Claudius James Rich
Claudius James Rich (born March 28, 1787 in Dijon (Burgundy) in France, † October 5, 1821 in Shiraz (Persia)) was one of the first Europeans to undertake serious archaeological research in Mesopotamia. He was resident (roughly equivalent to a consul) of the East India Company in Baghdad as well as a traveler, linguist and collector of antiquities.
childhood and education
Claudius James Rich was born out of wedlock on March 28, 1786 in Dijon. His father was Colonel Charles Coburn († 1809), nothing is known about his mother. He took his grandmother's name, Martha Rich, and was raised by an aunt in Bristol, England. where he also received his school education. Rich was extremely gifted at languages. At the age of nine he was already learning Latin and Greek from a relative. When he happened to see Arabic characters, he really wanted to learn this language. Mr. Fox from Bristol helped him with grammar and dictionary so that he could soon write, read, and even speak that language fairly fluently. By the time he was 15, he already had a good knowledge of Hebrew, Syriac, Persian and Turkish.
At the age of 16 he began his service as a cadet with the East India Company , which at the time was the only way for a young man to travel to a distant country. The friend who had secured this place for him regretted that he couldn't do more for him, but Rich replied, "Let me be in India first, I'll take care of the rest".
During his training at India House, Leadenhall Street , in London, Rich met the local librarian, Charles Wilkins , a well-known Sanskrit scholar and expert on the oriental languages. This discovered the "linguistic miracle" in the youth and convinced the directors of the company to convert Rich's military career into a civilian (literate -writer). With currently no vacancies in Bombay, he was appointed Secretary to Charles Lock, who had just been appointed Consul General for the Mediterranean based in Cairo.
On the way to the east
On February 8, 1804, Rich went on board the "Hindustan", which was loaded with goods to Gibraltar and for Nelson's fleet. The ship caught fire off the north coast of Spain and the crew had to bring the ship ashore in the Bay of Rosas. The crew was picked up by a frigate. But Rich, who was a civil servant, was left there until an English merchant from Bristol brought him to Barcelona.
From there he traveled on slow coastal boats to Italy, where he spent three months, mainly in Naples. During this time he made friends with music and learned some Italian.
When he Malta had achieved learned Rich that his future boss had recently passed away here. Mr. Lock had contracted a fever on his way back from Constantinople. As a result, Rich's plans became obsolete and the directors suggested that he travel to Constantinople to perfect his knowledge of Turkish and Arabic. After a few weeks in the capital, however, he went to Smyrna (now Izmir), where he attended lectures and mingled with the Turkish students. It is said that in 1805 he was employed as a "secret agent" and visited Aleppo and Antioch . He also traveled further north to Bolu, Amasya and Tokat during this time.
Eventually the consulate general in Cairo was filled with Colonel Missett and Rich became his assistant. Here he worked hard on his Arabic, but also made friends with some Mamelukes who were very powerful in Cairo. From them he also learned their riding tricks and how to use a lance and scimitar, as well as how to wear their clothes correctly.
When he received the order to travel to Bombay at the end of 1806 , he chose the route via Damascus , Aleppo, Mosul and Baghdad to Basra , where he dressed in Mamluk costume for the long journey. He had rehearsed his role so well that he was received with respect throughout the Ottoman Empire.
In September 1807 he arrived in Bombay by ship. Here he lived in the house of Sir James Mackintosh (1765-1834). This had already been briefed by Robert Hall during Rich's training in London about his skills and recommended to him. He was warmly welcomed, and although Rich had no assets or employment, Mackintosh married his eldest daughter, Mary.
Resident of the East India Company in Baghdad
In January 1808, Rich was made resident (roughly equivalent to a consul) of the East India Company in Baghdad. He took up his post there on May 22nd. Although he had received no preparation for this special position, he still brought enough experience with him from his travels. The tasks of a consul back then were to maintain good trade relations with the Ottoman Empire, as well as to accommodate travelers and English merchants who visited Mesopotamia. With great success he rebuilt the residence and ran a large house with many servants and guards in order to impress the Ottoman pashas. He used his freedom of movement and free time to visit historical sites. In the beginning Mr. Hine, the doctor in the residence, was his only company next to his wife.
At the beginning of his tenure in Baghdad he seemed very interested in the city and its immediate surroundings and he began to collect material on the history of their pashas.
The ruins of Babylon
When he visited the ruins of ancient Babylon on December 10, 1811, a new passion for antiquity awoke in him, into which he would devote all his energy.
In 1812 he carried out surveys and excavations in Babylon and the surrounding area, which he published two years later in the form of a topographical study in “Fundgruben”, a magazine published by his personal friend Joseph von Hammer-Purgstall in Vienna. After a dispute with Major Rennell, they agreed on the location of the ruins of Babylon on the east bank of the Euphrates and Rich took up his suggestions in "A Second Narrative". The dimensions of the mound of ruins are given by Rich as follows:
- Northern face 200 yards in length
- Southern 219 yards
- Eastern 182 yards
- Western 136 yards
- Elevation at the north-east angle 141 feet
Rich discovered some smaller objects from sarcophagi near the "Mujelibé" (palace) and excavated the "Lion of Babylon", which Austen Henry Layard would find again 40 years later. He also drove a shaft in the hill of Tell Ibrahim Khalil and collected mud bricks with inscriptions.
His first book “Narrative of a Journey to the Site of Babylon”, which appeared in England in 1818, caused a sensation and was the trigger for more than a century of excavations in this region.
Although he only stayed in Babylon for 10 days, he made numerous finds that would occupy science for a long time.
Trip to Europe and hiring of Bellino
Since Rich got sick several times, he and his wife decided that he had to recover and seek treatment in Constantinople. In 1813 they traveled there and stayed with the British Ambassador Sir Robert Liston. A year later they started a trip across the Balkan provinces to Vienna. Here Joseph von Hammer-Purgstall introduced him to the young orientalist Karl Bellino , whom Rich hired as a private secretary and interpreter for the British government with the rank of captain. In 1815, in the company of Bellino, they began their return journey to Baghdad via Italy, Greece, Constantinople and Asia Minor.
Prominent visitors to Baghdad
On his trip to India in 1816, James Silk Buckingham also visited Baghdad. In his book “Travels in Mesopotamia”, London 1827, he described some of the seals that Rich had collected.
On October 14, 1818, Rich received the visit from his compatriot Robert Ker Porter , a traveler and painter. He had visited Persepolis and copied some inscriptions. So it was natural that they discussed Rich's research in Babylon and his book. Ker Porter wanted to visit this site too, and Rich gave him his secretary, Karl (Charles) Bellino, as a guide. He painted the ruins of Babylon and also of Borsippa (which was then seen as the "Tower of Babel"). In 1822 Ker Porter published a book with many drawings and cuneiform texts (including copies by Karl Bellino) under the title "Travels in Georgia, Persia, Armenia, Ancient Babylonia".
Ker Porter concludes his book with a dedication to Rich: “A man whose brilliant mind and instant benevolence enlightened and paved the way for all travelers who came into his sphere of influence, while he diligently carried out the day-to-day duties of a diplomatic service, full of its general Philanthropy corresponded. "
In Nineveh
Rich was in Mosul four times between 1808 and 1820. On the first trip through 1808 he had already made sketches of the unusual hills opposite.
He visited and drew all the great mounds of ruins there that he believed might be ancient Nineveh . The first hill he visited was called "Neby Yunus" because it was believed that the tomb of the Prophet Jonas was there. In addition to his language skills, Rich had a special gift for communicating with the locals. Here he learned that even a cursory dig with a spade exposed fragments of inscriptions that the villagers showed him. They were in cuneiform script that Rich couldn't read. However, he found that the inscriptions were identical to those he found in Babylon. He was also shown underground rooms and corridors near the tomb. Rich convinced the locals that he was interested in what they found and hired a "curiosity hunter", Belli Samaan, to buy some interesting pieces.
Then Rich examined the hill of Kuyunjik, from which he created a detailed description and plan. He learned from the locals that most of the inscriptions can be found in Neby Yunis. In Kuyunschik he received some fragments of written clay tablets and bricks.
Dimensions of Nineveh
Rich conducted the first systematic survey of the ruins. According to his information
- the terrain of Nineveh is up to 2 miles wide and 4 miles long. On the north, south and west sides there are remains of just one wall, but on the east side there are remains of three walls.
- The highest elevation of Nabi Yunis is about 50 feet and the west wall ran in front of this hill. Kujundzhik hill is irregular in shape, its sides are very steep and the surface almost flat. Its vertical height is 43 feet and its total circumference is 7,691 feet.
Until the topographical survey by Felix Jones in 1852, these measurements were the only ones from Rich.
By documenting his trip in his book “Narrative of a Residence in Kurdistan and on the Site of Ancient Niniveh”, he provided both the first geological and archaeological description of this area with very valuable information. This book later became the "Bible" for Austen Henry Layard . This not only relieved the desire to excavate, but Layard also adopted the manner of speaking and listening to the residents at the various places of his travels in order to learn about their customs and traditions.
The Bellino cylinder from Senneharib from Nineveh
The greatest treasure he received from Nabi Yunis was a hollow clay pot (cylinder). In a letter to Joseph von Hammer-Purgstall in Vienna on April 5, 1819, Rich reported from Baghdad about the discovery of the cylinder:
"I have made very curious discoveries among the ruins of Niniveh, where I have a person employed in collecting antiques. The most curious article I have as yet found is a small earthern vase, covered with cuneiform writing. I send you a copy of the inscription, which you entirely owe to the zeal and perseverance of Mr. Bellino, who copied all with admirable ease and correctness. "
Translation: “I made very strange discoveries in the ruins of Nineveh where I hired a person to collect antiques. The strangest item I've found so far is a small clay vase covered in cuneiform writing. I am sending you a copy of the inscription, which you owe entirely to the diligence and perseverance of Mr Bellino, who copied it with admirable ease and correctness. "
The clay cylinder in a slightly concave shape was named after Karl Bellino, who copied the inscription. It comes from the estate of Claudius James Rich. The collection was purchased by his widow Mary at the British Museum in 1825.
Length: 25.4 cm, width: 12.06 cm (maximum), width: 8 cm (at each end), hole at one end with a diameter: 1.4 cm
64 lines in Akkadian cuneiform script, include the report of the king Sennacherib (705/704 - 681 BCE..) Of Nineveh ( Assyria ).
Georg Friedrich Grotefend received copies of inscriptions from Bellino on May 22nd and July 1818, which he published in Göttingen in 1848. Only after the decipherment by Georg Friedrich Grotefend did it become known that this was a report by King Sennacherib (705–681 BC) about the first two years of his construction activities in Nineveh. Even William Fox Talbot confirmed the cylinder in his translation that the transcript of Bellino was extremely accurate.
The trip to Kurdistan
In 1820, his poor health forced Rich to change the air again, so that he began a journey through the mountains of Kurdistan . He traveled to Sulaimaniyya , further east to Sinna and west of Nineveh, and then on a raft down the Tigris to Baghdad. On this trip by raft, he documented all the striking points on the banks.
The death of Bellino
Bellino left Rich in Sina, from where he went on a detour to Salimania, while Bellino traveled to Hamadan , where he wanted to copy inscriptions. There he developed a malignant biliary fever which forced him to return to Sulaimaniyya. With Rich was Mr. Bell, the residence doctor, who managed to improve his condition so that after a while Bellino felt able to make the trip to Mosul, where the air was very good at this time of year. He made the journey partly in Rich's wife's litter, partly in a covered litter, and seemed to be on the way to recovery. However, after a short time in Mosul, he began to lose heart and another diarrhea weakened him considerably. Rich visited him daily and his wife looked after him and went for walks with him. Nor did Mr. Bell leave him for a moment, day or night. However, Bellino relapsed and died on November 13th.
Rich arranged for the burial in the Catholic cemetery in Mosul and had a tombstone erected. Bellino had worked for Rich for five years, and the sadness about his passing was correspondingly great. Rich sent a letter of condolence to Bellino's parents through Freiherr von Hammer-Purgstall in Vienna ( see Karl Bellino ).
The trip to Shiraz in Persia
Due to an attack on the residence in the spring of 1821, which he could only repel by force of arms, and the impending confrontation with the governor of Baghdad province, Dawud Pasha, Rich was forced to temporarily close the residence and so he traveled with the Kelek on May 11 to Basra , where he arrived on May 19, 1821. He informed the British ambassador in Constantinople and the government in Bombay of the incident.
Meanwhile, Rich had been appointed to an important position in the office of Governor Mountstuart Elphinstone in Bombay and was awaiting further instructions from his company.
His wife Mary suffered from fever attacks and a boat trip was recommended to her because the sea air was expected to improve. So she traveled by ship from Bushehr on the Persian Gulf to Bombay.
The heat in Bushehr became unbearable, so that on July 24th Rich left for Shiraz. He traveled through Persepolis , which he still wanted to see. When he arrived on August 22nd, he added his name as a graffito to the "Gate of All Nations". He made small digs and made copies of inscriptions.
Approx. The ruined city of Pasargadae is 40 km north of Persepolis . The main monument here is the tomb of Cyrus the Great. Most of the ruins were always visible, but some of them were hidden under rubble and sand. Some have been exposed to rain, wind and sun for centuries and have suffered greatly as a result. At the time of Rich's visit, 40 columns must have been fully or partially upright.
It wasn't far to Shiraz now . A cholera epidemic had broken out there. Instead of leaving immediately, Rich hoped that with the authority of his office behind him, he could expedite medical care. Unfortunately, he became infected and succumbed to this disease on October 5, 1821. He was buried in the Armenian church of Julfa in Isfahan .
The Rich Collection
The Rich Collection was sold to the British Museum by his widow Mary in 1815 for £ 7,500. Parliament granted special permission for this. In addition to many seals, Rich had also collected bricks and coins.
His oil portrait of Thomas Phillips was given by the museum to the British Library, which is also where his diaries and papers are located.
Rich had a significant collection of Arabic, Persian, Turkish, Armenian, Greek, and "carshuni" manuscripts also residing there. Some of the Turkish manuscripts are written in Chaghatay, the classic literary language of eastern Turkey.
Fonts
The only book written by Rich:
- Narrative of a Journey to the Site of Babylon. Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme, and Brown, et al. a., London 1818.
The other books were published posthumously:
- by his wife Mary on the basis of his diaries and letters
- Narrative of a Residence in Koordistan and on the Site of ancient Niniveh. With Journal of a Voyage down the Tigris to Bagdad and an Account of a Visit to Shirauz and Persepolis. Duncan, London 1836 full text .
- Narrative of a Journey to the site of Babylon in 1811, [...] Memoir on the Ruins [...] Remarks on the Topography of ancient Babylon, by Major Rennell. In Reference to the memoir: Second Memoir on the Ruins. In reference to Major Rennell's remarks: With Narrative of a Journey to Persepolis. Now first printed, with now unpublished Cuneiform Inscriptions copied at Persepolis. By the late Claudius James Rich, Esq, formerly the resident of the Hon East India Company at Bagdad. Duncan and Malcolm, London 1839 full text .
- From his great-great-niece:
- Constance M. Alexander: Baghdad in Bygone Days. From the journals and correspondence of Claudius Rich, Traveler, Artist, Linguist, Antiquary and British Resident at Baghdad, 1808–1821. John Murray, London 1928.
literature
- Constance M. Alexander: Baghdad in Bygone Days. From the journals and correspondence of Claudius Rich, traveler, artist, linguist, antiquary and British resident at Baghdad, 1808–1821. John Murray, London 1928 (great-great-niece of Claudius J. Rich).
- JR Fawcett Thompson: The Rich Manuscripts. In: The British Museum Quarterly. Vol. 27, No. 1/2, 1963, ISSN 0007-151X , pp. 18-23.
- CJ Gadd: Assyria Antiquities, 1825–56. In: The British Museum Quarterly. Vol. 18, No. 2, June 1953, pp. 56-57.
Individual evidence
- ^ RD Barnett: Sir Robert Ker Porter: Regency Artist and Traveler. In: Iran. 10, 1972, ISSN 0578-6967 , pp. 19-24.
- ↑ The Bellino Cylinder in the British Museum
- ↑ Remarks on the inscription of a clay vessel with Babylonian cuneiform writing. In: Treatises of the Royal Society of Sciences in Göttingen. Vol. 4, 1848/1850, ZDB -ID 210028-9 , pp. 175-193 (special print. Dietrich, Göttingen 1848, here pp. 18-22 and 1850, p. 41, digitized version ).
- ^ H. Fox Talbot: Translation of Some Assyrian Inscriptions. In: The Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society. 18, 1861, ISSN 1356-1863 , pp. 35-105, here pp. 76ff.
- ↑ Photo Gate of the Nations ( Memento of the original dated February 1, 2014 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
- ↑ 362 objects in the British Museum
- ↑ Rich in British Library ( page no longer available , search in web archives ) Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Rich, Claudius James |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | British orientalist and traveler, resident (roughly equivalent to a consul) of the East India Company in Baghdad |
| DATE OF BIRTH | March 28, 1786 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Dijon , France |
| DATE OF DEATH | October 5, 1820 |
| Place of death | Shiraz , Persia |