BRIGGS, John. Madapollam, Madras 18.9.1785 — Burgess Hill, Sussex 27.4.1875. British Colonial Officer and Oriental Scholar, 1801-35 in India. Son of physician James (or John?) Briggs (1758–1830) and Martha Pybus (1758–1788), came to England 1789. Educated at Eton 1794-99. From 1801 in Madras infantry, participated in both Maratha wars. In…
BRIGGS, Henry George. Bombay 20.10.1824 — Bombay 4.7.1872. British Merchant, Traveller, and Orientalist. Son of Henry Briggs. In 1843 travelled in South Africa, in 1845 in China. In 1846 settled at the office of Briggs & Co. in Bombay. For a while lived in Karachi (1854/55), then from 1856 Assistant…
BRIGEL, Johann Jakob. Erpfingen, Württemberg 4.12.1832 — Engstlatt 4.12.1887. Rev. German Missionary in India. Son of Tobias Brigel and Anna Margarethe Walter (1800–1883). He belonged to Basel Mission in Mangalore and spent 16 years in India. Retired in 1875 and became minister in his native Württemberg. Married 1862 Johanna Sophia…
BRIESS, Erwin Eduard. Olmütz (Olomouc), Moravia 9.5.1886 — 1946. Austrian (Moravian) Journalist and former Student of Indology in Switzerland. Swiss citizen. Grew up in Zürich, where family moved when he was two years old. Studies of Oriental Philology at Vienna, Ph.D. 1912. Returned to Zürich in 1913 and was working…
BRENNAND, William. Clitheroe, Lancastershire 1818? — Wellington, Somerset ?.2.1897. British Teacher in India, Principal of Dacca College (1856). In 1896 had already been 23 years in retirement, living in Somerset. Married 1846 Iris Twisden (1827–1893), two daughters and one son. Apparently he claims a common Central Asian origin for the…
BRELOER, Bernhard. Herne, Westfalen 8.11.1894 — Tbilisi 20.4.1947. German Indologist. Professor in Berlin. Son of mill owner Bernhard Breloer (1865–1933) and Auguste Lueg. Participated in the WW I. Studied a brief time at Jena, then at Bonn (under Jacobi and Kirfel) and Munich (W. Geiger) Indology, also classical philology, and…
BREEKS, Susan Maria (née Denison). Woolwich, Kent 16.3.1841 — Brough, Cumbria 22.4.1923. Britishwoman in India, from 1863 wife of —> James Wilkinson Breeks (1830–1872). Daughter of Colonel Sir William Thomas Denison (1804–1871), who was then Governor of Madras (1861-66), and Caroline Hornby, marriage 1863. After her husband’s death in 1872…
BREEKS, James Wilkinson. Warcop, Westmoreland 5.3.1830 — Ootacamund 7.6.1872. British Civil Servant and Ethnologist in India. Son of Richard Breeks (1799–1849) and Elizabeth Wilkinson (1799–1870), educated at Haileybury. Arrived at Madras in 1849, served in revenue and financial departments. In 1861-64 Private Secretary to Governor William Denison (whose daughter he…
BRÉAL, Michel-Jules-Alfred (born Michael Bréal). Landau (Pfalz) 26.3.1832 — Paris 25.11.1915. French IE scholar. Professor in Paris. Son of Auguste Bréal (1789–1839), a French-Jewish lawyer, and Caroline Worms (1803–1876). Educated in Wissembourg, Metz and Paris (Lycée Louis-le-Grand), then 1852-55 at École normale supérieure. Teacher in Strasbourg (1855) and Paris (Louis-le-Grand,…
BRAY, Denys de Saumarez. Aberdeen 29.11.1875 — Winchester 19.11.1951. Sir. British Civil Servant in India, a Scholar of Baluchistan and its Languages (Brahui). Son of Rev. Thomas William Bray (1840–1887) and Rachel Le Mesurier (d. 1927). Educated at the Realgymnasium in Stuttgart and Blundell’s School in Tiverton (Devon), then studies…