Haupt, Paul, 1858-1926

Paul Haupt was a noted philologist and a professor of Semitic languages at The Johns Hopkins University.

He was born at Gorlitz, Germany, Nov. 25, 1858 and received the Ph. D. from the University of Leipzig in 1878. Haupt was appointed professor of Semitic languages at Hopkins in 1883, a position he held for forty-three years. At Hopkins, he also served as director of the Oriental seminary. Haupt was recognized as a leading Assyriologist and did extensive research in the district where the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah were supposed to have stood. Haupt's published works include "Sumerian Family Laws," (1879); "The Akkadian Language," (1883); and he was the editor of the polychrome Bible in 1898. Paul Haupt died in Baltimore, MD, Dec. 15, 1926.

Hermann Hugo Paul Haupt was born on November 25, 1858, in Görlitz, Germany. Haupt was a Semitic scholar and one of the pioneers of Assyriology in the United States.

He studied at the universities of Berlin and Leipzig. In 1880 he worked at the University of Göttingen and, from 1883 to 1889, was assistant professor of Assyriology. In 1883 he became professor of Semitic languages at Johns Hopkins University. Until 1889 Haupt continued to lecture during summers at Göttingen.

In 1881, Haupt became co-editor with Friedrich Delitzsch of the Beiträge zur Assyriologie und semitischen Sprachwissenschaft published in Leipzig. In addition to numerous smaller articles, he projected and edited the Polychrome Bible, a critical edition of the Hebrew text of the Old Testament, and a new English translation with notes. A unique feature of this edition is the use of different colors to distinguish the various sources and component parts in the Old Testament books--each one of which is entrusted to a specialist in biblical studies.

Haupt died on December 15, 1926, in Baltimore, Maryland.