Harinath De

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Not to be confused with Harinath Dey, University of Dhaka biochemist

Harinath De
Calcutta, India
NationalityIndian
Occupation(s)Academician, librarian, polyglot
Known forability to speak in 34 languages

Harinath De (12 August 1877— 30 August 1911) was an Indian historian, scholar and a polyglot, who later became the first Indian librarian of the National Library of India (then Imperial Library) from 1907 to 1911.[2] In a life span of thirty four years, he learned 34 languages.[3]

Early life and education

He was born in

Narendranath Dutta (future Swami Vivekananda) also stayed in the same building, briefly from 1877 to 1879.[4][5]

He attended Raipur High School, and went to study at

polyglot and linguistic prodigy, he was expert in 34 languages, including many eastern and western languages such as Chinese, Tibetan, Pali, Sanskrit, Persian, Arabic, English, Greek, Latin,[6][7]
out of which he was M.A in 14.

Career

De was the first

Calcutta University in 1907.[9] He was appointed the second librarian and first Indian librarian of the Imperial Library, after the death of John Macfarlane, who was previously Assistant Librarian of the British Museum, London, who was the first librarian of the newly merged Imperial Library.[10]

Literary career

In 1902 He published a new edition of Macaulay's Essay on Milton. In 1903 he edited and published a new version of Palgrave's Golden Treasury. Then he translated Rihla, the travelogue written by Ibn Battuta and Jalaluddin Abu Zafar Muhammad's book Al-fakhri to English. He also worked on Arabic grammar.[11]

The most important works of him included an English–

slokas, editing of Lankabatar Sutra, Nirbanbyakhya Shastram, etc. He also translated a few Sanskrit plays to English like Vasavdatta of Subandhu and Abhigyan Shakuntalam of Kalidasa.[11]

His works, 88 volumes on literature, linguistics and Hinduism, are now part of the National Library of India, known as the Harinath Dey Collection.[12]

Death

He died of typhoid on 30 August 1911 at the age of 34.[3]

Works

  • Select Papers, Mainly Indological, compiled and edited by Sunil Bandyopadhyay. Sanskrit Pustak Bhandar, 1972.

References

  1. ^ Sengupta, Subodh Chandra and Bose, Anjali (editors), (1976), Samsad Bangali Charitabhidhan (Biographical dictionary), (in Bengali), p 590
  2. ^ Ravindra N. Sharma, ed. (1981). Indian librarianship: perspectives and prospects. Kalyani Publishers. p. 221.
  3. ^ a b Capital. 1977. p. 267. Retrieved 4 June 2013.
  4. ISBN 8120815866
    .
  5. ^ a b Greenspan, p. 169
  6. ^ P. Thankappan Nair (1987). A history of Calcutta's streets (Vol. 2). Firma KLM. p. 396.
  7. ^ Greenspan, p. 140
  8. ^ "Biography of Harinath Dey". 4 May 2011.
  9. Calcutta University. Archived from the original
    on 6 May 2013. Retrieved 7 March 2013.
  10. ^ "Historical Background". National Library of India. Archived from the original on 17 June 2016. Retrieved 9 March 2013.
  11. ^ a b "Bishwa Bhashapathik Harindranath De". Ittefaq. 26 December 2011. (in Bengali)
  12. ISBN 8121204941
    .

Further reading
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