This article takes some first steps towards the establishment of the intellectual biography of the medical historian, classicist, and moral philosopher Ludwig Edelstein . Based on scattered archival records, it sheds light on Edelstein's early career in Germany, the decisions he was forced to make in 1933 when he left Germany and the events that led to his appointment as associate professor at Baltimore's Johns Hopkins University in the autumn of 1934. The representative nature of Edelstein's case will be highlighted (...) in terms of both the history of exile and the history of the academic disciplines involved ; in doing so, the article attempts to reinscribe Edelstein's achievements and influence back into their respective discourses. (shrink)