AUTRAN, Charles. Saint-Estèphe (Gironde) 29.10.1879 — 17.8.1952. French Oriental Scholar. Son of Fréderick Autran. After studies in France (?) and at Institute d’archéologie orientale in Cairo he became Professor at Faculté des lettres, University of Aix-en-Provence. In the early 1920s there, but in 1926 seems to be living in Paris.

Eagerly and with little criticism he was looking for ancient connections. His great thesis was that Phoenicians were not Semitic, but Dravidian, originally migrated from Kerala. Several Greek names (e.g. Astypalaia) were explained as Indian.

Publications: “Phéniciens.” Essai de contribution à l’histoire antique de la Méditerranée. 15+146 p. P. 1920; La Grèce et l’Orient ancien. 218  p. Babyloniaca 8. P. 1924; Sumerien et indo-européen, l’aspect morphologique de la question. 198 p. P. 1925; Homère et les origines sacerdotales de l’épopée grecque. 1-3. P. 1938-43; etc.

– Mithra, Zoroastre et la préhistoire aryenne du christianisme. 279 p. P. 1935.

– L’épopée indoue, étude de l’arrière-fonds ethnographique et religieux. 408 p. P. 1946 (on the Mbh); Phoinikes et dravidiens. Fasc. 1-7. P. 1937-39.

Sources: J. Filliozat, review of three writings by A. in JA 230, 1938, 672-675; Catal. général de la librairie française 29, 1919-21 & 31, 1921-25; works in the N.U.C.; not in the Arch. biogr. fr.