Baron Max von Oppenheim was a German lawyer, diplomat, ancient historian, pan-Islamist and archaeologist. He was a member of the Oppenheim banking dynasty. Abandoning his career in diplomacy, he discovered the site of Tell Halaf in 1899 and conducted excavations there in 1911–13 and again in 1927–29. Bringing many of his finds to Berlin, he exhibited them in a private museum in 1931. This was destroyed by Allied bombing in World War II; however, most of the findings were recently restored and have been exhibited again at Berlin and Bonn.