Otto von Böhtlingk (russian: Оттон Николаевич Бётлингк, ''Otton Nikolayevich Byotlingk''; 30 May 1815 – 1 April 1904) 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, ''magnum opus'' (), or ''chef-d’œuvre'' (; ; ) in modern use 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, ...

'' was a Sanskrit-German dictionary.

Biography

He was born in

Saint Petersburg Saint Petersburg ( rus, links=no, Санкт-Петербург, a=Ru-Sankt Peterburg Leningrad Petrograd Piter.ogg, r=Sankt-Peterburg, p=ˈsankt pʲɪtʲɪrˈburk), formerly known as Petrograd (1914–1924) and later Leningrad (1924–1991), i ...

, Russia. His German ancestors migrated to Russia from

Lübeck Lübeck (; Low German also ), officially the Hanseatic City of Lübeck (german: Hansestadt Lübeck), is a city in Northern Germany. With around 217,000 inhabitants, Lübeck is the second-largest city on the German Baltic coast and in the state ...

in 1713. Having studied (1833–1835) Oriental languages, particularly

Arabic Arabic (, ' ; , ' or ) is a Semitic language spoken primarily across the Arab world.Semitic languages: an international handbook / edited by Stefan Weninger; in collaboration with Geoffrey Khan, Michael P. Streck, Janet C. E.Watson; Walter ...

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 (; attributively , ; nominally , , ) is a classical language belonging to the Indo-Aryan branch of the Indo-European languages. It arose in South Asia after its predecessor languages had diffused there from the northwest in the late ...

, at the

University of Saint Petersburg A university () is an institution of higher (or tertiary) education and research which awards academic degrees in several academic disciplines. Universities typically offer both undergraduate and postgraduate programs. In the United States, th ...

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

Bonn The federal city of Bonn ( lat, Bonna) is a city on the banks of the Rhine in the German state of North Rhine-Westphalia, with a population of over 300,000. About south-southeast of Cologne, Bonn is in the southernmost part of the Rhine-Ru ...

. 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), 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 ...

elected him an international Member. In 1868 he settled at

Jena Jena () is a German city 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 inhabitants, while the city itself has a po ...

, and in 1885 moved to

Leipzig Leipzig ( , ; Upper Saxon: ) is the most populous city in the German state of Saxony. Leipzig's population of 605,407 inhabitants (1.1 million in the larger urban zone) as of 2021 places the city as Germany's eighth most populous, as ...

, 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 and written historical sources; it is the intersection of textual criticism, literary criticism, history, and linguistics (with especially strong ties to etymology). Philology is also defined as th ...

. His first great work was a translation of the Sanskrit

grammar In linguistics, the grammar of a natural language is its set of structural constraints on speakers' or writers' composition of clauses, phrases, and words. The term can also refer to the study of such constraints, a field that includes domain ...

of Panini, , with a German

commentary Commentary or commentaries may refer to: Publications * ''Commentary'' (magazine), a U.S. public affairs journal, founded in 1945 and formerly published by the American Jewish Committee * Caesar's Commentaries (disambiguation), a number of works ...

, 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 linguist known for extensive and pioneering comparative work on Indo-European languages. Early life Bopp was born in Mainz, but the political disarray in the Republic of Mai ...

'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 (; sa, उपनिषद् ) are late Vedic Sanskrit texts that supplied the basis of later Hindu philosophy.Wendy Doniger (1990), ''Textual Sources for the Study of Hinduism'', 1st Edition, University of Chicago Press, , ...

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

Brihadaranyaka The ''Brihadaranyaka Upanishad'' ( sa, बृहदारण्यक उपनिषद्, ) is one of the Principal Upanishads and one of the first Upanishadic scriptures of Hinduism. A key scripture to various schools of Hinduism, the ''Bri ...

'' (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 Rudolf von Roth (born Walter Rudolph Roth, 3 April 1821 – 23 June 1895) was a German Indologist, founder of the Vedic philology. His chief work is a monumental Sanskrit dictionary, compiled in collaboration with Otto von Böhtlingk. Biography R ...

(d. 1895) and Albrecht Weber (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 for brevity, is traditionally divided by Sanskrit grammarians into three qualities, ''udātta'' उदात्त "raised" (acute accent, high pitch), ''anudātta'' अनुदात्त "not ...

, ''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, ''

Kāvyādarśa The Kavyadarsha ( sa, काव्यादर्श, ) 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, ...

'' (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). It has been suggested that, during the 1860s, Böhtlingk pointed out the periodic nature of the

alphabet to the Russian chemist Dmitry Mendeleev and thereby helped him in the formulation of the periodic table. 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), culminati ...

and to the Sanskrit grammarian

Pāṇini , era = ;;6th–5th century BCE , region = Indian philosophy , main_interests = Grammar, linguistics , notable_works = ' ( Classical Sanskrit) , influenced= , notable_ideas=Descriptive linguistics (Devanaga ...

Bibliography

*with Rudolph Roth
''Sanskrit-Wörterbuch''

1855–1875.
''Sanskrit-Wörterbuch in kürzerer Fassung''
1879–1889, reprint Buske Verlag, 1998, 2003, *''Panini's Grammatik'' 1887, reprint 1998 *''Indische Sprüche'' 3 volumes, Saint Petersburg, Akad. d. Wissenschaften, 1863–65. *''Sanskrit-Chrestomathie'', reprinted 1967.

Notes

References

;Attribution *

External links