Boris Turayev
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Boris Alexandrovich Turayev (Russian: Бори́с Алекса́ндрович Тура́ев) (July 24 (August 5), 1868, Novogrudok – July 23, 1920, Petrograd) was a Russian scholar who studied Ancient East (mainly Ancient Egypt and Nubia).
After graduating from the University of St Petersburg (1891) Turayev studied under Gaston Maspero and Adolf Erman and worked in museums of Berlin, Paris and London. During many years spent abroad, he amassed a unique collection of ancient Egyptian statuary and curiosities, which he donated to the Moscow Museum of Fine Arts in 1912. Since 1896, he delivered lectures at the University of St Petersburg. He was an ordinary professor of this university since 1911. Turayev was admitted into the Russian Academy of Sciences in 1918.
Boris Turayev's magnum opus, History of Ancient East (1911, 2 volumes), quite unprecedented in its scope, brought him recognition throughout Europe. It was the first comprehensive study that analized the whole history and culture of Ancient Middle East (that was determined by Turayev as a territory from Central Asia and Iran on East to Carthage on West). For his achievements, Turayev was often compared with James Breasted and even called The Russian Breasted. He also wrote books about Egyptian literature and mythology (God Thot, 1898; Egyptian literature, 1920).
