of M. FFRESNEL to Mesopotamia for the purpose of investigating the ruins of Babylon and the neighboring country. After the untimely death of M. FRESNEL, OPPERT was appointed to publish the results of the expedition. The expedition was successful in its discoveries, but, owing to the capsizing of a boat on the Tigris, the greater part of the treasures found was lost. It is OPPERT's merit to have finally determined the site of ancient Babylon; and all subsequent maps of that city and its surroundings are based upon the plan which he had laid before the Geographical Society of the Institute.

After his return to France in 1854, OPPERT devoted himself to the study of Babylonian and Assyrian, for which his previous work in Old Persian and his thorough knowledge of the other Semitic languages had eminently fitted him. While to GROTEFEND belongs the honor of having laid the corner stone, and while it is Sir HENRY RAWLINSON'S merit to have laid broad and deep the foundations. of cuneiform research, OPPERT stands foremost among those who have erected upon these foundations the stately edifice of Assyriology. He submitted to the Institute a new system of interpreting the cuneiform inscriptions which he afterwards published in his Etudes assyriennes (1857) and in his magnificent work Expédition scientifique en Mésopotamie, two large quarto volumes, 1857 and 1864.**

Soon after the last part had been presented to the French Academy, this monumental work received on July 15, 1863 the great prize of 20,000 francs pour l'œuvre ou la découverte la plus propre à honorer ou à servir le pays. This was the second time this high honor had been awarded since the establishment of the prize.

Nor was the recognition of his invaluable services to science confined to the country of his adoption. Sir HCRAWLINSON addressing the Semitic Section of the Second International Congress of Orientalists, held at London in 1874, says of JULES OPPERT: If any one has a right to claim the paternity of Assyrian science, as it exists at the present day, it is certainly this distinguished scholar, who, having enjoyed the advantage of a personal investigation of the Assyrian and Babylonian ruins, now 23 years ago, devoted himself on his return to Europe to the prosecution of cuneiform studies with a vigor and ingenuity neither deterred by opposition nor discouraged by neglect, which ultimately led to a complete success, gaining as he

*Cf. JHUC Ap '89, p. 58b. ** See nos. 32, 55 and 56.

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