POBOŻNIAK, Tadeusz. Cracow 1910 — 26.1.1991 (when 80). Polish Indologist and Gipsy Scholar. Professor in Cracow. Born in a poor family, his father served in City Council guard.Educated in Cracow. Studied at Cracow IE (under Rozwadowski) and Germanic, then also Sanskrit under Willman-Grabowska. M.A. 1938 with a diss. on conjunctive in the Atharvaveda. In 1938-48 Assistant to Willman-Grabowska (with a long interruption during the war). Ph.D. 1948 Cracow. As the chair of Sanskrit was closed in 1948 Pobożniak prepared his habilitation in linguisticsdepartment and taught many years there. In 1973 he was finally allowed to reestablish Indian studies at Cracow. Formally retired in 1975, but continued teaching also after his retirement. Mainly taught Sanskrit, Hindi and Avesta. Several visits to India. He was twice married, the first wife was a gipsy and killed by Nazis in Birkenau, then with Anna P., children.

Among his students only P. Piekarski could complete his doctorate with Pobożniak, but several young Indologists started under him (i.al. A. Kuczkiewicz-Fraś, H. Marlewicz and L. Sudyka)and warmly remember him.

Publications: Diss. Instrumentalis w Gatha. Manuscript 1948 (in Polish, publ. in SpPAU 1952); hab.diss. Grammar of the Lowari dialect. 79 p. Prace Komisji Orientalistycznej 3. Cracow 1964.

– “Liquid sounds in the Gypsy language”, RO 15, 1949, 357-370; “The Instrumental in Gatha”, FO 7, 1964, 119-171; “The origin of comparison of adjectives in Hindi”, FO 11, 1969 (1970), 235-238; “Das System der Zahlwörter im Hindi”, Studien zur allg. u. vgl. Sprachwiss. Jena 1976; “Sanskrit and the Romani language”, IT 3-4, 1977, 397-401; “Die Causativa in der Hindi-Sprache”, FO 20, 1979, 5-21; “Exponents of Plural in Hindi Declension”, FO 24, 1987, 213-217.

– “Mṛcchakaṭikā as a drama of individual characters”, IT 6, 1978, 251-253; “Problem of dream in Milinda-Panha”, Sternbach Vol. Lucknow 1979, 675-678; “Genesis of Milinda-Panha”, W. Morgenroth (ed.), Sanskrit and World Culture. B. 1979, 508-510.

– Liczebnik w hindi. 1960; Cyganie. Kraków 1972; many articles in Polish.

– Transl. into Polish the Mṛcchakaṭikā. It was staged in two theatres (in Wrocław and Cracow), under name Wasantasena, publ. posthumously, Gliniany Wózeczek. Dramat sanskrycki napisany przez Śudrake. Ed. by H. Marlewicz  and L. Sudyka. 236 p. Cracow 2004.

– Transl. Milindapañha. unpublished.

– Tadeusz Pobożniak (1910-1991). Selected articles. Ed. by Agnieszka Kuczkiewicz-Fraś & Halina Marlewicz. 128 p. Cracow Indological Studies 3. Cracow 2001 (7 articles in English and one in German reedited, bibliography of TB).

Sources: P. Piekarski, Cracow Indological Studies 1, 1995, 13f. & 3, 2001, 9-13 (bibliography ibid. 123-127); oral reminiscences of Cracovian colleagues; photo in L. Sudyka, Orientalia Commemorativa. Cracow 2011.