Kurt Weitzmann photographs of manuscripts, 1980s-1990s

Kurt Weitzmann (1904-1993) was a noted Princeton scholar and an influential Byzantinist and medievalist. Born in Klein Almerode, Germany in 1904, Weitzmann began his academic career in medieval studies, completing his studies in Berlin under archaeologist Ferdinand Noack and medieval art historian Adolf Goldschmidt. Weitzmann completed his dissertation on ivory rosette caskets, Die Elfenbeinkästen aus der mittelbyzantinsichen Zeit, in 1929 under the direction of Goldschmidt, who published it as the first volume of his corpus of medieval ivories, Die byzantinischen Elfenbeinskulpturen des X.-XIII. Jahrhunderts. Weitzmann also worked with Goldschmidt on the second volume of the series. He married fellow Goldschmidt scholar Josepha Fiedler in 1932.

From 1930-1934, Weitzmann was a member of the Deutsches Archäologischen Institut in Berlin, from which he received funding for research in Athens, Patmos and Mount Athos (1931), and in Berlin (1932-34). Weitzmann left Germany in 1935 because of his association with Goldschmidt, a Jew, and his refusal to join the Nazi Party. He left Berlin for Princeton University, becoming a permanent member of the Institute for Advanced Study, initially engaged in preparing a corpus of illustrated manuscripts of the Septuagint with Charles Rufus Morey and Albert M. Friend, Jr. In 1938 he began his long association with Dumbarton Oaks Research Library and Collection, presenting the paper, “Principals of Byzantine Book Illumination,” even before the center was fully established. He remained active with Dumbarton Oaks until his death. In 1945 Weitzmann was appointed professor in the department of art history. His most influential book, Illustrations in Roll and Codex, a distillation of his principles of manuscript interpretation, appeared in 1947. He held visiting positions at Yale (1954-55). In 1956 he began his long research association with the Monastery of St. Catherine on Mt. Sinai. On his first visit he examined and photographed 2,000 manuscripts. Subsequent visits were sponsored by the Alexandria-Michigan-Princeton Expedition. Together with Ernst Kitzinger, Weitzmann organized the 1965 Dumbarton Oaks conference on Byzantine contribution to the art of the West of the twelfth and thirteenth centuries. Named emeritus in the department in 1972, he relinquished his Institute appointment, to be a visiting scholar at Dumbarton Oaks, 1972-74. In 1977, Weitzmann organized an exhibition and symposium (with Margaret Frazer) at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, entitled, “The Age of Spirituality.” The show recapped Weitzmann’s originality in looking at the range of early medieval objects which both showed the unity of the objects and the adoption of pagan images into new meanings. In 1990 his St. Catherine’s Monastery research began to appear in book form. The first, published in collaboration with George Galvaris, was The Illuminated Manuscripts. Although the icons of St. Catherine's had been published in cursory form, Weitzmann’s enthusiasm for them and the place they played in religious iconography resulted in his second volume of the Monastery, The Icons. Weitzmann oversaw the restoration of the Transfiguration mosaic of St. Catherine's, leading to a final volume on the church, written in collaboration with Forsyth, The Church and Fortress of Justinian.

Weitzmann remained active in scholarship and publications until the decline of his health in later life. He was conferred an honorary doctorate from Princeton University shortly before his death. Weitzmann died of a heart disease on June 7, 1993 at the age of 89.