Velishsky, Frantisek

Frantisek Wielisski (April 3, 1840, Ceykovice (Wielicz) - August 8, 1883, Prague ) - Austro-Hungarian Czech classical philologist, historian, archaeologist, teacher.

He received his secondary education in 1851-1859 at the Jičín Gymnasium, from 1859 to 1862 he studied ancient languages ​​at the University of Prague. In 1863 he graduated from the university, having received a diploma of a teacher of history with the right to teach in higher schools. In the years 1863-1864 he made a scientific trip to Italy, in 1864-1867 he worked as an assistant teacher, and in 1867-1868 - as a teacher in a gymnasium in Hradec Králové. From 1868 until the end of his life, with the rank of professor, he taught at an academic gymnasium in Prague (in the Stare Mesto district ^[1] ). In 1873 he made a scientific trip to Greece, Asia Minor and Egypt, in 1878 he trained at the Berlin Museum, the Louvre and the British Museum. Since 1880, he suffered from rapidly progressing nervous disorder, from which he died three years later in a psychiatric hospital. He was married, had three children.

According to the Otto Scientific Encyclopedia, Wielisski was one of the largest Czech classical philologists and archaeologists of the 19th century. He first gained fame as a scientist by translating into Czech the works of Plato: the dialogues Laches and Criton (were printed in 1869 in the Library of Greek Classics in Prague) and Pira (ibid., 1872). The main work is the study “Život Řeků a Římanů” (1876), two years later translated into Russian by I. Ya. Rostovtsev and published, like the Czech original, in Prague under the title “Life of the Greeks and Romans” at the expense of the author and poorly sold. To write this work, he used some research materials from his school friend, philologist Jindřich Niederlé , who died in 1875, for which he was subsequently accused of plagiarism and brought to trial. In 1877 he was acquitted, but because of this process he was denied the right to take a professorship at the university ^[2] . Velishsky also owns numerous articles and reviews on ancient subjects in the largest Czech-language scientific periodicals of the second half of the 19th century: in ČČM (Pompeje jindy a nyní, 1869; Řím za Času císařův, 1870, 1871, 1873), Osvěta (Atheny, 1878; Nejnovější objevy na pole archaeologie klassické, 1881), Listy filologické a pedagogické (Trója, 1874), and also in the German-language edition of Zeitschrift für die österreichischeymnas.