KENNEDY, James. 1842 — 20.6.1920. British (Scottish) Indologist and Historian of India. Born in North India as son of Rev. James K. (1815–1899), a missionary in Benares and Kumaon, and Margaret Walker. Educated at Edinburgh High School and University. After studies he joined the I.C.S. and from 1863 served in the United Provinces of Agra and Oudh. From 1884 Magistrate and Collector. Retired early in 1890 and returned to the U.K. In 1904-17 and 1919 treasurer of R.A.S. Suffered long time of an eye disease. He lectured about India at University College in London.
Kennedy was much interested in Asian, especially Indian, history, religions, geography and trade, and wrote a number of useful articles about them.
Publications: “The Early Commerce of Babylon with India – 700–300 B.C.”, JRAS 1898, 241-288.
– “Buddhist Gnosticism, the System of Basilides”, JRAS 1902, 377-415; Review of Medlycott, Ap. Thomas 1905, JRAS 1906, 1020-1029; “The Child Krishna, Christianity, and the Gujars”, JRAS 1907, 951-991; “The Child Krishna and his Critics”, JRAS 1908, 505-521; “The Gospels of the Infancy. The Lalita Vistara and the Vishnu Purana: or the Transmission of religious Legends between India and the West”, JRAS 1917, 209-243 & 469-540.
– “The Indians in Armenia, 130 B.C. — 300 A.D.”, JRAS 1904, 309-314; “Seres or Cheras?”, JRAS 1904, 359-362; “A Passage in the Periplus”, JRAS 1913, 127-130; “Some notes on the Periplus of the Erythræan Sea”, JRAS 1916, 829-837; “Eastern kings contemporary with the Periplus”, JRAS 1918, 106-114.
– “The Secret of Kanishka”, JRAS 1912, 665-688 & 981-1019, further artricles on Kanishka in JRAS 1913, 121-124, 369-378 & 664-669; “Heraus ὁ τύραννος”, JRAS 1913, 124-127; “The Later Kushanas”, JRAS 1913, 1054-1064.
– “The Aryan invasion of Northern India”, JRAS 1919, 493-529 & 1920, 31-48.
– Articles on serpent worship (1891), early Aryans (JRAS 1909, 1915), Anglo-Indian Novelists and Hinduism, tendencies of Hinduism, Indian education, etc. Chapter of “Medieval History of India” in the Imperial Gazetteer and a history of the N.W.P. in the British Empire Series.
Sources: F.E. Pargiter, JRAS 1920, 395f.; Buckland, Dictionary.
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