Sándor Kőrösi Csoma
| Alexander Csoma de Kőrös | |
|---|---|
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| Born | Sándor Csoma 27 March 1784[1] Kőrös, Grand Principality of Transylvania (today part of Covasna, Romania) |
| Died | 11 April 1842 (aged 58) Darjeeling, Colonial India |
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Sándor Csoma de Kőrös (hu; born Sándor Csoma; 27 March 1784/8 – 11 April 1842)[1][2] was a Hungarian philologist and Orientalist, author of the first Tibetan–English dictionary and grammar book.
He was called Phyi-glin-gi-grwa-pa in Tibetan, meaning "the foreign pupil", and was declared a bosatsu or bodhisattva by the Japanese in 1933.[3] He was born in Kőrös, Grand Principality of Transylvania (today part of Covasna, Romania). The Magyar ethnic group, the Székelys, to which he belonged believed that they were derived from a branch of Attila's Huns who had settled in Transylvania in the fifth century. Hoping to study the claim and to find the place of origin of the Székelys and the Magyars by studying language kinship, he set off to Asia in 1820 and spent his lifetime studying the Tibetan language and Buddhist philosophy. Csoma de Kőrös is considered as the founder of Tibetology. He was said to have been able to read in seventeen languages. He died in Darjeeling while attempting to make a trip to Lhasa in 1842 and a memorial was erected in his honour by the Asiatic Society of Bengal.
Further reading
Sándor Kőrösi Csoma, Wikipedia
Notes
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 Short bio and works (Hungarian)
- ↑ The native form of this personal name is Kőrösi Csoma Sándor. This article uses Western name order when mentioning individuals
- ↑ Hetenyi, Ernest. "Alexander Csoma de Koros: The Hungarian Bodhisattva" (PDF). Bulletin of Tibetology. 9 (1): 34–41.
External links
