HEICHELHEIM, FRITZ MORITZ

HEICHELHEIM, FRITZ MORITZ (1901–1968), ancient history scholar. He taught at the university of his native Giessen in Germany from 1929, but was dismissed in 1933 during the Nazi purge. Heichelheim then became a research scholar at Cambridge, England (1933–42), and later lectured at Nottingham (1942–48). From 1948 he taught Greek and Roman history at the University of Toronto. He was elected fellow of the Royal Society of Canada in 1966.

Heichelheim produced over 600 publications in economic history, numismatics, archaeology, and papyrology. His major work is Wirtschaftsgeschichte des Altertums (2 vols., 1938; translated and revised as An Ancient Economic History from the Palaeolithic Age, 3 vols., 1958–70). Other important publications include Auswaertige Bevoelkerung im Ptolemaerreich (1925); Wirtschaftliche Schwankungen der Zeit von Alexander bis Augustus (1930); "Roman Syria" (in: T. Frank (ed.), An Economic Survey of Ancient Rome, 4 (1938), 121–257); The Adler Papyri (with E.N. Adler et al., 1939); Sylloge Nummorum Graecorum, vol. 4 (1940–65); and History of the Roman People, with C.A. Yeo (1962). Heichelheim also wrote extensively on classical Judaism. From 1951 he contributed a column, "Mind and Spade," to the Jewish Standard of Toronto and Montreal. He was president of the Jewish Historical Society of Toronto (1951–53), trustee of the Liberal Jewish Congregation "Habonim" (1956–61), and a member of the cultural commission of the Canadian Jewish Congress (1950–54).

[Sydney Eisen]