Johannes Voldemar Veski (27 June 1873

Vaidavere Vaidavere is a village in Jõgeva Parish, Jõgeva County in eastern Estonia Estonia, officially the Republic of Estonia, is a country in Northern Europe. It is bordered to the north by the Gulf of Finland across from Finland, to the west by t ...

Tartu County Tartu County ( or ''Tartumaa'') is one of 15 counties of Estonia. It is located in eastern Estonia bordering Põlva County, Valga County, Viljandi County and Jõgeva County. The area of Tartu County is , which covers 6.9% of the territory of E ...

– 28 March 1968

Tartu Tartu is the second largest city in Estonia after Tallinn. Tartu has a population of 97,759 (as of 2024). It is southeast of Tallinn and 245 kilometres (152 miles) northeast of Riga, Latvia. Tartu lies on the Emajõgi river, which connects the ...

) was an

Estonia Estonia, officially the Republic of Estonia, is a country in Northern Europe. It is bordered to the north by the Gulf of Finland across from Finland, to the west by the Baltic Sea across from Sweden, to the south by Latvia, and to the east by Ru ...

n linguist. From 1896 until 1899, he studied at the

University of Tartu The University of Tartu (UT; ; ) is a public research university located in the city of Tartu, Estonia. It is the national university of Estonia. It is also the largest and oldest university in the country.

; he initially studied religion and thereafter nature sciences. From 1920 until 1938, he taught at the University of Tartu. In 1946 he became a member of

Estonian Academy of Sciences Founded in 1938, the Estonian Academy of Sciences (, ) is Estonia's national academy of science in Tallinn. As with other national academies, it is an independent group of well-known scientists whose stated aim is to promote research and develo ...

. From 1946 to 1968, he was the chair of the

Mother Tongue Society Mother Tongue Society () is an Estonian organization that focuses on topics related to the Estonian language. The organization was established on 23 March 1920 at Tartu University. Today, the organization is located in Tallinn. The organization i ...

. His activity was primarily related to developing Estonian language

terminology Terminology is a group of specialized words and respective meanings in a particular field, and also the study of such terms and their use; the latter meaning is also known as terminology science. A ''term'' is a word, Compound (linguistics), com ...

and Estonian

language planning In sociolinguistics, language planning (also known as language engineering) is a deliberate effort to influence the function, structure or acquisition of languages or language varieties within a speech community.Kaplan B., Robert, and Rich ...

. In total, he was an editor or compiler of 30 specialised dictionaries (all of them consist of about 150,000 terms).

Awards

* 1938:

Order of the White Star The Order of the White Star (; ) was instituted in 1936. The Order of the White Star is bestowed on Estonian citizens and foreigners to give recognition for services rendered to the Estonian state. Design Classes The Order of the White Star ...

, Third Class

References

1873 births 1968 deaths Linguists from Estonia Recipients of the Order of the White Star, 3rd Class University of Tartu alumni Academic staff of the University of Tartu People from Jõgeva Parish {{Estonia-academic-bio-stub