John Dyneley Prince (April 17, 1868 – October 11, 1945) was an American

linguist Linguistics is the scientific study of human language. It is called a scientific study because it entails a comprehensive, systematic, objective, and precise analysis of all aspects of language, particularly its nature and structure. Linguis ...

, diplomat, and

politician A politician is a person active in party politics, or a person holding or seeking an elected office in government. Politicians propose, support, reject and create laws that govern the land and by an extension of its people. Broadly speaking ...

. He was a professor at

New York University New York University (NYU) is a private research university in New York City. Chartered in 1831 by the New York State Legislature, NYU was founded by a group of New Yorkers led by then- Secretary of the Treasury Albert Gallatin. In 1832, th ...

and

Columbia University Columbia University (also known as Columbia, and officially as Columbia University in the City of New York) is a private research university in New York City. Established in 1754 as King's College on the grounds of Trinity Church in Manhatt ...

, minister to

Denmark ) , song = ( en, "King Christian stood by the lofty mast") , song_type = National and royal anthem , image_map = EU-Denmark.svg , map_caption = , subdivision_type = Sovereign state , subdivision_name = Kingdom of Denmark , establish ...

and

Yugoslavia Yugoslavia (; sh-Latn-Cyrl, separator=" / ", Jugoslavija, Југославија ; sl, Jugoslavija ; mk, Југославија ;; rup, Iugoslavia; hu, Jugoszlávia; rue, label=Pannonian Rusyn, Югославия, translit=Juhoslavija ...

, and leader of both houses of the New Jersey Legislature.

Early life

Prince was born in

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the most densely populated major city in the Un ...

in 1868, the son of John Dyneley Prince (1843–1883) and Anna Maria ( née Morris) Prince (1847–1904). His paternal grandparents were John Dyneley Prince and Mary (née Travers) Prince. His maternal grandparents were Thomas H. Morris and Mary (née Johnson) Morris (a daughter of

Reverdy Johnson Reverdy Johnson (May 21, 1796February 10, 1876) was a statesman and jurist from Maryland. He gained fame as a defense attorney, defending notables such as Sandford of the Dred Scott case, Maj. Gen. Fitz John Porter at his court-martial, and Mary ...

, a U.S. Senator from

Maryland Maryland ( ) is a state in the Mid-Atlantic region of the United States. It shares borders with Virginia, West Virginia, and the District of Columbia to its south and west; Pennsylvania to its north; and Delaware and the Atlantic Ocean to ...

who also served as

United States Attorney General The United States attorney general (AG) is the head of the United States Department of Justice, and is the chief law enforcement officer of the federal government of the United States. The attorney general serves as the principal advisor to the p ...

). After the death of his father in 1883, his mother remarried to Dr.

Alfred Lebbeus Loomis Alfred Lebbeus Loomis (October 16, 1831 – January 23, 1895) was an American physician who served as president of the Association of American Physicians. Life and career Alfred Loomis was born in Bennington, Vermont. He graduated from U ...

, who served as president of the

Association of American Physicians The Association of American Physicians (AAP) is an honorary medical society founded in 1885 by the Canadian physician Sir William Osler and six other distinguished physicians of his era for "the advancement of scientific and practical medicine." ...

. His step brother was Henry Patterson Loomis. He attended Columbia Grammar & Preparatory School, Columbia Grammar School. Prince had a strong interest in foreign languages as a child, acquiring basic skills in speaking the Romani language, Romani and Shelta languages by the age of 12, after reading Charles Godfrey Leland's ethnographic accounts of the Romani people, Gypsies. As retold in his 1939 memoir ''Fragments from Babel'', he ran away with another boy from their families in New York to a gypsy camp near Newark, New Jersey, where they spent three days and were accepted because of his proficiency in their language. He also learned Welsh language, Welsh and Turkish language, Turkish in his youth. Prince attended

, graduating with a Bachelor of Arts, B.A. in 1888. He represented Columbia on the University of Pennsylvania's Babylonian expedition, where Sultan Abdul Hamid II of the Ottoman Empire heard of his language skills and made him an honorary captain of the troops that protected the expedition, after conversing with Prince in Turkish. He then studied Semitic languages at Humboldt University of Berlin, University of Berlin from 1888 to 1889 and received his Doctor of Philosophy, Ph.D from Johns Hopkins University in 1892.

Career

He was professor of Semitic languages at

from 1892 to 1902 and dean of its Graduate School from 1895 to 1902. Prince served as a professor of Semitic languages on the faculty of Columbia University from 1902 to 1915, when he was named professor of Slavonic languages at Columbia from 1915 to 1921 and again from 1933 to 1935, whereupon he was named professor of East European languages from 1935 to 1937.

Political career

Prince entered New Jersey politics, using his language skills to reach out to various ethnic groups of constituents in their native tongues. He was a Republican Party (United States), Republican member of the New Jersey General Assembly from 1906 to 1909, serving as Speaker of the Assembly in his final year. From 1910 to 1913 he served in the New Jersey Senate representing Passaic County, New Jersey, Passaic County, and was President of the Senate in 1912, in which role he served as Acting Governor while Governor Woodrow Wilson was out of state. While serving as Acting Governor, Prince found an anonymous seventeenth-century manuscript in the state archives containing a list of Unami language, Delaware-based trade jargon. Prince analyzed the word list in a 1912 article in ''American Anthropologist'' entitled "An Ancient New Jersey Indian Jargon."

Diplomatic career

Prince served as president of the New Jersey Civil Service Commission from 1917 to 1921, when he was chosen by Warren G. Harding to be United States Ambassador to Denmark, Minister to

. In 1926, Calvin Coolidge appointed him United States Ambassador to Yugoslavia, Minister to the Kingdom of the Serbs, Croats, and Slovenes. He continued to serve as ambassador after the nation was renamed the Kingdom of Yugoslavia in 1929. He served until 1932, after which time he returned to his professorship at Columbia, retiring in 1937.

Personal life

On October 5, 1889, Prince was married to his step-sister, Adeline E. Loomis, the daughter of Dr. Alfred Lebbeus Loomis, Alfred L. Loomis. In 1891, they moved to Ringwood Manor in Ringwood, New Jersey, Ringwood in Passaic County, New Jersey. Their only child, John Dyneley Prince, Jr., was born that year. Prince died of a heart ailment at his Manhattan home in 1945 at the age of 77.

Works

References

External links

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The Political Graveyard: John Dyneley Prince
{{DEFAULTSORT:Prince, John Dyneley 1868 births 1945 deaths Columbia College (New York) alumni Johns Hopkins University alumni New York University faculty Columbia University faculty Linguists from the United States People from Ringwood, New Jersey Politicians from Passaic County, New Jersey Speakers of the New Jersey General Assembly Republican Party members of the New Jersey General Assembly Republican Party New Jersey state senators Presidents of the New Jersey Senate Ambassadors of the United States to Denmark Ambassadors of the United States to Yugoslavia 20th-century American diplomats Linguists of Algic languages Columbia Grammar & Preparatory School alumni Loomis family