Thomas Pell Platt (1798–1852) was an English orientalist.

Life

Born in London, he was the son of Thomas Platt. After attending a school at

Little Dunham Little Dunham is a village situated in the Breckland District of Norfolk and covers an area of 749 hectares (2.9 square miles) with a population of 309 at the 2001 census. The village lies south of its sister village Great Dunham and by road ...

, Norfolk, he was admitted at Trinity College, Cambridge, as pensioner on 25 Nov. 1815. He was elected scholar on 3 April 1818, minor fellow on 2 October 1820, and major fellow on 2 July 1823. He graduated B.A. in 1820, and M.A. in 1823. While at Cambridge he became connected with the

British and Foreign Bible Society The British and Foreign Bible Society, often known in England and Wales as simply the Bible Society, is a non-denominational Christian Bible society with charity status whose purpose is to make the Bible available throughout the world. The Soc ...

, and acted for some years as its librarian. Platt was one of the earliest members of the

Royal Asiatic Society The Royal Asiatic Society of Great Britain and Ireland, commonly known as the Royal Asiatic Society (RAS), was established, according to its royal charter of 11 August 1824, to further "the investigation of subjects connected with and for the en ...

, and sat on its oriental translation committee. He was also a Fellow of the

Society of Antiquaries of London A society is a group of individuals involved in persistent social interaction, or a large social group sharing the same spatial or social territory, typically subject to the same political authority and dominant cultural expectations. Societ ...

. He lived for many years at

Child's Hill Childs Hill is one of two areas at the south end of the London Borough of Barnet along with Cricklewood which straddles three boroughs. It took its name from Richard le Child, who in 1312 held a customary house and "30 acres" of its area. It is a ...

Hampstead Hampstead () is an area in London, which lies northwest of Charing Cross, and extends from Watling Street, the A5 road (Roman Watling Street) to Hampstead Heath, a large, hilly expanse of parkland. The area forms the northwest part of the Lon ...

, dying at Dulwich Hill in

Surrey Surrey () is a ceremonial and non-metropolitan county in South East England, bordering Greater London to the south west. Surrey has a large rural area, and several significant urban areas which form part of the Greater London Built-up Area. ...

, on 31 October 1852. He left an only son, Francis Thomas Platt.

Works

In 1823 Platt published a catalogue of Ethiopian biblical manuscripts in the Royal Library of Paris and in the library of the British and Foreign Bible Society; and in succeeding years collated and edited for the Society texts of the New Testament. He made notes of the readings which particularly struck, in the Gospels; for the Acts and the Epistles he used only one manuscript and Brian Walton's text. In 1829 he also prepared an edition of the Syriac Gospels, and in 1844 edited an

Amharic Amharic ( or ; (Amharic: ), ', ) is an Ethiopian Semitic language, which is a subgrouping within the Semitic branch of the Afroasiatic languages. It is spoken as a first language by the Amharas, and also serves as a lingua franca for all oth ...

version of the Bible, using the translation of Abba Rukh for the Old Testament, and that of Abu Rumi Habessinus for the New. In 1827 Platt defended the British and Foreign Bible Society from an attack made on their publications in the ''

Quarterly Review The ''Quarterly Review'' was a literary and political periodical founded in March 1809 by London London is the capital and largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River ...

''. In 1840, in a ''Letter to Dr. Pusey'', he described his conversion from

evangelical Evangelicalism (), also called evangelical Christianity or evangelical Protestantism, is a worldwide Interdenominationalism, interdenominational movement within Protestantism, Protestant Christianity that affirms the centrality of being "bor ...

opinions to

Tractarian The Oxford Movement was a movement of high church members of the Church of England which began in the 1830s and eventually developed into Anglo-Catholicism. The movement, whose original devotees were mostly associated with the University of O ...

views. He objected, however, to some of the Tractarian interpretations of the prophecies in the Old Testament.

Notes

Attribution {{DEFAULTSORT:Platt, Thomas Pell 1798 births 1852 deaths English orientalists English librarians Fellows of the Society of Antiquaries of London Fellows of Trinity College, Cambridge