Ferdinand Sommer (4 May 1875, in

Trier Trier ( , ; ), formerly and traditionally known in English as Trèves ( , ) and Triers (see also Names of Trier in different languages, names in other languages), is a city on the banks of the Moselle (river), Moselle in Germany. It lies in a v ...

– 3 April 1962, in

Munich Munich is the capital and most populous city of Bavaria, Germany. As of 30 November 2024, its population was 1,604,384, making it the third-largest city in Germany after Berlin and Hamburg. Munich is the largest city in Germany that is no ...

) was a German classical and Indo-European philologist. From 1893, he studied at the universities of

Marburg Marburg (; ) is a college town, university town in the States of Germany, German federal state () of Hesse, capital of the Marburg-Biedenkopf Districts of Germany, district (). The town area spreads along the valley of the river Lahn and has ...

and

Freiberg Freiberg () is a university and former mining town in Saxony, Germany, with around 41,000 inhabitants. The city lies in the foreland of the Ore Mountains, in the Saxon urbanization axis, which runs along the northern edge of the Elster and ...

, where he was a pupil of

Rudolf Thurneysen Eduard Rudolf Thurneysen (14 March 1857 – 9 August 1940) was a Swiss linguist and Celticist. Biography Born in Basel, Thurneysen studied classical philology in Basel, Leipzig, Berlin and Paris. His teachers included Ernst Windisch and ...

. In 1899, he obtained his

habilitation Habilitation is the highest university degree, or the procedure by which it is achieved, in Germany, France, Italy, Poland and some other European and non-English-speaking countries. The candidate fulfills a university's set criteria of excelle ...

from the

University of Leipzig Leipzig University (), in Leipzig in Saxony, Germany, is one of the world's oldest universities and the second-oldest university (by consecutive years of existence) in Germany. The university was founded on 2 December 1409 by Frederick I, Electo ...

with the thesis ''Die Komparationssuffixe im Lateinischen'' (Comparative suffixes of Latin). In 1902, he was named professor of Indo-European linguistics,

Sanskrit Sanskrit (; stem form ; nominal singular , ,) is a classical language belonging to the Indo-Aryan languages, Indo-Aryan branch of the Indo-European languages. It arose in northwest South Asia after its predecessor languages had Trans-cultural ...

and classical philology at the

University of Basel The University of Basel (Latin: ''Universitas Basiliensis''; German: ''Universität Basel'') is a public research university in Basel, Switzerland. Founded on 4 April 1460, it is Switzerland's oldest university and among the world's oldest univ ...

, and later on in his career, he held professorships in Indo-European linguistics at the universities of

Rostock Rostock (; Polabian language, Polabian: ''Roztoc''), officially the Hanseatic and University City of Rostock (), is the largest city in the German States of Germany, state of Mecklenburg-Vorpommern and lies in the Mecklenburgian part of the sta ...

(1909–13),

Jena Jena (; ) is a List of cities and towns in Germany, city in Germany and the second largest city in Thuringia. Together with the nearby cities of Erfurt and Weimar, it forms the central metropolitan area of Thuringia with approximately 500,000 in ...

(1913–24) and

Bonn Bonn () is a federal city in the German state of North Rhine-Westphalia, located on the banks of the Rhine. With a population exceeding 300,000, it lies about south-southeast of Cologne, in the southernmost part of the Rhine-Ruhr region. This ...

(1924–26). From 1926 to 1951, he was a professor of

comparative linguistics Comparative linguistics is a branch of historical linguistics that is concerned with comparing languages to establish their historical relatedness. Genetic relatedness implies a common origin or proto-language and comparative linguistics aim ...

at the

University of Munich The Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich (simply University of Munich, LMU or LMU Munich; ) is a public university, public research university in Munich, Bavaria, Germany. Originally established as the University of Ingolstadt in 1472 by Duke ...

.Sommer, Johann Ferdinand
at Neue Deutsche BiographieSommer, Ferdinand
Catalogus Professorum Rostochiensium He was a member of the

Saxon Academy of Sciences The Saxon Academy of Sciences and Humanities in Leipzig () is an institute which was founded in 1846 under the name ''Royal Saxon Society for the Sciences'' (). Notable people * Kurt Aland * Annette Beck-Sickinger * Walther Bothe * Alexander Car ...

(from 1922),

Göttingen Academy of Sciences Göttingen (, ; ; ) is a university city in Lower Saxony, central Germany, the capital of the eponymous district. The River Leine runs through it. According to the 2022 German census, the population of Göttingen was 124,548. Overview The ...

(from 1925),

Bavarian Academy of Sciences The Bavarian Academy of Sciences and Humanities () is an independent public institution, located in Munich. It appoints scholars whose research has contributed considerably to the increase of knowledge within their subject. The general goal of th ...

(from 1927) and Academy of Sciences in Berlin (from 1944).

Selected works

* ''Handbuch der lateinischen Laut- und Formenlehre. Eine Einführung in das sprachwissenschaftliche Studium des Lateins''. Heidelberg 1902, 3rd edition 1914 – Handbook of Latin phonetics and morphology; an introduction to the linguistic study of Latin. * ''Griechische Lautstudien''. Straßburg 1905 – Greek phonetic studies. * ''Die indogermanischen iā- und io-Stämme im Baltischen''. Leipzig 1914 – The Indo-European iā- and io-stems in

Baltic Baltic may refer to: Peoples and languages *Baltic languages, a subfamily of Indo-European languages, including Lithuanian, Latvian and extinct Old Prussian *Balts (or Baltic peoples), ethnic groups speaking the Baltic languages and/or originatin ...

. * ''Sprachgeschichtliche Erläuterungen für den griechischen Unterricht. Laut- und Formenlehre''. Leipzig 1917, 4th edition Darmstadt 1961 – Linguistic-historical explanations for teaching Greek;

phonology Phonology (formerly also phonemics or phonematics: "phonemics ''n.'' 'obsolescent''1. Any procedure for identifying the phonemes of a language from a corpus of data. 2. (formerly also phonematics) A former synonym for phonology, often pre ...

and

morphology Morphology, from the Greek and meaning "study of shape", may refer to: Disciplines *Morphology (archaeology), study of the shapes or forms of artifacts *Morphology (astronomy), study of the shape of astronomical objects such as nebulae, galaxies, ...

. * ''Vergleichende Syntax der Schulsprachen (Deutsch, Englisch, Französisch, Griechisch, Lateinisch) Mit besonderer Berücksichtigung des Deutschen''. Leipzig 1921, 6th edition Darmstadt 1989 – Comparative syntax of school languages (German, English, French, Greek, Latin) with special reference to German. * ''Die Aḫḫijavā-Urkunden''. Munich 1932. Nachdruck Hildesheim 1975 – The Aḫḫijavā documents. * ''Aḫḫijavāfrage und Sprachwissenschaft,'' Verlag der Bayerischen Akademie der Wissenschaften, München, 1934
Digitalisat
* ''Hethiter und Hethitisch''. Stuttgart 1947 –

Hittites The Hittites () were an Anatolian peoples, Anatolian Proto-Indo-Europeans, Indo-European people who formed one of the first major civilizations of the Bronze Age in West Asia. Possibly originating from beyond the Black Sea, they settled in mo ...

and Hittite. * ''Schriften aus dem Nachlass'' (edited by Bernhard Forssmann) Munich 1977 – Writings from the

Nachlass ''Nachlass'' (, older spelling ''Nachlaß'') is a German language, German word, used in academia to describe the collection of manuscripts, notes, correspondence, and so on left behind when a scholar dies. The word is a compound word, compound in ...

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Sommer, Ferdinand 1875 births 1962 deaths People from Trier Academic staff of the University of Basel Academic staff of the University of Rostock Academic staff of the University of Jena Academic staff of the University of Bonn Academic staff of the Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich German classical philologists Hittitologists