June 20, 2025 is the 60th anniversary of Marat Mingaliyevitch Yunusov, Candidate of Sciences in History, researcher at the Department of Ancient Eastern Studies.

After graduating from the Department of Oriental Studies of the Saint Petersburg (Leningrad) State University in 1991 (specialization: Arabic philology, with honours), Marat M. Yunusov taught in North Africa for 2 years. This work helped put into practice what was learned in the university and also gain first-hand experience of the vast region and its people with whom were directly tied several decades of his practical and scientific work.

Additional education in international public law (the Diplomatic Academy of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs) and several years of work in Africa (diplomatic and consular service), acquaintance with monuments of ancient civilizations and contacts with notable experts in archaeology, history and philology of South and East Mediterranean peoples have led M.M. Yunusov to become interested in the history and culture of the Phoenicians.

In 2000, M.M. Yunusov as a junior researcher joined the Department of Ancient Eastern Studies at the Saint Petersburg Branch of the Institute of Oriental Studies. In 2011 he successfully defended the dissertation titled “History of cities of the Phoenician coast in the second half of the 2nd millennium BCE” (supervisor: Professor Tsirkin Y.B.) in which he suggested, based on the entire corpus of available data on the most ancient period of Eastern Mediterranean cities, that the Phoenician ethnicity resulted from a synthesis of the indigenous sedentary Canaanite population of these city-states and the incoming Amorites, nomads and artisans from the Syrian steppe, who started a gradual and not always peaceful integration into the urban culture of the Levant coast at the turn of the 2nd millennium BCE.

Later, participating in various humanitarian, educational and technical projects abroad and also teaching at the Institute of Jewish Studies (Saint Petersburg), Marat M. Yunusov in numerous presentations and articles discussed little-known and partially forgotten materials on the early history of Oriental studies and their development as an academic field in Europe in the 15th-18th centuries (West Semitic philology, Hebrew studies, epigraphy). He showed the history of Oriental studies as a “living process” with its swift rises and sharp falls, tedious waiting and futile search, high hopes and bitter disappointments, discoveries of famous scholars and misfortunes of hardworking researchers who selflessly served Enlightenment and Knowledge.

For several years M.M. Yunusov responsibly served as the secretary of the Department of Ancient Eastern Studies carefully preserving the ambiance of goodwill, respect and mutual help that is always felt in the Department.

M.M. Yunusov has earned respect and recognition of his colleagues at the Institute. He is known for friendliness, attention to others and willingness to support his colleagues.

The IOM RAS administration and colleagues congratulate Marat M. Yunusov on his anniversary and wish him good health and new successes in academic work in the field of Ancient Eastern Studies.

We would like to thank Marat M. Yunusov for many years of diligent and dedicated academic work.

Irina F. Popova, Corresponding member of the RAS, Doctor of Sciences in History
Director of the Institute of Oriental Manuscripts, RAS