Ludwig Rieß
| Ludwig Riess | |
|---|---|
Ludwig Riess
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| Born | December 1, 1861 Deutsch-Krone, Prussia |
| Died | December 27, 1928 (aged 67) Springfield, Ohio, United States |
| Nationality | German |
| Occupation | historian, educator, foreign advisor to Japan |
| Known for | Foreign advisor to Meiji Japan |
Ludwig Riess (December 1, 1861 – December 27, 1928) was a German-born historian and educator, noted for his work in late 19th century Japan.
Riess was born in Deutsch-Krone, Prussia (present-day Wałcz, West Pomeranian Voivodeship), as the youngest of five children in a German Jewish family. He was proficient in mathematics and physics as a child, and encouraged by his family to become an engineer or architect. However, he was more interested in world history, and chose to pursue an academic career over their wishes and studied at the University of Berlin under the renowned historian, Leopold von Ranke.
In 1884 Riess traveled to Great Britain and Ireland for the purpose of collecting materials for his doctoral dissertation "The vote of the British Parliament in the medieval ages", and received his doctorate at the age of 24. He returned to the British Isles again in 1885 and 1886 to collect additional materials pertaining to German history and the Hanseatic League.
Riess was recruited as a foreign advisor by the Meiji government of the Empire of Japan in 1887 to establish Western methods of historiography into the Japanese university curriculum. These methods included a reliance on primary sources, an emphasis on narrative history and a commitment to writing history from a neutral point of view, without moral judgements on past events. Riess was initially hired on a three-year contract, which was renewed several times. He taught at Tokyo Imperial University、Keio University, where he introduced Ranke's research methods of historical research, and introduced European archival materials, especially Dutch sources preserved at The Hague relevant to the study of Japanese history. Riess himself made a personal search for documents when he visited Europe on leave in 1893, visiting The Hague, London, and Rome, and sending back handwritten copies and excerpts from Dutch manuscripts.
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