Richard Kleis

Richard Adolf Kleis (6 October 1896 – 18 June 1982) was an Estonian historian, classical philologist, lexicographer, translator and encyclopedist. He is chiefly known for serving as chief editor of the interwar reference work Eesti Entsüklopeedia and for his later career as a lecturer in Latin and ancient literature at the University of Tartu.

Early life and education Kleis was born in Tallinn, the son of a small merchant. He studied at Nikolai I Gymnasium in Tallinn from 1907 to 1915 and graduated with a gold medal.

Career After graduating from the University of Tartu, Kleis taught at Hugo Treffner Gymnasium in Tartu. He taught history, civics and Latin, and from 1930 served as the school's inspector.

Following the Soviet occupation of Estonia in 1940, Kleis worked at Tartu State University from 1941 as acting docent. During the German occupation of Estonia during World War II, he continued working in education and publishing.

In 1944 Kleis returned to the University of Tartu. He headed the chair of the history of the USSR, served as dean of the Faculty of History and Linguistics from 1945 to 1948, and was director of the Institute of History of the Academy of Sciences of the Estonian SSR from 1947 to 1950. He also worked as editor-in-chief of the scholarly publishing house Teaduslik Kirjandus.

During the Stalinist campaign against alleged "bourgeois nationalism", Kleis lost his senior positions in 1950 and was removed from the Institute of History. He subsequently worked in a Tartu bookshop before returning to the University of Tartu in 1954. He remained at the university until his retirement in 1978, teaching Latin, ancient literature and related subjects. He also contributed to the Ladina-eesti sõnaraamat, translated the Chronicle of Henry of Livonia into Estonian, worked on the Antiigileksikon, and wrote extensively for the postwar Eesti nõukogude entsüklopeedia. Antiikkirjanduse ajalugu (1980) Henriku Liivimaa kroonika (translation from Latin; first published 1982, reissued in later editions) Ladina-eesti sõnaraamat = Glossarium Latino-Estonicum (with Ülo Torpats, Lalla Gross and Heinrich Freymann; first published 1986)