POSENER, GEORGES HENRI

POSENER, GEORGES HENRI (1906–1988), French Egyptologist. Born and educated in Paris, Posener was a member of the Institut Française d'Archéologie Orientale in Cairo from 1931 to 1935. In 1945 he was named directeur d'études of the Ecole Pratique des Hautes Etudes (4th section). From 1961, he held the chair of Egyptian philology and archaeology of the Collège de France. He was elected president of the Société Française d'Egyptologie in 1963. Posener's work concentrated on ancient texts. He published for the French Institute in Cairo the Catalogue des ostraca hiératiques littéraires de Deir el Medineh (2 vols., 1934–52). His La première domination Perse en Egypte (1936) collected the hieroglyphic inscriptions relating to the Persians in Egypt. In Princes et pays d'Asie et de Nubie (1940) he studied the hieratic texts written on figurines, believed to have magic properties. Littérature et politique dans l'Egypte de la XIIe dynastie (1956) continued his interest in the use of literature in historical studies. He also wrote De la divinité du pharaon (1960), but is probably best known for the Dictionnaire de la civilisation egyptienne (1959; A Dictionary of Egyptian Civilization, 1962). (Irwin L. Merker)