Wilhelm Ludwig Geiger (; ; 21 July 1856 – 2 September 1943) was a German Orientalist in the fields of

Indo-Iranian languages The Indo-Iranian languages (also known as Indo-Iranic languages or collectively the Aryan languages) constitute the largest branch of the Indo-European language family. They include over 300 languages, spoken by around 1.7 billion speakers ...

and the history of

Iran Iran, officially the Islamic Republic of Iran (IRI) and also known as Persia, is a country in West Asia. It borders Iraq to the west, Turkey, Azerbaijan, and Armenia to the northwest, the Caspian Sea to the north, Turkmenistan to the nort ...

and

Sri Lanka Sri Lanka, officially the Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka, also known historically as Ceylon, is an island country in South Asia. It lies in the Indian Ocean, southwest of the Bay of Bengal, separated from the Indian subcontinent, ...

. He was known as a specialist in

Pali Pāli (, IAST: pāl̤i) is a Classical languages of India, classical Middle Indo-Aryan languages, Middle Indo-Aryan language of the Indian subcontinent. It is widely studied because it is the language of the Buddhist ''Pali Canon, Pāli Can ...

Sinhala language Sinhala ( ; Sinhala: , , ), sometimes called Sinhalese ( ), is an Indo-Aryan language primarily spoken by the Sinhalese people of Sri Lanka, who make up the largest ethnic group on the island, numbering about 16 million. It is also the first ...

and the

Dhivehi Dhivehi, also spelled Divehi, is the main language, used in the Maldive Islands. This may refer to: *Dhivehi people, an ethnic group native to the historic region of the Maldive Islands *Dhivehi language, an Indo-Aryan language predominantly spoke ...

language of the

Maldives The Maldives, officially the Republic of Maldives, and historically known as the Maldive Islands, is an Archipelagic state, archipelagic country in South Asia located in the Indian Ocean. The Maldives is southwest of Sri Lanka and India, abou ...

. He is especially known for his work on the Sri Lankan chronicles

Mahāvaṃsa ''Mahāvaṃsa'' (Sinhala: මහාවංශ (Mahāvansha), Pali: ''මහාවංස (Mahāvaṃsa)'') is the meticulously kept historical chronicle of Sri Lanka until the period of Mahasena of Anuradhapura. It was written in the style of ...

and Cūlavaṃsa and made critical editions of the Pali text and English translations with the help of assistant translators.

Life

He was born in

Nuremberg Nuremberg (, ; ; in the local East Franconian dialect: ''Nämberch'' ) is the Franconia#Towns and cities, largest city in Franconia, the List of cities in Bavaria by population, second-largest city in the States of Germany, German state of Bav ...

, the son of an evangelical clergyman, and was educated especially at the

University of Erlangen-Nuremberg A university () is an institution of tertiary education and research which awards academic degrees in several academic disciplines. ''University'' is derived from the Latin phrase , which roughly means "community of teachers and scholars". Univ ...

under the scholar

Friedrich von Spiegel Friedrich (von) Spiegel (11 July 1820 in Kitzingen – 15 December 1905 in München) was a German orientalist. He was one of the pioneers in the field of Iranian philology, and as such a major influence on the works of German 19th century phi ...

. During his studies, he joined the fraternity Uttenruthia. After completing his

Ph.D. A Doctor of Philosophy (PhD, DPhil; or ) is a terminal degree that usually denotes the highest level of academic achievement in a given discipline and is awarded following a course of graduate study and original research. The name of the deg ...

thesis in 1878, he became a lecturer on ancient Iranian and Indian philology and then a master at a gymnasium. In 1891 he was offered a chair in Indo-European Comparative Philology at the University of Erlangen, succeeding Spiegel. His first published works were on ancient Iranian history, archaeology and philology. He travelled to

Ceylon Sri Lanka, officially the Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka, also known historically as Ceylon, is an island country in South Asia. It lies in the Indian Ocean, southwest of the Bay of Bengal, separated from the Indian subcontinent, ...

in 1895 to study the language.He appeared on a stamp in

, in 1989 (se
Goethe-Institut Sri Lanka
. He died in

Neubiberg Neubiberg is a municipality south-east of Munich, Germany, founded in 1912. It is part of the Munich district of Upper Bavaria. It used to have a military airport that was used as a Luftwaffe base in the Third Reich. After the war, it served as a ...

. Among his children were included the physicist

Hans Geiger Johannes Wilhelm Geiger ( , ; ; 30 September 1882 – 24 September 1945) was a German nuclear physicist. He is known as the inventor of the Geiger counter, a device used to detect ionizing radiation, and for carrying out the Rutherford scatt ...

, inventor of the

Geiger counter A Geiger counter (, ; also known as a Geiger–Müller counter or G-M counter) is an electronic instrument for detecting and measuring ionizing radiation with the use of a Geiger–Müller tube. It is widely used in applications such as radiat ...

, and the meteorologist Rudolf Geiger.

Works

English works and translations

* ''The Age of the

Avesta The Avesta (, Book Pahlavi: (), Persian language, Persian: ()) is the text corpus of Zoroastrian literature, religious literature of Zoroastrianism. All its texts are composed in the Avestan language and written in the Avestan alphabet. Mod ...

and

Zoroaster Zarathushtra Spitama, more commonly known as Zoroaster or Zarathustra, was an Iranian peoples, Iranian religious reformer who challenged the tenets of the contemporary Ancient Iranian religion, becoming the spiritual founder of Zoroastrianism ...

'', co-authored with Friedrich Spiegel, translated into English by Dārāb Dastur Peshotan Sanjānā, London 1886
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* ''Civilization of the eastern Iranians in ancient times, with an introduction on the Avesta religion'', translated into English by

Darab Dastur Peshotan Sanjana Darab Dastur Peshotan Sanjana (18 November 1857 – 5 August 1931) was an Indian scholar and Zoroastrian head-priest (Dastur). He is known for his translations of works from Central Asia, in languages including Bactrian, Pahlavi, and Avestan. ...

, London 1885–1886. * ''Zarathushtra in the Gathas, and in the Greek and Roman classics'', co-authored with Friedrich Heinrich Hugo Windischmann; translated into English by Dārāb Dastur Peshotan Sanjānā, Leipzig 1897. * ''The

Dīpavaṃsa The ''Dīpavaṃsa'' (दीपवंस, , "Chronicle of the Island") is the oldest historical record of Sri Lanka. The chronicle is believed to be compiled from Atthakatha and other sources around the 3rd to 4th century CE. Together with the ...

and Mahāvaṃsa and their historical development in Ceylon'', translated into English by Ethel M. Coomaraswamy, Colombo 1908
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* ''The Mahavāmsa or the Great Chronicle of Ceylon'', English translation assisted by Mabel Haynes Bode, Pali Text Society, London 1912
Internet Archive
* ''Maldivian Linguistic Studies'', Colombo 1919. * ''The Language of the Väddās'', Calcutta 1935. * ''A Grammar of the Sinhala language'', Colombo 1938. * ''Pali Literature and Language'', translated by Batakrishna Ghosh from the German original, Calcutta 1943. Revised by

K. R. Norman Kenneth Roy Norman (21 July 19255 November 2020) was a British Philology, philologist at the University of Cambridge and a leading authority on Pali and other Middle Indo-Aryan languages. Life Norman was born on 21 July 1925, and was educated ...

under the title ''A Pali Grammar'', Oxford 1994. * ''Cūlavamsa : being the more recent part of the Mahāvamsa'', English translation assisted by Christian Mabel Duff Rickmers, Colombo 1953. * ''Culture of Ceylon in mediaeval times'', edited by

Heinz Bechert Heinz Bechert (26 June 1932, Munich – 14 June 2005, Göttingen) was a German Indologist and Buddhologist. Life The son of lawyer Rudolf Bechert and his wife, Herta ( Bade), from 1965 to 2000, Heinz Bechert held the Chair of Indology at the ...

, Wiesbaden 1960.

German works

* ''Aogemadaêcâ: ein Pârsentractat in Pâzend, Altbaktrisch und Sanskrit.'' Erlangen, 1878
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* ''Das Yātkār-i Zarirān und sein Verhältnis zum Šāh-nāme'' he Yātkār-i Zarirān and its Relation to the Šāhnāme von W. Geiger. München: Druck der Akademischen Buchdrukerei von F. Straub. 1890 * ''Die Pehleviversion des Ersten Capitels des Vendîdâd herausgegeben nebst dem Versuch einer ersten Uebersetzung und Erklärung.'' Erlangen, 1877
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* ''Handbuch der Awestasprache. Grammatik, Chrestomathie und Glossar.'' Erlangen, 1879
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* ''Etymologie des Balūčī. Aus den Abhandlungen der k. bayer. Akademie der Wiss. I. Cl. XIX. Bd. I. Abth.'' München, 1890
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* ''Etymologie des Singhalesischen. Aus den Abhandlungen der k. bayer. Akademie der Wiss. I. Cl. XXI. Bd. II. Abth.'' München, 1897
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* ''Ceylon. Tagebuchblätter und Reiseerinnerungen.'' Wiesbaden, 1898
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* Wilhelm Geiger &

Ernst Kuhn Ernst Wilhelm Adalbert Kuhn (7 February 1846, in Berlin – 21 August 1920, in Munich) was a German Indologist and Indo-Europeanist. He was the son of philologist Adalbert Kuhn. He studied at the universities of Berlin and Tübingen, rece ...

(Hrsg.): ''Grundriß der iranischen Philologie.'' 1. Bd., 1. Abt., Straßburg 1895–1901
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; Anhang zum 1. Bd., Straßburg, 1903
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; II. Bd., Straßburg, 1896–1904
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* ''Litteratur und Sprache der Singhalesen.'' Straßburg, 1900
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* ''Dīpavamsa und Mahāvamsa, die beiden Chroniken der Insel Ceylon. Sonderabdruck aus der Festschrift der Universität Erlangen zur Feier des achtzigsten Geburtstages Sr. königlichen Hoheit des Prinzregenten Luitpold von Bayern.'' Erlangen & Leipzig, 1901
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* ''Dīpavaṃsa und Mahāvaṃsa und die geschichtliche Überlieferung in Ceylon'', Leipzig, 1905
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* Wilhelm Geiger & Magdalene Geiger: ''Pāli Dhamma vornehmlich in der kanonischen Literatur'', München, 1920. * Wilhelm Geiger: ''Elementarbuch des Sanskrit'', de Gruyter, Berlin und Leipzig, 1923. * Wilhelm Geiger: ''Besprechung zu Heinrich Junker, Arische Forschungen'', um 1930. * Wilhelm Geiger: ''Singhalesische Etymologien.'' Stephen Austin and Sons, 1936. * Wilhelm Geiger: ''Beiträge zur singhalesischen Sprachgeschichte'', Bayerischen Akad. der Wiss., München 1942. * Wilhelm Geiger: ''Kleine Schriften zur Indologie und Buddhismuskunde'', hrsg. von Heinz Bechert. Steiner, Wiesbaden 1973. * Wilhelm Geiger: ''Die Reden des Buddha: Gruppierte Sammlung, Saṃyutta-nikāya'', translation of Saṃyutta-nikāya, Beyerlein-Steinschulte, Stammbach, 1997.

Notes

External links