Otto von Böhtlingk (, ''Otton Nikolayevich Byotlingk''; – ) was a Russian-German

Indologist Indology, also known as South Asian studies, is the academic study of the history and cultures, languages, and literature of the Indian subcontinent, and as such is a subset of Asian studies. The term ''Indology'' (in German, ''Indologie'') is ...

and Sanskrit scholar. 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, ...

'' was a Sanskrit-German dictionary.

Biography

He was born in

Saint Petersburg Saint Petersburg, formerly known as Petrograd and later Leningrad, is the List of cities and towns in Russia by population, second-largest city in Russia after Moscow. It is situated on the Neva, River Neva, at the head of the Gulf of Finland ...

, Russia. His German ancestors migrated to Russia from

Lübeck Lübeck (; or ; Latin: ), officially the Hanseatic League, Hanseatic City of Lübeck (), is a city in Northern Germany. With around 220,000 inhabitants, it is the second-largest city on the German Baltic Sea, Baltic coast and the second-larg ...

in 1713. Having studied (1833–1835)

Oriental The Orient is a term referring to the East in relation to Europe, traditionally comprising anything belonging to the Eastern world. It is the antonym of the term ''Occident'', which refers to the Western world. In English, it is largely a meto ...

languages, particularly

Arabic Arabic (, , or , ) is a Central Semitic languages, Central Semitic language of the Afroasiatic languages, Afroasiatic language family spoken primarily in the Arab world. The International Organization for Standardization (ISO) assigns lang ...

Persian Persian may refer to: * People and things from Iran, historically called ''Persia'' in the English language ** Persians, the majority ethnic group in Iran, not to be conflated with the Iranic peoples ** Persian language, an Iranian language of the ...

and

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 ...

, at the

University of Saint Petersburg Saint Petersburg State University (SPBGU; ) is a public research university in Saint Petersburg, Russia, and one of the oldest and most prestigious universities in Russia. Founded in 1724 by a decree of Peter the Great, the university from the be ...

, he continued his studies in Germany, first in Berlin and then (1839–1842) in

Bonn Bonn () is a federal city in the German state of North Rhine-Westphalia, located on the banks of the Rhine. With a population exceeding 300,000, it lies about south-southeast of Cologne, in the southernmost part of the Rhine-Ruhr region. This ...

. Returning to Saint Petersburg in 1842, he was attached to the Royal Academy of Sciences, and was elected an ordinary member of that society in 1855. In 1860 he was made Russian state councillor, and later privy councillor with a title of nobility. In 1862, the

American Philosophical Society The American Philosophical Society (APS) is an American scholarly organization and learned society founded in 1743 in Philadelphia that promotes knowledge in the humanities and natural sciences through research, professional meetings, publicat ...

elected him an international Member. In 1868 he settled at

Jena Jena (; ) is a List of cities and towns in Germany, city in Germany and the second largest city in Thuringia. Together with the nearby cities of Erfurt and Weimar, it forms the central metropolitan area of Thuringia with approximately 500,000 in ...

, and in 1885 moved to

Leipzig Leipzig (, ; ; Upper Saxon: ; ) is the most populous city in the States of Germany, German state of Saxony. The city has a population of 628,718 inhabitants as of 2023. It is the List of cities in Germany by population, eighth-largest city in Ge ...

, where he resided until his death.

Scholarship

Böhtlingk was one of the most distinguished scholars of the nineteenth century, and his works are of pre-eminent value in the field of Indian and comparative

philology Philology () is the study of language in Oral tradition, oral and writing, written historical sources. It is the intersection of textual criticism, literary criticism, history, and linguistics with strong ties to etymology. Philology is also de ...

. His first great work was a translation of the Sanskrit

grammar In linguistics, grammar is the set of rules for how a natural language is structured, as demonstrated by its speakers or writers. Grammar rules may concern the use of clauses, phrases, and words. The term may also refer to the study of such rul ...

of Panini, , with a German commentary, under the title ''Acht Bücher grammatischer Regeln'' (Bonn, 1839–1840). This was in reality a criticism of

Franz Bopp Franz Bopp (; 14 September 1791 – 23 October 1867) was a German linguistics, linguist known for extensive and pioneering comparative linguistics, comparative work on Indo-European languages. Early life Bopp was born in Mainz, but the pol ...

's philological methods. This work was followed by: *'' Vopadevas Grammatik'' (Saint Petersburg, 1847) *''Über die Sprache der Jakuten'' (Saint Petersburg, 1851

*''Indische Sprüche'', a series of Sanskrit apothegms and proverbial verses (2nd ed. in 3 parts, Saint Petersburg, 1870–1873, to which an index was published by Blau, Leipzig, 1893) *a critical examination and translation of the '' Chandogya

Upanishad The Upanishads (; , , ) are late Vedic and post-Vedic Sanskrit texts that "document the transition from the archaic ritualism of the Veda into new religious ideas and institutions" and the emergence of the central religious concepts of Hind ...

'' (Saint Petersburg, 1889) *a translation of the '' Brihadaranyaka

'' (Saint Petersburg, 1889) His

was his great Sanskrit-German dictionary, ''Sanskrit-Wörterbuch'' (7 vols., Saint Petersburg, 1853–1875; shortened ed. (without citations) 7 vols, Saint Petersburg, 1879–1889), which with the assistance of his two friends, Rudolf Roth (d. 1895) and

Albrecht Weber Friedrich Albrecht Weber (; 17 February 1825 – 30 November 1901) was a Prussian-German Indologist and historian who studied the history of Jainism in India. Some older sources have the first and middle names interchanged. Biography Weber was ...

(b. 1825), was completed in 23 years. He also published several smaller treatises, notably one on

Vedic accent The pitch accent of Vedic Sanskrit, or Vedic accent (Vedic: स्वराः svarāḥ) for brevity, is traditionally divided by Sanskrit grammarians into three qualities, ''udātta'' "raised" (acute accent, high pitch), ''anudātta'' "not ra ...

, ''Über den Accent im Sanskrit'' (1843). Also notable are his ''Sanskrit-Chrestomathie'' (Saint Petersburg, 1845; 2d ed., 1877–97), and an edition with translation of a treatise on Hindu poetics by

Daṇḍin Daṇḍi or Daṇḍin (Sanskrit: दण्डिन्) () was an Indian Sanskrit grammarian and author of prose romances. He is one of the best-known writers in Indian history. Life Daṇḍin's account of his life in ''Avantisundari-ka ...

, ''

Kāvyādarśa The Kavyadarsha (, ) by Dandin is the earliest surviving systematic treatment of poetics in Sanskrit. Contents This work is divided into 3 ''pariccheda''s (chapters) in most of the printed editions, except one, where the third chapter of the oth ...

'' (Leipzig, 1890). Böhtlingk took up Panini's grammar again, 47 years after his first edition, when he republished it with a complete translation under the title ''Panini's Grammatik mit Übersetzung'' (Leipzig, 1887). Abhik Ghosh and

Paul Kiparsky René Paul Victor Kiparsky (born January 28, 1941) is a Finnish linguist and professor of linguistics at Stanford University. He is the son of the St. Petersburg (Russia)-born linguist and Baltist/ Slavicist Valentin Kiparsky. Kiparsky is es ...

suggested that

Dmitri Mendeleev Dmitri Ivanovich Mendeleev ( ; ) was a Russian chemist known for formulating the periodic law and creating a version of the periodic table of elements. He used the periodic law not only to correct the then-accepted properties of some known ele ...

may have known his contemporary's Böhtlingk's work on the periodic nature of the

writing and this helped him in the formulation of the

periodic table The periodic table, also known as the periodic table of the elements, is an ordered arrangement of the chemical elements into rows (" periods") and columns (" groups"). It is an icon of chemistry and is widely used in physics and other s ...

. According to this suggestion, Mendeleev's use of the prefixes ''eka'', ''dvi'', and ''tri'' (Sanskrit for one, two, and three) to name as yet undiscovered chemical elements may be viewed as an homage to

Sanskrit grammar The grammar of the Sanskrit language has a complex verbal system, rich nominal declension, and extensive use of compound nouns. It was studied and codified by Sanskrit grammarians from the later Vedic period (roughly 8th century BCE), culminatin ...

and to the Sanskrit grammarian

Pāṇini (; , ) was a Sanskrit grammarian, logician, philologist, and revered scholar in ancient India during the mid-1st millennium BCE, dated variously by most scholars between the 6th–5th and 4th century BCE. The historical facts of his life ar ...

Bibliography

Kalidasa
1842 *with Rudolph Roth
''Sanskrit-Wörterbuch''

1855–1875.
''Sanskrit-Wörterbuch in kürzerer Fassung''
1879–1889 *'' Panini's Grammatik'' 1887 *''Indische Sprüche''
Band 1 1863Band 2 1864Band 3 1865
Saint Petersburg, Akad. d. Wissenschaften, 1863–65. *'' Sanskrit-Chrestomathie'' 1845

Notes

References

Attribution: *

External links