Donich Sergey Vladimirovich General data:
12.03.1900 - 26.12.1958
Place of birth: Dzhegam city, Elizabethtopol province, Russian Empire
Studied in: Kamianets-Podilskyi State Ukrainian University (since 2008 Ivan Ogienko Kamianets-Podilskyi National University) (1920-1922); Transnistria University, Odessa city (1942-1943);
Biography:
He was born on March 13, 1900 in the city of Dzhegam in the Elizabeth province of the Russian Empire in the family of a customs official. The father came from an ancient Moldavian lineage, the mother - a Ukrainian from Podolsk province.
He received his secondary education in Kamianets-Podilskyi city, where in 1920 he graduated from the classical eighth-grade gymnasium. From childhood he was interested in foreign languages, which he studied independently. He has mastered over 200 languages, including English, Arabic, Polish, German, French, Moldovan, Turkish, Cambodian, Chinese, Bantu, Hebrew.
In 1920 he entered the Faculty of Physics and Mathematics of Kamenets-Podilsky State Ukrainian University, where he studied for two years. At the same time, under the guidance of Professor OA Alenich, he worked as a supervisor of the astronomical observatory at the university.
During 1923-1936 he worked as a junior specialist (junior astronomer) of the Odessa Astronomical Observatory.
During 1927-1941 he worked as head of the department of the Ancient East. He discovered and described in the form of a catalog the largest collection of Egyptian antiquities (644 units) in Ukraine.
On February 13, 1927 he was elected an employee, and since February 2, 1930 he was a full member of the Odessa branch of the All-Ukrainian Academy of Sciences.
Since 1927 he was a member of the All-Ukrainian Scientific Association of Oriental Studies.
In 1929 he spent a month in a business trip in Leningrad, where he was introduced to the literature and monuments of the Egyptian department at the Hermitage.
During 1936-1940 he worked as an associate professor at the Department of Ancient History of the Faculty of History of Odessa State University. He taught the history of the Ancient East and Latin.
With the outbreak of the Great Patriotic War of the USSR against Hitler's Germany, which was part of World War II, he was mobilized and sent to the Sanitary Battalion as a staff clerk, and on October 5, 1941, transferred to the headquarters of the 339th Rifle Division. On November 6, he was taken prisoner, then fled, and already on December 5, 1941 he returned to Odessa.
Returning to Odessa, he was received by the Head of the Department of Egyptian Antiquities and Head of the Numismatic Department of the Archaeological Museum. With no relevant education, he studied from the fall of 1942 until July 1943 at the Faculty of History and Philology of Transnistria University (established on the basis of Odessa State University). At this time, he continued research on the connection between Egyptian script and ancient Hebrew.
March 21, 1944, before returning Soviet troops to Odessa, together with his wife, left for Romania in the city of Libling, but after his capture parts of the Red Army, they returned to Odessa. On March 12, 1945 he began work in the archaeological museum as a senior researcher. For six months, as a representative of the museum, he worked out a mandatory obligation to procure coal for the city as a deputy chief of a mine in Donbass. Upon his return to Odessa on November 4, 1945 he was arrested, and on January 5, 1946 he was sentenced to 10 years in prison. On January 30, 1946, the Military Tribunal considered his cassation appeal and decided to continue the investigation and establish a commission to determine "whether the Egyptian Donych is the only one in the USSR and what is the value of his scientific works." Academician Ignatius Crackowski spoke in defense of the scientist. In May 1946, he was again sentenced to 10 years in labor camp, but thanks to the hard work of his wife and friends, he was released from prison on November 13, 1946 for amnesty.
From 1947 to 1948 he worked as a consultant for the workshop-laboratory of the Odessa branch of the Astronomical and Geodetic Society.
Since May 1948 to December 1950 he worked as a senior librarian at the Gorky Odessa Scientific Library, where he made a description and revealed the contents of about one hundred manuscripts in ten Oriental languages, some of which provided detailed philological and historical commentary.
For the last years of his life he worked as a librarian at the Agar Plant and Victory Park, as a bibliographer of the Scientific Medical Library and the Institute for the Advancement of Doctors. At the end of 1956 he was given the job of accountant at the Odessa Astronomical Observatory.
He died December 26, 1958 (according to other figures in 1959) of cancer.
Known as historian, Egyptologist, astronomer. Author of more than 18 scientific papers.
Main publications:
1. Donych S. V. Comparative Dictionary of Ancient Egyptian and Arabic with Introduction to Dissertation, 1932
2. Донич С. В. Про деякі особливості єгипетського листа
3. Donych S. V. The Sarcophagus of Ptahthru № 3 of the History and Archaeology Museum of Odessa // Доклады Академии наук СССР. — № 8. — 1929-С. 149-151
4. Donych S. V. Funeral cones of the Odessa Archaeological Museum // Сборник Египтологического кружка при ЛГУ. — № 5. — 1930-С. 28-29
Sources:
1 Південний захід. Одесика. Історико-краєзнавчий науковий альманах. - Вип. 21. - Одеса: Друкарський дім, 2016. – 312 с.-С.189
2 uk.wikipedia.org
3 egyptology.ru
4 СХОДОЗНАВСТВО І ВІЗАНТОЛОГІЯ В УКРАЇНІ В ІМЕНАХ. БІОБІБЛІОГРАФІЧНИЙ СЛОВНИК.-Київ 2011. - С.19-20, 85-86
