Johan David Åkerblad

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Johan David Åkerblad (born May 6, 1763 in Stockholm , Sweden , † February 8, 1819 in Rome , Italy ) was a Swedish diplomat , paleographer and orientalist .

Life

From 1778 Åkerblad studied classical and oriental languages at Uppsala University . In 1782 he defended his thesis entitled De primis sub rege Gustavo I extra Septentrionem initis fæderibus before Professor Eric Michael Fant . From 1783 he worked for the Royal Chancellery in Constantinople because of his language skills . From 1784 to 1789 he worked in Asia Minor , Syria , Palestine , Egypt and North Africa. After his return in 1789 he worked as a secretary and translator for diplomatic missions into Turkish . From 1791 he worked again in Constantinople and made his first research trips, including to Troy .

From 1800 he conducted research at the Georg August University in Göttingen , Paris , The Hague and in Rome . He concentrated on the dead languages ​​of Egypt. So he collected material for a dictionary of the Coptic language . In 1800 he was elected a corresponding member of the Göttingen Academy of Sciences .

Åkerblad was one of the first scientists to study the Rosetta Stone more intensively . From 1802 he worked with a copy of the stone that he received from the French philologist Antoine-Isaac Silvestre de Sacy . He concentrated on the demotic and the hieroglyphics . He was the first to assign the names Alexander and Ptolemy. After two months he was able to assign all proper names in the demotic text. He used his knowledge of the Coptic language and discovered that the demotic used a phonetic alphabet consisting of 29 letters.

Works

  • 1801: Lettre à M. Silv. de Sacy sur l'écriture cursive copte
  • 1802: Inscriptionis phoenicieæ Oxoniensis nova interpretatio
  • 1802: Lettre sur l'inscription égyptienne de Rosette, adressée au citoyen Silvestre de Sacy
  • 1804: Lettre sur une inscription phénicienne, trouvée à Athenes
  • 1804: Notice sur deux inscriptions en caractères runiques, trouvées à Venise et sur les Varanges, avec les remarques de M. d'Ansse de Villoison
  • 1811: Sopra due laminette di bronzo trovate ne 'contorni di Atene. Dissertazione letta nell'accademia libera d'archeologia al campidoglio li 30th July 1811 digitized in the Google book search
  • 1813: Inscrizione greca sopra una lamina di piombo, trovata in un sepolcro nelle vicinanze d'Atene
  • 1817: Lettre à M: r le cheval. Italinsky sur une inscription phénicienne

literature

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Holger Krahnke: The members of the Academy of Sciences in Göttingen 1751-2001 (= Treatises of the Academy of Sciences in Göttingen, Philological-Historical Class. Volume 3, Volume 246 = Treatises of the Academy of Sciences in Göttingen, Mathematical-Physical Class. Series 3, volume 50). Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, Göttingen 2001, ISBN 3-525-82516-1 , p. 24.
personal data
SURNAME Åkerblad, Johan David
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Swedish diplomat, paleographer and orientalist
DATE OF BIRTH May 6, 1763
PLACE OF BIRTH Stockholm , Sweden
DATE OF DEATH February 8, 1819
Place of death Rome , Italy