LEES, William Nassau. Dublin County (Wikipedia) or Kilanny, co. Louth (Grokipedia & D.I.B.) 26.2.1825 — London 9.3.1889. British (Irish) Colonial Officer and Oriental Scholar in India, Specialist of Arabic, Persian and Hindustani. Fourth son of Sir Harcourt Lees, Bart. (1776–1852), a Protestant clergyman from Ireland, and Sophia Lyster, educated at…
LA VALLÉE POUSSIN, Louis Étienne Marie de. Liège 1.1.1869 — Brussels 18.2.1938. Belgian Indologist, a specialist of Buddhism and History. Professor in Ghent. Son of a French father, Gustave de La Vallée Poussin (1829–1910), and Belgian mother, Marie Pauline de Monge de Franeau (1845–1876), both of families with great scholarly…
LASSEN, Christian. Bergen 22.10.1800 — Bonn 8.5.1876. Norwegian Indologist in Germany. Professor in Bonn. Son of Nicolai Christian Vendelboe Lassen (1748–1818), a lawyer, and Frederikke Elisabeth Frisch (1761–1830). Matriculated 1818 from Bergen school and after his father’s death went in 1819 with his mother to his married sister living in…
LAMBRICK, Hugh Trevor. Shardlow, Derbyshire 20.4.1904 — Oxford 31.8.1982. British Civil Servant and Historian in India. Son of Rev. Charles Mengier (Menzies?) Lambrick (1862–1947) and Jessie Mabel Trevor (1875–1946). Educated at schools in Caterham, Surrey and in Fleetwood, Lancashire. Born in a family with long traditions in colonial service and…
LAIDLAY, John Watson. Glasgow 27.3.1808 — 8.3.1885. British (Scottish) Archaeologist and Numismatist in India. Son of John Laidlay (1782–1855), a businessman, and Elizabeth Watson, educated in London. Studied chemistry under Faraday, then, for India, Hindustani in London under Gilchrist. At 17 in 1825 went to India, employed in the mercantile…
LAGARDE, Paul Anton de (until 1854 Paul Bötticher). Berlin 2.11.1827 — Göttingen 22.12.1891 (Walravens & Stache-Weiske 2015, 181, nt. 545 died 22.11). German Oriental Scholar, Theologian, and Racist, also interested in Iranian. Professor in Göttingen. Son of Johann Friedrich Wilhelm Bötticher (1798–1850), teacher and historian, and Luise Klebe (d. 1827…
KONOW, Sten. Søndre Aurdal, Valdres 17.4.1867 — Oslo 29.6.1948. Norwegian Indo-Iranian Scholar. Professor in Oslo. Born in Central Norway as the son of minister Wollert Otto Konow (1833–1895, of a merchant family from Bergen) and Anne Heyerdahl. Educated in Lillehammer, matriculated in 1884. Studies of classical and Germanic philology (under…
KÖNIG, Friedrich Wilhelm. Adlerkosteletz (Kostelic nad Orlici), Bohemia 7.1.1897 — Vienna 5.2.1972. Austrian Historian of Ancient Iran and the Near East. Son of railway officer, educated in Vienna. After gymnasium in Vienna voluntary in Russian front 1915-17, lost his left leg and one eye. Now continued his studies of Sanskrit,…
KLATT, Johannes Emil Otto. Filehne, Posen (now Wieleń, Poland) 31.10.1852 — Bonn 27.8.1903. German Indologist. Son of postmaster Friedrich Michael Klatt (1806–1880) and Caroline Fiedler. After gymnasium in Bromberg (Bydgoszcz) from 1868 studies of Indology under Weber at Berlin (also classical philology and history). Ph.D. 1873 Halle (A. F. Pott). Worked…
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 (discoverer of uranium) Martin-Heinrich Klaproth (1743–1817) and Christine Sophie Lehmann (1748–1803). Gymnasium in Berlin. As a fifteen years old schoolboy he started the study of Chinese from Bayer’s…