Adolf Furtwängler (June 30, 1853 - October 10, 1907) was a famous German archaeologist and art historian. He was the father of the conductor Wilhelm Furtwängler and grandfather of the German archaeologist Andreas Furtwängler. Furtwängler was born at Freiburg im Breisgau, and was educated there, at Leipzig and at Munich, where he was a pupil of Heinrich Brunn, whose comparative method in art criticism he much developed. He took part in the excavations at Olympia in 1878, became an assistant in the Berlin Museum in 1880, and professor at Berlin (1884) and later at Munich. His latest excavation work was at Aegina. Furtwangler was amongst the first archaeologists to appreciate the chronological value of pottery sherds when they previously been discarded as spoil. By noting the recurrence of similar vases within a variety of strata Furtwangler was able to use these sherds as a tool for dating sites. His joint publication with Georg Loeschcke in 1886 of Mykenische Vasen , a complete publication of the Mycennean pottery finds on Aegina, was not only a valuable chronology but the first corpus of pottery finds in archaeology.[1] His 1891 reconstructions of the Lemnian Athena by Phidias were celebrated but have subsequently occasioned dispute; they may be found in the Dresden Albertinum. Furtwängler was a prolific writer, with a prodigious knowledge and memory, and a most ingenious and confident critic; and his work not only dominated the field of archaeological criticism but also raised its standing both at home and abroad. Among his numerous publications the most important were a volume on the bronzes found at Olympia, vast works on ancient gems and Greek vases, and the invaluable Masterpieces of Greek Sculpture (English translation by Eugenie Strong). He died at Athens.
References
- ^ 150 years of archaeology, Glyn Daniel, p. 167
- This article incorporates text from the Encyclopædia Britannica Eleventh Edition, a publication now in the public domain. The article is available here.
