Having served as an officer of artillery in the Bavarian army, he returned to Greece, where he held several high educational and administrative appointments.

[2] Of his various works, Hellenic Antiquities (1842–1855, of great value for epigraphical purposes), Archaeologia (1865–1866), an illustrated Archaeological Lexicon (1888–1891), and the first History of Modern Greek Literature (1877) are of the most interest to scholars.

He wrote also the following dramatic pieces: The Wedding of Koutroulis (comedy),[3] Dukas (tragedy), The Thirty Tyrants, The Eve (of the Greek revolution); the romances, The Prince of Morea, Leila, and The Notary of Argostoli; and translated portions of Dante, Schiller, Lessing, Goethe and Shakespeare.

He had married Caroline, the daughter of James Skene of Rubislaw, near Aberdeen.

A complete edition of his philological works in nineteen volumes was published at Athens (1874–1890), and his Memoirs appeared posthumously in 1894–1895.