Otto Donner (15 December 1835,
Kokkola
Kokkola (; sv, Karleby, ) is a town and municipality of Finland.
The town is located in the Central Ostrobothnia region. The town has a population of () and covers an area of of which is water. The population density is . Neighbour municipali ...
– 17 September 1909,
Helsinki
Helsinki ( or ; ; sv, Helsingfors, ) is the Capital city, capital, primate city, primate, and List of cities and towns in Finland, most populous city of Finland. Located on the shore of the Gulf of Finland, it is the seat of the region of U ...
) was a
Finnish
Finnish may refer to:
* Something or someone from, or related to Finland
* Culture of Finland
* Finnish people or Finns, the primary ethnic group in Finland
* Finnish language, the national language of the Finnish people
* Finnish cuisine
See also ...
linguist and politician.
Biography
He was professor of
Sanskrit
Sanskrit (; attributively , ; nominally , , ) is a classical language belonging to the Indo-Aryan languages, Indo-Aryan branch of the Indo-European languages. It arose in South Asia after its predecessor languages had Trans-cultural diffusion ...
and Comparative
Indo-European
The Indo-European languages are a language family native to the overwhelming majority of Europe, the Iranian plateau, and the northern Indian subcontinent. Some European languages of this family, English, French, Portuguese, Russian, Du ...
linguistics at the
University of Helsinki
The University of Helsinki ( fi, Helsingin yliopisto, sv, Helsingfors universitet, abbreviated UH) is a public research university located in Helsinki, Finland since 1829, but founded in the city of Turku (in Swedish ''Åbo'') in 1640 as the R ...
, but also studied the
Finno-Ugric languages
Finno-Ugric ( or ; ''Fenno-Ugric'') or Finno-Ugrian (''Fenno-Ugrian''), is a traditional grouping of all languages in the Uralic language family except the Samoyedic languages. Its formerly commonly accepted status as a subfamily of Uralic is ...
. He was a member of the
Diet of Finland
The Diet of Finland ( Finnish ''Suomen maapäivät'', later ''valtiopäivät''; Swedish ''Finlands Lantdagar''), was the legislative assembly of the Grand Duchy of Finland from 1809 to 1906 and the recipient of the powers of the Swedish Ri ...
1877–1905, and
minister of education 1905–1908. He was also influential in the founding of the
Finno-Ugrian Society in 1883.
He was elected as a member of the
American Philosophical Society
The American Philosophical Society (APS), founded in 1743 in Philadelphia, is a scholarly organization that promotes knowledge in the sciences and humanities through research, professional meetings, publications, library resources, and communit ...
in 1886.
His
mother tongue
A first language, native tongue, native language, mother tongue or L1 is the first language or dialect that a person has been exposed to from birth or within the critical period. In some countries, the term ''native language'' or ''mother tong ...
was
Swedish
Swedish or ' may refer to:
Anything from or related to Sweden, a country in Northern Europe. Or, specifically:
* Swedish language, a North Germanic language spoken primarily in Sweden and Finland
** Swedish alphabet, the official alphabet used by ...
, but he was a
fennoman
The Fennoman movement or Fennomania was a Finnish nationalist movement in the 19th-century Grand Duchy of Finland, built on the work of the ''fennophile'' interests of the 18th and early-19th centuries.
History
After the Crimean War, Fennoma ...
by conviction. He had many children:
Ossian
Ossian (; Irish Gaelic/Scottish Gaelic: ''Oisean'') is the narrator and purported author of a cycle of epic poems published by the Scottish poet James Macpherson, originally as ''Fingal'' (1761) and ''Temora'' (1763), and later combined unde ...
, Otto Jr., Uno,
Kai, Harry and Eva Louise.
[
He is buried in the ]Hietaniemi Cemetery
The Hietaniemi cemetery ( fi, Hietaniemen hautausmaa, sv, Sandudds begravningsplats) is located mainly in the Lapinlahti quarter and partly in the Etu-Töölö district of Helsinki, the capital of Finland. It is the location for Finnish state fu ...
in Helsinki.
See also
*Donner family
The Donner family is one of the renowned and wealthy Finland-Swedish families that grew in importance during the times of the Grand Duchy of Finland. Family members have been influential in Finnish politics and culture.
* Jürgen Donner (died c. ...
*
Otto Donner in 375 humanists – 26 April 2015. Faculty of Arts, University of Helsinki.
'
Footnotes
1835 births
1909 deaths
People from Kokkola
People from Vaasa Province (Grand Duchy of Finland)
Donner family
Finnish people of German descent
Young Finnish Party politicians
Finnish senators
Members of the Diet of Finland
Linguists from Finland
Academic staff of the University of Helsinki
Burials at Hietaniemi Cemetery
{{Finland-linguist-stub
Members of the American Philosophical Society
Swedish-speaking Finns