20 Facts About Margarete Bieber

Margarete Bieber was a Jewish German-American art historian, classical archaeologist and professor.

Margarete Bieber became the second woman university professor in Germany in 1919 when she took a position at the University of Giessen.

Margarete Bieber studied the theatre of ancient Greece and Rome as well as the sculpture and clothing in ancient Rome and Greece.

Margarete Bieber published hundreds of works during her career and authored definitive works in four areas of study: the Greek and Roman theater, Hellenistic sculpture, ancient dress, and Roman copies of Greek art.

Margarete Bieber emphasised that Roman reproductions of Greek originals were essentially Roman works and carried the stamp of Roman civilization.

Margarete Bieber attended a girls' school in Schwetz for six years before being sent to a finishing school in Dresden.

Margarete Bieber received her PhD from the University of Bonn in 1907, her dissertation concerning representations of ancient Greek costume in art.

Margarete Bieber was the first woman to receive a travel grant from the German Archaeological Institute in 1909.

Margarete Bieber became a member of the DAI in 1913.

Margarete Bieber continued to teach private courses out of her home, counting Dora and Erwin Panofsky among her students.

Margarete Bieber was the second woman to become a University professor in Germany.

Margarete Bieber's future looking secure, she adopted a six-year-old girl named Ingeborg in 1932.

She, Ingeborg and her governess Katharina Freytag left Germany for England where Margarete Bieber became an honorary fellow at Somerville College, Oxford.

Margarete Bieber left for the United States in 1934 at the invitation of Barnard College, where she was a lecturer.

Margarete Bieber was recommended to Columbia University, where she became a visiting professor in the Department of Art History and Archaeology in 1936.

Margarete Bieber retired from Columbia University in 1948, though she continued to lecture at the Columbia University School of General Studies and at Princeton University.

Margarete Bieber continued to publish works, describing sculpture in American museums and ancient clothing.

Margarete Bieber was elected a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 1971 and in 1974, the Archaeological Institute of America awarded her the Gold Medal for Distinguished Archaeological Achievement.

Margarete Bieber remained active in her later years, living with her adopted daughter, Ingeborg Sachs.

Margarete Bieber died on 25 February 1978 in New Canaan, Connecticut.