Scientific background knowledge and research transfer as exemplified by the Egyptologist Georg Steindorff (1861-1951)

2011年，Georg Steindorff的继承人将他的私人信件交给了莱比锡大学的考古学研究所/埃及博物馆，从而使人们能够利用迄今为止基本上未知的档案来深入了解一门学科的历史。在60年的时间里，不少于6800份文件（斯坦多夫收到并注释的信件以及他自己的信件草稿）阐明了生物学中心人物之一的活动，不仅作为一名学者，而且作为一名学术决策者，他在20世纪前30年的影响力不容低估。施泰因多夫的影响力在很大程度上是他在所谓的Wörterbuchkommission长达十年的成员资格的结果，该委员会由四个德国学院的代表组成。在这个学术机构，这也是负责监督德意志帝国埃及考古研究所在开罗，斯坦多夫挥舞着最大的影响力沿着的领导人物，阿道夫·埃尔曼。他对即将到来的德国生物学领域的所有相关问题的深刻见解使他成为埃尔曼最重要的顾问，并接替他成为德国生物学最有影响力的权威。他的各种编辑工作也使他与大型出版社有直接联系。这些材料的重要性在于其质地、密度和质量，以及其惊人的60多年的时间跨度。私人信件的不加修饰的坦率提供了对人文学科Meta层面的见解。因此，例如，最近发现的话语的参与，德国天文学家在国际上发动的科学竞赛的文化（皇帝威廉二世）是说明在最定性的方式。第一次细读揭示了在学术界以及学术话语和公众之间发生的研究转移中复杂的互动网络。有待彻底审查的档案文件明确证明了行为人的互动和真正动机。这就引出了第二层次的理解：（1）从同步的角度看，国际研究网络和研究在各自国家限制下的跨学科影响变得明显;（2）从历时的角度看，在这种情况下，知识/信息传递和过程，引起了学术学校出现在一个新的光，并揭示了直接线的传统，从威廉时代运行到后，二战时期。因此，参与知识生产和研究转让的行为者的形象，远远超出了他们的轶事重建网络。

In 2011, the heir of Georg Steindorff handed over his private correspondence to the Egyptological Institute/Egyptian Museum of the University of Leipzig, thereby making it possible to exploit a hitherto largely unknown archive in order to gain insights into the history of an academic discipline. No less than 6800 documents written over a period of 60 years (letters received and annotated by Steindorff as well as drafts of his own letters) shed light on the activities of one of the central figures in Egyptology, not only as a scholar but also as an academic policy-maker whose influence in the first three decades of the 20th century can hardly be underestimated. Steindorffs influence was to a considerable extent the result of his decade-long membership in the so-called Wörterbuchkommission, which was made up of representatives of the four German academies. Within this academic organ, which was also in charge of supervising the Imperial German Institute for Egyptian Archaeology in Cairo, Steindorff wielded the greatest influence along with the leading figure, Adolf Erman. His profound insight into all matters related to the upcoming field of German Egyptology enabled him to become Ermans most important adviser and to succeed him as the most influential authority in German Egyptology. His various editorships also placed him in direct contact with the large publishing houses.The significance of the material that has now become accessible lies in its texture, density, and quality as well as in its astonishing chronological scope of more than 60 years. The unembellished frankness of the private correspondence affords insights into the meta level of a humanistic discipline. Thus, for instance, the recently uncovered discourse on the participation of German Egyptologists in the internationally waged scientific contest of cultures (Emperor William II) is illustrated in the most qualitative manner. A first perusal reveals the complex meshwork of interactions in the research transfer that was taking place within the academic world as well as between the academic discourse and the public at large. The documents of the archive that awaits thorough examination bear explicit testimony to the interactions and to the true motives of the acting persons. This leads to a second level of understanding: (1) from a synchronous perspective, under which the international research networks and the transdisciplinary influencing of research under the respective national constraints become apparent, and (2) from a diachronic perspective, under which the mechanisms of knowledge/information transfer and the processes that gave rise to scholarly schools appear in a new light and reveal the direct lines of tradition that ran from the Wilhelmine age to the post-World War II period. The actors involved in the production of knowledge and in research transfer thus become portrayable in a manner that extends far beyond their anecdotically reconstructable networks.