BERTRAND, François-Marie, l’abbé. Fontainebleau (Seine-et-Marne) 26.10. 1807 — Versailles 30.1.1881. French Indologist (Hindi scholar) and Catholic priest. Studies at Seminaire St.Sulpice in Versailles. Served long time as minister in Herblay, 1837-56, then canon in Versailles. His opinions were heavily criticized by the conservatives, and he was generally wary of letting…
BERTHOLET(-SCHMID), Alfred Robert Felix. Basel 9.11.1868 — Münsterlingen, Thurgau 24.8.1951. Swiss Reformed Theologian and Scholar of Comparative Religion in Germany. Professor in Göttingen and Berlin. Son of David Bertholet, a school director, and Sabine Wagner. Studies of Theology at Basel, also briefly at Strasbourg and Berlin (under B. Duhm). From…
BERNSTEIN, Georg Heinrich. Cospeda near Jena 12.1.1787 — Lauban, Silesia (now Lubań, Poland) 5.4.1860. German Oriental (mainly Syriac) Scholar, also interested in Sanskrit. Professor in Breslau. School and from 1806 studies, theology and Semitic languages, in Jena, from 1811 PD there. From 1812 ao. Professor at Berlin, from 1820 ord.…
BERNOULLI, Johann. Basel 4.11.1744 — Berlin-Köpenick 13.7.1807. Swiss Scientist interested in India. Born in the family of famous mathematicians, himself a noted astronomer and called Johann III as the third scholar of this name in the family (his father was Johann II [1710–1790], mother Susanna König [1715–1803]). Studies of law…
GIUSEPPE MARIA DA GARGNANO (Iosephus Maria a Gargnano; lay Bernardino Bernini). Gargnano near Brescia (then Venetian Republic) 2.9.1709 (hardly 1711) — Bettia in Bihar Terai 15.1.1761. Count. Italian Missionary in Tibet. Son of Count Giuseppe De Bernini and Giovanna De’ Bettoni, partly grew up in Vienna. Joined the Capuchin order…
BERNIER, François. Joué-Étiau (Maine-et-Loire) 26.9.1620 — Dauphine (or Paris?) 22.9.1688. French Physician and Traveller in India. Spent twelve years (1656-68) in India, and was eight years physician at the Mughal court. Son of Pierre Bernier, one of the foremost tenants of the chapter of Angers, and Andrée Grimault. He lost…
BERNHEIMER, Carlo. Leghorn 3.9.1877 — 1966. Italian (Jewish) Indologist and Palaeographist. From Leghorn, studies at Bologna (Pullé), graduated 1896/97. Taught from 1906 as Docent of Sanskrit at University of Bologna, also taught palaeography, dismissed in 1938 because of Fascist racial laws, restored 1945. Stopped publication after the heavy criticism of…
BERNHARD, Franz. Schweidnitz in Silesia (now Świdnica in Poland) 31.5.1931 — Mustang/Nepal 5.9. 1971. German Indologist. Professor in Hamburg. Son of a butcher from Silesia. Studiedin 1952-60 at Göttingen classical philology, Indology (under W. Thomas and Waldschmidt), IE, and even Finno-Ugric philology. Ph.D. 1958 Göttingen. In 1956-60 worked at Tübingen…
BERNET KEMPERS, August Johan. ’s-Hertogenbosch 7.10.1906 — Arnhem 2.5.1992. Dutch Art Historian and South-East Asian Scholar, long time in Indonesia. Son of Karel Jan Willem Bernet Kempers, a notary, and Anna den Doesschate. After school in Middelburg studies of Indo-Iranian and Indonesian from 1926 at Leiden, Ph.D. 1933 (under Krom).…
BERNER, Vil’gel’m Mihajlovič. v Baranovič, Minskoj gub. (now in Belarus) 1903 — Leningrad 1958. Russian Indologist. After school from 1917 apprenticed in north-western railway, in 1920 volunteer in Red Army and member of Communist Party. In 1922-26 machinist in Soviet Navy, 1926-29 fireman in the factory Krasnaja Zarja, Leningrad, 1929-31…