KANTOROWICZ, ERNST

KANTOROWICZ, ERNST (1895–1963), historian; among the century's premier medievalists. Born to an affluent middle-class family in Posen (now Poznan), he was studying philosophy at Berlin* when World War I erupted. He volunteered for the army and served first in France (he was wounded at Verdun) and then in Turkey. While working on the Baghdad Railway, he learned Arabic and formed an interest in the Islamic world. After Germany's defeat he resumed his studies, this time in economics. Concurrently, he joined the Freikorps* and participated in actions against the Spartacus League* in Berlin, the Poles in Posen, and Munich's Ra¨terepublik. He enrolled at Heidelberg late in 1919 and took a doctorate in 1921 with a dissertation on the Muslim artisan guilds; he was self-educated as a medievalist. While at Heidelberg, Kantorowicz belatedly joined Stefan George's* circle (George-Kreis) and formed a friendship with the poet himself. His first book, the idealized biography Kaiser Friedrich der Zweite (Emperor Frederick the Second), was written under George's influence and was published in 1927 to considerable acclaim. Not only did it establish Kantorowicz, while raising a storm of protest among academics who claimed that its literary qualities were superior to its accuracy, but it spawned an academic career. Frankfurt's new university gave him an honorary professorship in 1930 and promoted him to full professor in 1932. But the academy remained uneasy with someone who cared more about style than historical technique. His fidelity to a mystical German Reich led him to reject the egalitarianism of the Republic. Later, however, he regretted the role his biography played in aiding the NSDAP (Hitler* claimed to have read the book twice). An assimilated Jew,* Kantorowicz was forced to resign his professorship late in 1933. Awarded emeritus status in 1934, he relocated to Berlin and taught occasionally at Oxford. In November 1938, the month of Kristallnacht, he emigrated, going first to England and then to America. He taught at Berkeley until California's loyalty oath led him to accept appointment at Princeton in 1950. Much of his best scholarship was completed in the United States.