Oliver Robert Gurney was an English

England

England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...

 Assyriologist and a leading scholar of the Hittites

Hittites

The Hittites were a Bronze Age people of Anatolia.They established a kingdom centered at Hattusa in north-central Anatolia c. the 18th century BC. The Hittite empire reached its height c...

.

Early life

Gurney was born in London

London

London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...

 in 1911, the son of Robert Gurney, a zoologist, and a nephew of the archaeologist John Garstang

John Garstang

John Garstang was a British archaeologist of the ancient Near East, especially Anatolia and the southern Levant....

. He was educated at Eton College

Eton College

Eton College, often referred to simply as Eton, is a British independent school for boys aged 13 to 18. It was founded in 1440 by King Henry VI as "The King's College of Our Lady of Eton besides Wyndsor"....

 and New College, Oxford

New College, Oxford

New College is one of the constituent colleges of the University of Oxford in the United Kingdom.- Overview :The College's official name, College of St Mary, is the same as that of the older Oriel College; hence, it has been referred to as the "New College of St Mary", and is now almost always...

, where he studied classics

Classics

Classics is the branch of the Humanities comprising the languages, literature, philosophy, history, art, archaeology and other culture of the ancient Mediterranean world ; especially Ancient Greece and Ancient Rome during Classical Antiquity Classics (sometimes encompassing Classical Studies or...

, graduating in 1933.

His uncle John Garstang excited the young Gurney's interest in Hittite studies, then in its infancy, and after a course in Akkadian

Akkadian language

Akkadian is an extinct Semitic language that was spoken in ancient Mesopotamia. The earliest attested Semitic language, it used the cuneiform writing system derived ultimately from ancient Sumerian, an unrelated language isolate...

 at Oxford University in 1934-35, he went to the University of Berlin to study Hittite under Hans Ehelolf

Hans Ehelolf

Hans Wilhelm Heinrich Ehelolf was a German Hittitologist. Born in Hanover, Lower Saxony. He began his oriental studies in Marburg, focusing on Assyriology, Semitic linguistics, Indology, and Biblical exegesis. He wrote a PhD thesis entitled Ein Wortfolgeprinzip im Assyrisch-Babylonischen and...

.

During the Second World War he joined the Royal Artillery

Royal Artillery

The Royal Regiment of Artillery, commonly referred to as the Royal Artillery , is the artillery arm of the British Army. Despite its name, it comprises a number of regiments.-History:...

, and served with the Sudan Defence Force

Sudan Defence Force

The Sudan Defence Force was a Sudanese military unit formed in 1925, as its name indicates, to maintain the borders of the Sudan under the British administration...

.

Academic career

On his return to Oxford in 1945, Gurney accepted the post of Reader in Assyriology, a post he held until his retirement in 1978. In 1948, he joined the council of management of the British Institute of Archaeology at Ankara, founded by his uncle, and maintained his links with the Institute for the rest of his life, serving as President from 1982. From 1956 to 1996 he edited the Institute's journal, Anatolian Studies.

He was elected a Fellow of the British Academy

British Academy

The British Academy is the United Kingdom's national body for the humanities and the social sciences. Its purpose is to inspire, recognise and support excellence in the humanities and social sciences, throughout the UK and internationally, and to champion their role and value.It receives an annual...

 in 1959 and a Fellow of Magdalen College, Oxford

Magdalen College, Oxford

Magdalen College is one of the constituent colleges of the University of Oxford in England. As of 2006 the college had an estimated financial endowment of £153 million. Magdalen is currently top of the Norrington Table after over half of its 2010 finalists received first-class degrees, a record...

 in 1963. In 1965, the University conferred on him the title of Professor.

Gurney wrote the classic text on The Hittites, published by Penguin

Penguin Books

Penguin Books is a publisher founded in 1935 by Sir Allen Lane and V.K. Krishna Menon. Penguin revolutionised publishing in the 1930s through its high quality, inexpensive paperbacks, sold through Woolworths and other high street stores for sixpence. Penguin's success demonstrated that large...

 in 1952 and in print for many years.

Works

(with John Garstang

John Garstang

John Garstang was a British archaeologist of the ancient Near East, especially Anatolia and the southern Levant....

)

• Some Aspects of Hittite Religion Oxford University Press (1977) ISBN 978 0197259740