András Róna-Tas (born 30 December 1931) is a Hungarian historian and linguist.

Biography

He was born in 1931 in

Budapest Budapest is the Capital city, capital and List of cities and towns of Hungary, most populous city of Hungary. It is the List of cities in the European Union by population within city limits, tenth-largest city in the European Union by popul ...

. Róna-Tas studied under such preeminent professors as Gyula Ortutay and Lajos Ligeti, and received a degree in folklore and eastern linguistics ( Tibetan,

Mongol Mongols are an East Asian ethnic group native to Mongolia, China (Inner Mongolia and other 11 autonomous territories), as well as the republics of Buryatia and Kalmykia in Russia. The Mongols are the principal member of the large family of M ...

, and Turkic.) From 1956, he worked at the Faculty of Humanities of the

Eötvös Loránd University Eötvös Loránd University (, ELTE, also known as ''University of Budapest'') is a Hungarian public research university based in Budapest. Founded in 1635, ELTE is one of the largest and most prestigious public higher education institutions in ...

. In 1957–1958, Róna-Tas conducted anthropological fieldwork in

Mongolia Mongolia is a landlocked country in East Asia, bordered by Russia to the north and China to the south and southeast. It covers an area of , with a population of 3.5 million, making it the world's List of countries and dependencies by po ...

, studying the culture, language, and folklore of the

nomad Nomads are communities without fixed habitation who regularly move to and from areas. Such groups include hunter-gatherers, pastoral nomads (owning livestock), tinkers and trader nomads. In the twentieth century, the population of nomadic pa ...

ic tribes in that country. During the mid-1960s, Róna-Tas focused his fieldwork on the

Chuvash people The Chuvash people (, ; , ) also called Chuvash Tatars, are a Turkic ethnic group, a branch of the Oğurs, inhabiting an area stretching from the Idel-Ural region to Siberia. Most of them live in the Russian republic of Chuvashia and the ...

of the middle

Volga River The Volga (, ) is the longest river in Europe and the longest endorheic basin river in the world. Situated in Russia, it flows through Central Russia to Southern Russia and into the Caspian Sea. The Volga has a length of , and a catchment ...

basin. In 1964, Róna-Tas defended his candidates (CSc) degree, and finally in 1971, he earned a doctorate from the

Hungarian Academy of Sciences The Hungarian Academy of Sciences ( , MTA) is Hungary’s foremost and most prestigious learned society. Its headquarters are located along the banks of the Danube in Budapest, between Széchenyi rakpart and Akadémia utca. The Academy's primar ...

(DSc) with his thesis "The Theory of Linguistic Affinity and the Linguistic Relations between the Chuvash and

Languages", published as ''Linguistic Affinity'' in 1978. From 1968 to 2002, Róna-Tas was professor of

Altaic The Altaic () languages are a group of languages comprising the Turkic, Mongolic and Tungusic language families, with some linguists including the Koreanic and Japonic families. These languages share agglutinative morphology, head-final ...

Studies and Early Hungarian History at József Attila University in

Szeged Szeged ( , ; see also #Etymology, other alternative names) is List of cities and towns of Hungary#Largest cities in Hungary, the third largest city of Hungary, the largest city and regional centre of the Southern Great Plain and the county seat ...

, where he is now a distinguished professor emeritus. He has published over 450 papers, monographs and reviews. His

magnum opus A masterpiece, , or ; ; ) is a creation that has been given much critical praise, especially one that is considered the greatest work of a person's career or a work of outstanding creativity, skill, profundity, or workmanship. Historically, ...

, ''A honfoglaló magyar nép'', was published in 1996 and an extended translated version, ''Hungarians and Europe in the Early Middle Ages'', appeared in 1999. In addition to his work on the early

Magyars Hungarians, also known as Magyars, are an ethnic group native to Hungary (), who share a common culture, language and history. They also have a notable presence in former parts of the Kingdom of Hungary. The Hungarian language belongs to the ...

, Róna-Tas has published numerous works on other

Eurasia Eurasia ( , ) is a continental area on Earth, comprising all of Europe and Asia. According to some geographers, Physical geography, physiographically, Eurasia is a single supercontinent. The concept of Europe and Asia as distinct continents d ...

n societies such as the

Tibetans Tibetans () are an East Asian ethnic group native to Tibet. Their current population is estimated to be around 7.7 million. In addition to the majority living in the Tibet Autonomous Region of China, significant numbers of Tibetans live in t ...

Kipchaks The Kipchaks, also spelled Qipchaqs, known as Polovtsians (''Polovtsy'') in Russian annals, were Turkic nomads and then a confederation that existed in the Middle Ages inhabiting parts of the Eurasian Steppe. First mentioned in the eighth cent ...

Khazars The Khazars ; 突厥可薩 ''Tūjué Kěsà'', () were a nomadic Turkic people who, in the late 6th century CE, established a major commercial empire covering the southeastern section of modern European Russia, southern Ukraine, Crimea, a ...

Oghuz Turks The Oghuz Turks ( Middle Turkic: , ) were a western Turkic people who spoke the Oghuz branch of the Turkic language family. In the 8th century, they formed a tribal confederation conventionally named the Oghuz Yabgu State in Central Asia ...

and

Alans The Alans () were an ancient and medieval Iranian peoples, Iranic Eurasian nomads, nomadic pastoral people who migrated to what is today North Caucasus – while some continued on to Europe and later North Africa. They are generally regarded ...

. He was awarded the prestigious

Humboldt Prize The Humboldt Research Award (), also known informally as the Humboldt Prize, is an award given by the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation of Germany to internationally renowned scientists and scholars who work outside of Germany in recognition of ...

in 1996.

Selected bibliography

*"Turkic-Alanian-Hungarian contacts." (2005) (Journal article in ''Acta Orientalia Academiae Scientiarum Hungaricae'') *"Khitan word for 'marmot'." (2004) (Journal article in ''Acta Orientalia Academiae Scientiarum Hungaricae'') *"New publications on Uyghur texts translated from Chinese." (2003) (Journal article in ''Acta Orientalia Academiae Scientiarum Hungaricae'') *"Old Turkic Loan Words in Hungarian: Overview and Samples." (2002) (Journal article in ''Acta Orientalia Academiae Scientiarum Hungaricae'') *"Where was Khuvrat's Bulgharia?" (2000) (Journal Article in ''Acta Orientalia Academiae Scientiarum Hungaricae'') *"Chuvash and historical morphology." (1999) (Journal Article in ''Acta Orientalia Academiae Scientiarum Hungaricae'') *The Migration and Landtaking of the Magyars (Journal article in ''The Hungarian Quarterly'') *

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Rona-Tas, Andras 1931 births Living people Writers from Budapest 20th-century Hungarian historians Linguists from Hungary Khazar studies Historical linguists Linguists of Turkic languages Linguists of Altaic languages 21st-century Hungarian historians Academic staff of the University of Szeged