Prominent German historian, Wolfgang Mommsen has died while swimming in the Ostsee. He was the scion of an astonishingly prolific family of German historians and thinkers (his great-grandfather, Theodor Mommsen, won the Nobel Prize; Max Weber was a relation by marriage). He is likely to be remembered for his prominent and honorable role in the _Historikerstreit_ (historians’ controversy), in which he along with several others (Jurgen Habermas, _Kaiserreich_ historian Hans-Ulrich Wehler, social historian Jurgen Kocka) battled with conservatives who seemed to be trying to normalize the Nazi period of German history. See Rhine River blog for more. Thanks to Nathanael Robinson for letting us know.