411 



CSOMA DK KOR08, ALEXANDER. 



C80MA DE KOR03, ALEXANDER. 



that it exposed hint to ridicule, and it was supposed that be luid 

 dropped hit intention. In 1815 be went to Oottingen ostensibly to 

 study mexlieinr, but in reality his chief view was to acquire n 

 sufficient knowledge of oriental language* to qualify him lor In- 

 ]>ui-|-o- of travel. It was in 1820, when he ws upwards of thirty 

 yean of age, that be set out on hit pilgrimage. His friend Hrgedu*, 

 ona of the profesaors at Enjed. was surprised to hear from him one 

 evening when he walked into his room lightly clad and with a little 

 tick in hi* hand, as if about to set out on a country walk, that he came 

 to take his leave, as he meant to start for the East to-morrow. He 

 bad received from his friend Michael Kcndere*y, one of the few who 

 encouraged him, a contribution of 100 florins (about 101.), and a 

 promise of another 100 yearly, and on this and the produce of his 

 medical skill he meant to rely for subsistence. 



The friends had an animated conversation that evening, and the 

 next morning Hegedua, who relates these particulars in an obituary 

 notice which be wrote of C.-oma, accompanied him part of bis way, 

 and followed him with his eyes to the banks of the Maros. He never 

 saw him more. Almost the next news that the Transylvanians had of 

 Csoma was in a letter from Teheran, dated the 21st of December 

 1820, addressed to the patrons of the college of Enytd. In this he 

 mentioned that instead of going direct to Asia, ho bad, after crossing 

 the Balkan and visiting Constantinople, embarked for Alexandria, 

 probably to consult the Arabic libraries at Cairo, and traversing 

 Egypt and Syria, concluded the first year of his travels at Teheran. 

 He was at the time of writing the letter sanguine of finding the 

 object of hi* search, a nation speaking Hungarian, at no great distance 

 of either time or place, and thought he should be home in about a 

 twelvemonth. Years went by after this and nothing wo* heard of 

 him, and then a flying rumour came from India that some great 

 Hungarian scholar was studying Tibetan in one of the monasteries of 

 Tibet. At Teheran, where Csoma was very kindly assisted by the 

 English envoy Sir Henry Willock, he appear.', on hearing five or fix 

 words of Tibetan, to have been struck with their resemblance to 

 Magyar, and to have resolved to master the language. Taciturn in 

 his habits, and peculiarly averse to speaking of himself, he never gave 

 even hi* frunds any but the most general account of the years he 

 spent in Tibet. It is only known that he wandered across Little 

 Bucbaria to the desert of Gobi, that partly with Moorcroft, the 

 English traveller, who died before hu return, and partly nlone, he 

 traversed many of the valleys of the Himalaya, and that be spent four 

 yean from 1827 to 1830 in the Buddhist monastery of Kanam, deeply 

 engaged in the study of Tibetan. For four months of this time lie 

 never stirred out of n room nine feet square, in which be remained 

 wit!. nut furl, with the temperature below tho zero of Fahrenheit, 

 studying from inorninir till night the Buddhist sacred books. He 

 had written down 40,000 Tibetan words, when, in 1880, he left the 

 mountains to carry hi* stores of learning to Calcutta, and there a dis- 

 covery awaited him which he afterwards declared occasioned him the 

 bitterest momenta in his life. He had soon found that there was no 

 real resemblance between Tibetan and Magyar, but he prosecuted the 

 study iu the hope that the literature of the language would throw- 

 some light on the early history of the nation of which ho wo* in 

 qnett, and now learned from the scholars of Calcutta that the litera- 

 ture of Tibet consisted of translations from the Sanscrit, a language 

 which be might have studied with ease at home. The disappoint- 

 ment wo* so bitter that it threw him on a bed of sickness, but there 

 were consolations in store for him. HU studies in the liuddhist 

 rnonas'.erieH had made him well acquainted with the literature of the 

 Buddhist religion, to which Hodgson and Tumour were then begin- 

 ning to call attention, and on this subject Csouia became an oracle. 



The library of tho Asiatic Society of Bengal contained eleven 

 hundred volumes in Tibetan, which no one had hitherto been able to 

 catalogue. Csoma not only undertook the tusk, but when be was 

 paid for it, remarked that he should have been willing to pay if he 

 bad been a rich man for the pleasure of making the catalogue. The 

 singular disinterestedness of bis character, the frugality of hi* habit* 

 and their eccentricity, his strange costume, which was always the 

 long wsrm blue cloak of Transylvania under an Indian sun, all made 

 him a noted personage in Indian society, which however he shunned 

 inr-t a-1 of courting. The Indian scholars, especially Prinsep and 

 Wilson, treated him with marked generosity and kindness ; he was 

 provided with apartment* at the library of the Asiatic Society, and 

 for some time officiated a* librarian ; his articles in English on subject* 

 of Tibetan literature were revised by Profeenor Wilson and published 

 iu the journal of the Society, or in the 'Asiatic Researches, 1 and he 

 was eofagrd at the government expense to prepare a Tibetan grammar 

 and dictionary. From the Indian journals his fame travelled home- 

 ward", and the Tnosylvaoiaha were delighted to hoar that their long- 

 musing countryman was now a celebrated scholar on the banks of 

 the Oaagea, The Transylvauian diet voted him a sum of about HO/. 

 for bis support ; but Csoma, who received it with extreme gratifica- 

 tion a* a token of bis country's approval, bad already more money 

 than be knew how to employ, and handed this over to Prinscp to 

 purchase Indian books and manuscripts to be presented to native 

 seat* of leainiug on hi* return. He continued for some yean at or 

 about Calcutta, diligently employed in the study of Sanscrit and 

 other language*, avoiding the society of Europeans, and for some 



time making only excursions of no great moment. In IM'J he pre- 

 pared for a tiiiitl expedition to accompli*!, the fi-i-.it object of his life. 

 He was at that time convinced that tho laud of the Uigurs was to be 

 found to the east aud north of Laasa, the capital of Eastern 

 and on the western confines of China. On the '.'/tli of March 

 be arrived at Darjeeling on his way to Sikkitn iu Tibet, and l>r. 

 Campbell, the superintendent at that station, sent the vakeel of the 

 rajah of Sikkim to visit him, to convince himself that the rajah might 

 permit him to enter the country without danger. "The vakeel," 

 says Dr. Campbell, " who is a man of intelligence and Rome learning, 

 was altogether annoyed at finding a Feringhee a complete master of 

 the colloquial language of Tibet, and so much his own superior iu 

 acquaintance _ with the religion and literature of that country." 

 While Csoma awaited at Darjeeling a reply to his application to thu 

 rajah, he was seized with illness, refused to take medicine, grew 

 rapidly worse, and on the llth of April expired without a groan or 

 struggle. 



The news of his death was received with great regret throughout 

 India and Europe, and more especially in his native country. The 

 celebrated Hungarian novelist Eotvos, the author of the 'Village 

 Notary,' the English translation of which was so successful a few 

 yean ago, pronounced a funeral oration on him in October 1843, at 

 a meeting of the Hungarian Academy, of which in his absence Csoma 

 had been elected a member. It is from this oration that our par- 

 ticulars respecting his Hungarian life have been taken, those relating 

 to his career in India are chiefly derived from the Indinn journals. 

 There is one passage in Eotvos which an Englishman can hardly deny 

 himself the gratification of giving at length. 



" Proudly and majestically stands the British nation among the 

 nations of Europe ; the five parts of the globe acknowledge its power, 

 and it* banner floats in command of the ocean ; but it is not this 

 which constitutes the highest glory of Albion which inspires every 

 thinking man with involuntary reverence at the mention of its 

 The constancy with which it contends for the triumphs of mind ; the 

 victories it ha* won in the field of humanity and science ; the k 

 feeling which every great thought, every lofty sentiment, th 

 esteem which all true merit like that of Kiirij-i excites in the En/iis'a 

 nation, this it is which identifies its existence with civilUal; 

 supremacy with the supremacy of all that is high aud nuble ; which 

 make* its name great and glorious among the nations of the earth. 

 It is to the English nation that we stand indebted, after God, for the 

 glory that redounds to us from what wa* effected by K<nii. In 

 Teheran, Willock ; in Tibet, Moorcroft ; in Calcutta, Prinsep ; in D.ir- 

 jecling, Campbell always and everywhere it was Englishmen who aided 

 our countryman with their advice and their benefits ; who, recognising 

 his merits, did heartily for him what hit country could not do, or had 

 failed to do, for her illustrious son ; and if by the Tibetan Ur 

 and Dictionary he redeemed his obligations, and could receive without 

 a blush the benefit* of strangers, I yet discharge a sacred duty when, 

 in the name of this Academy, iu the name of every admirer of K 

 in the name of the country at large, I publicly return our thanks to 

 the most glorious nation of this earth for the sympathy and assistance 

 which our countryman received at the hands both of it* indivi !'. .1 

 citizens and of it* government." 



The original purpose of Csoma's travels to the East was not 

 attained. His example, however, has had imitators. ('outran 



who travelled to Russia in search of the diale 

 Finnish, was, in fact, on tho same quest as Csoma, a* Finnish and 

 Hungarian are certainly connected, though the degree of their con- 

 nection, like that of the Tartar languages iu general, is a fruitful sub- 

 ject of discussion. But iu searching for one thing, the Transylvsniau 

 traveller found another. He wa* not so unfortunate as he imagined 

 in having devoted himself to the study of Tibetan ; for, ip doing so, 

 ho stumbled on a new field. In lleiuusat's 'Hcclu-rchcs sur les 

 langucs T.-vtarcn,' published in 1820, but whirh ('.-.mm had not seen 

 till he saw it at Calcutta, the most unsatisfactory chapter is that > > 

 Tibetan, in which he successfully demonstrates that all written on tho 

 subject by Fouruiout and Quorgi is a moss of blunders, but is unable. 

 to point out what is to be substituted. The Dictionary of the Bho- 

 tanta language (another name for Tibetan), published by Marshmau 

 at Serampore in 1820, from an Italian manuscript, is described a* 

 worthless by Schmidt of St Petersburg and Fougaux of Paris, tho 

 two great living authorities on the subject of Tibetan, who, on tho 

 contrary, unite in declaring that Csoma had completely ent -red into 

 the spirit of the language ; that his Dictionary is a standard work, and 

 that if they have succeeded in clearing up some points even more than 

 he did, it is to his guidance that they owe their proficiency. The 

 title of the work is characteristic, 'Essay towards a Dictionary 

 Tibetan and English : prepared with the ft eiietancu of Itandc Sang", 

 Rgyas Pbun-Tshogx, a learned Litma of Zaugskiir, by Alexander Csoma 

 de Koros, Siculo-Hungarian of Transylvania, during a residence at 

 Kanam, in the Himalaya Mountains, on thu confines of India and 

 Tibet, 1827-30.' It was published in one volume quarto at Calcutta, 

 in 1834, and the Grammar followed in the same year. The articles on 

 Tibetan literature by the author iu the Journal of the Asiatic S 

 of Bengal are numerous; and his analysis of the Kah-Qyur, the 

 principal sacred book of tho Buddhist religion, is printed iu the 

 twentieth volume of the 'Asiatic Researches.' In the preface to his 



