Robert von Heine Geldern was born in Grub (Wienerwald) and attended school in Vienna which was then the capital of the Austro-Hungarian Empire.
Upon his return to Vienna, he switched to ethnology (under Father Wilhelm Schmidt), anthropology and prehistory, completing his doctoral thesis in 1914 on The Mountain Tribes of Northern and Northeastern Burma.
His research combined ethnological, pre-historical and archaeological concepts, and in 1923 pioneered the field of Southeast Asian anthropology with his chapter "Sϋdostasien" in G. Buschan's Illustrierte Völkerkunde.
In 1925 he completed his habilitation thesis and was awarded the venia legendi (licence to teach at universities) in the field of "ethnology with special consideration of Southeast Asia and India".
He began teaching at the University of Vienna in 1927, where he was appointed associate professor for Ethnology and Archaeology of India, Southeast Asia and Oceania in 1931.