Louis Robert (historian)

Robert studied at the École Normale Supérieure from 1924 to 1927, and joined the École française d'Athènes after his graduation[4]. His research in Athens was cut short by tuberculosis, which forced him to spend two years in a sanatorium in Leysin.[5] He used this time to study the early modern antiquarian travel accounts of the Aegean and the Levant, which proved influential for his own work[6] – he would later be called “the last of the great Anatolian travelers”.[7] On his recovery in 1932 he accepted the offer to join the American Society for Archaeological Research in Asia Minor for a mission of exploration in Turkey, at which point his interests shifted permanently from Greece to Asia Minor.[8]

In 1932 or 1933, Robert received a teaching position in Historical Geography of the Hellenic World at the École pratique des hautes études (IVth section) in Paris.[8][9]

In 1939, he was made full professor at the Collège de France, where he replaced his mentor Maurice Holleaux[8] and remained until his retirement in 1974.

He was elected a member of the Académie des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres in 1948 at the recommendation of the hellenist Paul Mazon.[10] He was also a member of the national academies of sciences in London, Brussels, Vienna, Berlin, Rome, Athens, Warsaw and Boston. He received a honorary doctorate from the University of Louvain and the National Order of the Legion of Honour.[11]

Robert conducted excavations in Turkey at Amyzon in Caria (1949–50) and at Claros in Ionia (1950–61). He was the director of the Institut français d'archéologie d'Istanbul in 1956–64 and assisted as an epigrapher with the Archaeological Exploration of Sardis launched in 1958.[12][11]

The hallmark of Robert's approach lies in the combination of philology with geography in an effort to produce a vivid account of historical environment.[13][14] While his work emphasised regional divergences and local human agency, it also tended, due to Robert's romanticised approach to geographical exploration, to underestimate the historical mutability of landscape resulting from shorter-term factors. Robert's key interests included the ancient economy and religion, Hellenisation and Romanisation, and the transformations of Late Antiquity, but his impact within the discipline of Classics has been limited by his excessive focus on detail and has endured most clearly in the fields of epigraphy and historical geography.[15]

The Académie des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres preserves his archive of notes, photographs, correspondence, estampages, and numismatic material as Fonds Louis Robert.[16]

Robert married Jeanne Vanseveren in 1938. Fluent in Greek and Turkish, she was his research and travel companion and the co-author of many of his publications until his death in 1985.[9][17]