Henry William Frederick Saggs

December 2, 1920 (age 84)

Essex, East of England, United Kingdom

Saggs fought in the Second World War with the Fleet Air Armenian He suffered a broken back following an air accident in 1944. They had four daughters. He began his Assyriological studies at the School of Oriental and African Studies, London, under Sidney Smith after the war. In 1952, he joined Max Mallowan"s excavation at Nimrud under the aegis of the British School of Archaeology in Iraq. Saggs has been described as "one of the outstanding Assyriologists of his generation". His life"s work, encouraged by Max Mallowan, was the publication of 243 letters found at the Nimrud archive of cuneiform tablets. These were released as a series of articles in the journal Iraq and the book The Nimrud Letters 1952 (Cuneiform Texts from Nimrud V). In 1965, Saggs worked at Tell al-Rimah in northern Iraq, and published a business archive of tablets dating from Middle Assyrian. In 1966, Saggs was invited to take the Chair of Semitic Languages in University College, Cardiff. He served as Professor there from 1966 to 1983. Here he established good relations with Iraq"s universities, inviting and training a series of Iraqi Assyriologists who then became influential in their own country. He also expanded Cardiff"s specialisations to Ugaritic and Aramaic studies. Saggs taught at Baghdad University in 1956-1957, and later at Mosul University. He published the Anzu tablet of Sherifkhan with his former student Amir Suleiman, who was head of the department of arts at Mosul. Following his retirement, Saggs remained active both academically and in his pursuit of Old Testament studies, becoming a lay reader at Roydon, near Harlow. He published works popularising Assyriology and the history of the ancient Near East. Saggs died on August 31, 2005.

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Works

book

Everyday life in Babylonia & Assyria

(During the 3 millennia before the birth of Christ there f...)

The Greatness That Was Babylon A Sketch of the Ancient Civilization of the Tigris-Euphrates Valley

(a great book to read)

The Greatness That Was Babylon, A Sketch of the Ancient Civilization of the tigr

(A sketch of the ancient civilization of the Tigr.)

The Greatness That Was Babylon: A Sketch of the Ancient Civilization of the Tigris-Euphrates Valley

The Might That Was Assyria

(see image)

The greatness that was Babylon;: A survey of the ancient civilization of the Tigris-Euphrates Valley,

The Might that Was Assyria (Great Civilizations Series) (Great civilization series)

(Written by Assyriologist H. W. F. Saggs. It illustrates t...)

Everyday Life in Babylonia and Assyria

(Frontis. + 207 pp. with 114 illus., 8vo.)

The Greatness That Was Babylon (Great civilizations series) (Excavations in Mesopotamia have revealed a large amount o...)

Henry William Frederick Saggs

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scientist

Background

Saggs was born in East Anglia on December 2, 1920.

Education

He attended Clacton County High School, following which he went to King"s College London where he studied theology, graduating in 1942. Saggs was awarded his Doctor of Philosophy degree in 1953 for his dissertation titled A study of city administration in Assyria and Babylonia in the period 705 to 539 British Columbia He joined SOAS as a Lecturer in Akkadian.

Career

Saggs fought in the Second World War with the Fleet Air Armenian He suffered a broken back following an air accident in 1944. They had four daughters.

He began his Assyriological studies at the School of Oriental and African Studies, London, under Sidney Smith after the war.

In 1952, he joined Max Mallowan"s excavation at Nimrud under the aegis of the British School of Archaeology in Iraq. Saggs has been described as "one of the outstanding Assyriologists of his generation".

His life"s work, encouraged by Max Mallowan, was the publication of 243 letters found at the Nimrud archive of cuneiform tablets. These were released as a series of articles in the journal Iraq and the book The Nimrud Letters 1952 (Cuneiform Texts from Nimrud V).

In 1965, Saggs worked at Tell al-Rimah in northern Iraq, and published a business archive of tablets dating from Middle Assyrian.

In 1966, Saggs was invited to take the Chair of Semitic Languages in University College, Cardiff. He served as Professor there from 1966 to 1983. Here he established good relations with Iraq"s universities, inviting and training a series of Iraqi Assyriologists who then became influential in their own country.

He also expanded Cardiff"s specialisations to Ugaritic and Aramaic studies.

Saggs taught at Baghdad University in 1956-1957, and later at Mosul University. He published the Anzu tablet of Sherifkhan with his former student Amir Suleiman, who was head of the department of arts at Mosul.

Following his retirement, Saggs remained active both academically and in his pursuit of Old Testament studies, becoming a lay reader at Roydon, near Harlow. He published works popularising Assyriology and the history of the ancient Near East.

Saggs died on August 31, 2005.