BERGÈR, PHILIPPE:

By: Crawford Howell Toy, Isaac Broydé

Christian professor of Hebrew; member of the Académie des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres; born at Beaucourt, Haut-Rhin, September, 1846; brother of Samuel Bergér. Graduating at the University of Strasburg, he settled in Paris, where he became professor of Hebrew in the Faculté de Théologie Protestante (now a part of the University of Paris), and sublibrarian of the Institut de France.

Disciple and intimate friend of Renan, whom he succeeded in the chair of Hebrew at the Collège de France, Bergèr devoted himself to the study of Semitic epigraphy, for which his friend and master had a predilection. He collaborated in the redaction of the "Corpus Inscriptionum Semiticarum," published by the Académie.

Among Bergèr's numerous writings two are of special interest for Jewish scholars: (1) "L'Ecriture des Inscriptions Sémitiques," Paris, 1880; and (2) "Essai sur la Signification Historique des Noms des Patriarches Hébreux," Paris, 1887.

T. I. Br.