LEITNER, Gottlieb Wilhelm. Pest 14(17?).10.1840 — Bonn 22.3.1899. Austro-Hungarian Indologist and Anthropologist in the U.K. and India. Professor in Lahore. Son of Leopold Saphir, a physician, of Austrian Jewish family living in Hungary. Father died early and his mother, Marie Henriette Herzberg, remarried Johann Moritz Leitner (a Protestant Christian) and…
LE GENTIL DE LA GALAISSIÈRE, Guillaume-Joseph-Hyacinthe-Jean-Baptiste. Coutances (Manche) 12.9.1725 — Paris 22.10.1792. French Astronomer and Traveller, in India 1768–71. Instead of the planned career in church, but turned to astronomy. Left for India in 1760 in order to observe the transit of Venus in 1761, but missed the occasion because…
LEBEDEV, Gerasim Stepanovič (Herasim Lebedeff). Jaroslavl 1749 (not 1746) — St.Petersburg 15.7.(27.7.)1817. Russian Musician, Traveller and Pioneer of Indology. Son of Stepan L. and his wife Paraskov’a. Father was a poor Orthodox clergyman, who did not allow him to obtain higher education. The family moved to St.Petersburg, where he studied…
LAUFER, Berthold. Köln 11.10.1874 — Chicago 13.9.1934. German Sinologist and Anthropologist in the U.S.A. Son of Max L. (of Jewish background) and Eugenie Schlesinger, his younger brother was —> Heinrich L. After gymnasium in Cologne studied at Berlin, first law, but soon ethnology and Oriental languages, then at Leipzig under…
KNOX, Robert. London 8.2.1641 — Wimbledon, London 19.6.1720. British (Scottish) Traveller. In South Asia in 1657-94 (1659-79 prisoner in Ceylon). Son of Robert Knox, a Puritan and commander in E.I.C.’s service. Grew up in Wimbledon, Surrey. After mother’s death sailed with his father in January 1657 to Fort George. On…
KLEMENC (Klementz), Dmitrij Aleksandrovič. Gorjaino, gub. Samara 14.12.1848 — Moscow 8.1.1914. Russian Central Asian Scholar and Traveller. Born in a land owner family belonging to minor nobility. Educated in Samara and Kazan, studies at physico-mathematical faculties at Kazan and from 1870 at St.Petersburg. In his youth he was a noted…
KLAPROTH, Heinrich Julius von. Berlin 11.10.1783 — Paris 28.8.1835. German Oriental Scholar in Russia and France. Son of the mineralogist and chemist Martin-Heinrich Klaproth (1743–1817) and Christine Sophie Lehmann (d. 1803). Gymnasium in Berlin. As a fifteen years old schoolboy he started the study of Chinese from Bayer’s book. From…
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…
KEPHALAS, Nikolaos (Nicola Chiefala; Νικόλαος Κεφαλᾶς). Zakynthos 1763 or 1770 — Constaninople 1847 or Thessaloniki 1850. Greek Traveller in India. Born in a noble, but poor family in Zakynthos, Ionian Islands, then Venetian domain. Captain, participated in the Greek revolution from its very beginning (but also said to have been…
HUTH, Georg. Krotoschin, Posen (now Krotoszyn in Poland) 25.2.1867 — Berlin 1.6.1906. German Indologist and Tibetologist. Born in a Jewish family in the then Prussian part of Poland, where his father Aron Huth (d. 1893) was Rector of a Jewish school, mother Keile Pincus (thus Vogel & ancestry.com, Knüppel has…