James Prinsep

James Prinsep

James Prinsep (born August 20, 1799 in Chelmsford , † April 22, 1840 in London ) was an English scholar and orientalist . He was - together with others - the decipherer of the ancient Indian Kharoshthi and Brahmi scriptures ; He was also a skilled numismatist , metallurgist and manager of the mints of Calcutta and Benares .

origin

James Prinsep was the seventh son of India to prosperity coming in indigo and cotton planter and mineralogists to found John Prinsep, who returned in 1787 to England to a family. The family moved to Clifton in 1809 , where James attended school.

India

In 1819 James Prinsep traveled to India with his brother Thoby, where he expanded his metallurgical knowledge at the Mint of Calcutta. A year later he was sent to the Mint of Benares, where he worked until it was closed in 1830; During this time numerous drawings, watercolors and an exact map of the city were created. He also designed buildings and had the collapsing minarets of the Aurangzeb Mosque restored. Because of his research and several articles on the temperature measurement of molten metals , he was recognized as a Fellow by the Royal Society in 1828 . He returned to Calcutta, where he took over the direction of the Asiatic Society of Bengal and its magazine in 1832 . In the old cathedral of Calcutta (now St. John's Church ) he married Harriet Sophia Aubert, the daughter of a high British officer, in 1835.

During his time in Calcutta his interest in ancient Indian coins increased, which he divided into three groups according to their production process. His popularity grew and so he received coins from collectors all over India in order to decipher, classify and publish them - if possible. Something similar happened with copies of several Ashoka edicts . He devoted himself to this task from 1836 to 1838, using a few bilingual Greek characters for the coins of the Gandhara culture . During this time the idea of ​​a Corpus Inscriptionum Indicarum arose , which was taken up decades later by Alexander Cunningham .

Since the spring of 1838 James Prinsep suffered increasingly from severe headaches. In November he returned to England; However, he did not recover from his suffering and died on April 22, 1840.

Prinsep Ghat in Kolkata

Honors

The Royal Society issued a commemorative medal on his death ; a bust was also made. The citizens of the British colony of Calcutta donated money for a memorial building in the form of an antique portico on the banks of the Hugli , which was inaugurated in 1843 and can still be seen today. Prinsep's extensive coin collection is now part of the British Museum in London.

Drawings from Benares

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Fonts (selection)

• Bactrian and Indo-Scythic Coins - continued. In: The Journal of the Asiatic Society of Bengal. Vol. 2, No. 20, 1833, ZDB -ID 300934-8 , pp. 405-416 .
• Specimens of Hindu Coins descended from the Parthian type, and of the Ancient Coins of Ceylon. In: The Journal of the Asiatic Society of Bengal. Vol. 6, Part 1, No. 64, 1837, pp. 288-302 .
• Interpretation of the most ancient of the inscriptions on the pillar called lát of Feroz Sháh, near Delhi, and of the Allahabad, Radhia and Mattiah pillar, or lát, inscriptions which agree therewith. In: Journal of the Asiatic Society of Bengal. Vol. 6, Part 2, No. 67, 1837, pp. 566-609 .

literature

• Jeremiah P. Losty: Prinsep, James (1799-1840). In: Oxford Dictionary of National Biography . Oxford University Press 2004, doi : 10.1093 / ref: odnb / 22812 .

Web links

Commons : James Prinsep  - Collection of Images, Videos and Audio Files

• James Prinsep, biography and appreciation - Photos and information (English)
• Questions about deciphering the Brahmi script - photos + information (English)

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Corpus Inscriptionum Indicarum ( Memento of the original dated December 7, 2017 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. - Archaeological Survey of India