HUIZINGA, JOHAN

HUIZINGA, Johan: translation

(1872–1945)

Historian. After his studies in Germanics at Groningen University, Huizinga wrote his doctoral thesis “The Vidusaka in Indian Theater” in 1897. The same year, Huizinga—who as a young student had shown vivid interest in mod ern poetry and painting (e.g., that of Jan Toorop and Vincent van Gogh)—became a teacher of history in Haarlem. In 1905, he was appointed professor of general and Dutch history at Groningen Uni versity. In his inaugural lecture, “The Aesthetic Element of Historical Ideas,” he presented some leading thoughts, which determined his later historical works. Visualization was, in his opinion, a prerequi site for the creation of historical concepts. From 1914 to 1942, he was professor of history at Leiden University. During this period, he gained international fame with his books The Waning of the Middle Ages (1919) and Erasmus (1924). Criticism of modern culture was a topic that he touched on in several publications on his visits to the United States in 1918 and 1927 and in In de schaduw van morgen [In the Shadow of Tomorrow, 1935], translated into German by the Swiss historian Werner Kaegi (1901–1979), who also published other works by Huizinga. Among his correspondents were anthropologist Bronislaw Kasper Malinowski (1884–1942), classicist Percy Stafford Allen (1869–1933), and French historian Gabriel Hanotaux (1853–1944)

See also Historiography.