KETELAAR, Joan Josua (Johann Joshua K., Kettler, Kessler). Elbing, East Prussia (now Elbląg in Poland) 1659 — Bandar Abbas 1716. German Traveller. Son of Josua Kettler, a bookbinder, apprenticed to the same craft, but accused for stealing and attempted murder of his master had to escape to Stockholm. From 1682 in service of the Dutch E.I.C., in India, Indonesia and Persia until death. In 1711-12 he was Ambassador of the Dutch E.I.C. to the Great Mughals, then 1712-15 director of the Surat factory and in 1715-16 on a mission to Persian court, died on his way back. In 1698 in Lakhnau he wrote a Hindustani grammar, which was then translated into Latin by David Mill and published in Leiden in 1743.

Publications: Hindustani grammar in D. Mill, Disssertationes selectae. Lugd. Bat. 1743, 455-601.

– The journal of his embassy publ. in F. Valentijn’s Oud- en Nieuw Oost-Indiën. 4. 1726, 280-302; ed. by J.-Ph. Vogel, Journaal van J. J. Ketelaar’s hofreis naar den groot mogol te Lahore, 1711-1713. Linschoten Ver. 41. ’s-Gr. 1937; English translation “Embassy of Mr. Johan Joshua Ketelaar, Ambassador of the Dutch East India Company to the Great Moguls Shah ‘Alam Bahadur Shah and Jahandar Shah”, JPHS 10, 1929, 1-94.

Sources: *J.-Ph. Vogel, “J.J.K. of Elning, Author of the first Hindūstānī Grammas”, BSOS 8:2-3, 1936, 817-822; introduction to English journal in JPHS 10, 1929; http://bc.library.uu.nl/earliest-hindustani-grammar.html; Dutch Indology homepage.