Abraham Rogerius or Abraham Roger (1609 – 1649, in Gouda) was a Dutch clergyman/translator working for the

Dutch East India Company The United East India Company ( ; VOC ), commonly known as the Dutch East India Company, was a chartered company, chartered trading company and one of the first joint-stock companies in the world. Established on 20 March 1602 by the States Ge ...

, and one of the first Europeans who wrote about

Indian culture Indian culture is the heritage of social norms and technologies that originated in or are associated with the ethno-linguistically diverse nation of India, pertaining to the Indian subcontinent until 1947 and the Republic of India post-1947. ...

Life

Pulicat-India-An-Old-Abandoned-Dutch-House-with-Large-Pots-6

It is possible Abraham was born in

Haarlem Haarlem (; predecessor of ''Harlem'' in English language, English) is a List of cities in the Netherlands by province, city and Municipalities of the Netherlands, municipality in the Netherlands. It is the capital of the Provinces of the Nether ...

, like his brother Jacobus, also a chaplain, who went to the Indies. The Calvinist Rogerius (anglicized as Roger), studied in Leiden under Antonius Walaeus. His first trip was to Batavia (1631) and then

Surat Surat (Gujarati Language, Gujarati: ) is a city in the western Indian States and territories of India, state of Gujarat. The word Surat directly translates to ''face'' in Urdu, Gujarati language, Gujarati and Hindi. Located on the banks of t ...

(1632). From 1633 he worked as a chaplain in

Pulicat Pulicat or Pazhaverkadu is a historic seashore town in Chennai Metropolitan Area at Thiruvallur District, of Tamil Nadu states and territories of India, state, India. It is about north of Chennai and from Elavur, on the southern periphery of ...

, the capital of

Dutch Coromandel Coromandel was a governorate of the Dutch East India Company on the coasts of the Coromandel region from 1610, until the company's liquidation in 1798. Dutch presence in the region began with the capture of Pulicat from the Portuguese in Goa and ...

. He studied

Hinduism Hinduism () is an Hypernymy and hyponymy, umbrella term for a range of Indian religions, Indian List of religions and spiritual traditions#Indian religions, religious and spiritual traditions (Sampradaya, ''sampradaya''s) that are unified ...

southern India South India, also known as Southern India or Peninsular India, is the southern part of the Deccan Peninsula in India encompassing the states of Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka, Kerala, Tamil Nadu and Telangana as well as the union territories of ...

and learned Portuguese. Rogerius authored ''Open Door to the Secrets of Heathendom'', which begins with ten years of ministry among the

Tamil people The Tamils ( ), also known by their endonym Tamilar, are a Dravidian ethnic group who natively speak the Tamil language and trace their ancestry mainly to the southern part of the Indian subcontinent. The Tamil language is one of the longe ...

in the Dutch colony of Pulicat near

Madras Chennai, also known as Madras ( its official name until 1996), is the capital and largest city of Tamil Nadu, the southernmost state of India. It is located on the Coromandel Coast of the Bay of Bengal. According to the 2011 Indian ce ...

, India. His knowledge came from three

Brahmins Brahmin (; ) is a ''Varna (Hinduism), varna'' (theoretical social classes) within Hindu society. The other three varnas are the ''Kshatriya'' (rulers and warriors), ''Vaishya'' (traders, merchants, and farmers), and ''Shudra'' (labourers). Th ...

whom he met regularly. In 1642 he went back to Batavia and became the manager of an orphanage/school and promoted the use of Portuguese during church services. In 1647 he returned to the

Dutch Republic The United Provinces of the Netherlands, commonly referred to in historiography as the Dutch Republic, was a confederation that existed from 1579 until the Batavian Revolution in 1795. It was a predecessor state of the present-day Netherlands ...

. "De Open-Deure tot het verborgen Heydendom ofte Waerachtigh vertoogh van het leven ende zeden, mitsgaders de Religie ende Gotsdienst der Bramines op de Cust Chormandel ende der landen daar ontrent ("The open door to the hidden paganism or truthful account of life and customs, as well as religion and worship of the Brahmins at Coromandel Coast and surrounding countries "), was published in Leiden in 1651 and since translated into German (1663), French (1670). This book was one of the first European books describing hinduism. The book has two parts. The first deals with the Brahmins life and customs, while the other describes their faith and worship. Rogerius seems to have been the first to publish a translation of aphorisms in

Sanskrit Sanskrit (; stem form ; nominal singular , ,) is a classical language belonging to the Indo-Aryan languages, Indo-Aryan branch of the Indo-European languages. It arose in northwest South Asia after its predecessor languages had Trans-cultural ...

Bhartṛhari Bhartṛhari (Devanagari: ; Bhartrihari; fl. c. 5th century CE), was an Indian-Hindu linguistic philosopher and poet, known for his contributions to the fields of linguistics, grammar, and philosophy. He is believed to have been born in the 5t ...

, (Hundred aphorisms on the path to heaven by the heathen Bhartṛhari, famous amongst the Brahmins on the Coromandel coast) which forms the third part of the book.

Works

Breviario de religiāo christāo, em maneira de dialogo (1689)

De open-deure tot het verborgen heydendom

Literature

* Biographies in Dutch * Windisch, Ernst: Geschichte der Sanskrit Philologie und Indische Altertumskunde. Bd. 1. Strassburg, 1917.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Rogerius, Abraham - Roger, Abraham 1609 births 1649 deaths 17th-century Dutch Calvinist and Reformed ministers 17th-century Dutch explorers Dutch Protestant missionaries Dutch expatriates in India Hindu studies scholars Leiden University alumni Clergy from Haarlem Protestant missionaries in India Dutch East India Company people Missionary linguists