John Watson McCrindle (16 May 1825 - 16 July 1913, West Cliff-on-Sea) was a Scottish classical philologist and educator who wrote several major works on references to India in ancient classical writings.

Life

McCrindle was the son of John McCrindle and was born near

Maybole Maybole (, ) is a town and former burgh of barony and police burgh in South Ayrshire, Scotland. It had an estimated population of in . It is situated south of Ayr and southwest of Glasgow by the Glasgow and South Western Railway. The town is ...

, Ayrshire and went to the

University of Edinburgh The University of Edinburgh (, ; abbreviated as ''Edin.'' in Post-nominal letters, post-nominals) is a Public university, public research university based in Edinburgh, Scotland. Founded by the City of Edinburgh Council, town council under th ...

where he received the Stratton Gold Medal in 1853. He graduated BA in 1854 and MA in 1855 and taught for a while in Edinburgh schools before moving to India in 1859 to become Principal of the Doveton College in Calcutta. He became a professor at Patna College and later at Krishnagar College. He became the first principal of Patna College from 1867 and retired in 1880. He founded a school for girls in Patna. He wrote a number of works (first in the ''Indian Antiquary'' and later as books) on ancient India as described in the works of

Ctesias Ctesias ( ; ; ), also known as Ctesias of Cnidus, was a Greek physician and historian from the town of Cnidus in Caria, then part of the Achaemenid Empire. Historical events Ctesias, who lived in the fifth century BC, was physician to the Acha ...

, Megasthenes and Arrian; the ''Periplus Maris Erythraei'' ("Coastal Cruise of the Red Sea");

Ptolemy Claudius Ptolemy (; , ; ; – 160s/170s AD) was a Greco-Roman mathematician, astronomer, astrologer, geographer, and music theorist who wrote about a dozen scientific treatises, three of which were important to later Byzantine science, Byzant ...

's geography of India and the invasion of India by

Alexander the Great Alexander III of Macedon (; 20/21 July 356 BC – 10/11 June 323 BC), most commonly known as Alexander the Great, was a king of the Ancient Greece, ancient Greek kingdom of Macedonia (ancient kingdom), Macedon. He succeeded his father Philip ...

References

External links

Ancient India as described in classical literature (1901)

Ancient India as described by Ptolemy (1885)

Ancient India as described by Ktesias the Knidian (1882)

Commerce and navigation of the Erythraean sea (1879)

Ancient India as described by Megasthenes and Arrian (1877)
{{DEFAULTSORT:McCrindle, J. W. 19th-century British historians Alumni of the University of Edinburgh 1825 births 1913 deaths Historians of India Scottish Indologists Ancient Greece–Ancient India relations