Berthold Laufer

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Berthold Laufer
Born	October 11, 1874(1874-10-11) Cologne, Germany
Died	September 13, 1934 (aged 59) Chicago, Illinois
Fields	Anthropology Orientalism
Institutions	American Museum of Natrural History Columbia University Field Museum

Berthold Laufer (October 11, 1874 – September 13, 1934) was a German-American anthropologist, orientalist.

Born in Cologne to a Jewish family, Laufer attended the Friedrich Wilhelms Gymnasium from 1884-1893. He continued his studies in Berlin (1893-1895) and completed his doctorate degree at the University of Leipzig in 1897. The following year he emigrated to the United States where he remained until his death. He carried out ethnographic fieldwork on the Amur River and Sakhalin Island during 1898-1899 as part of the Jesup North Pacific Expedition. He worked as assistant in Ethnology at the American Museum of Natural History (1904-1906), became a lecturer in Anthropology and East-Asiatic Languages at Columbia University (1905-1907). The rest of his career he spent at the Field Museum in Chicago. (cf. obituary JAOS 55.4 (1934): 349-362). He died upon leaping from the roof of the hotel in which he lived in Chicago.

1 Literary works
2 Works in Tibetan Studies
3 Collections
4 External links

[edit] Literary works

1899 Petroglyphs on the Amoor, Oct. 1899
1909 Chinese pottery of the Han-dynasty, 1909
1911 Jade, 1911 http://www.archive.org/details/fieldiana10chicuoft
1914 Chinese clay figure, 1914
1915 The diamond, 1915 http://www.archive.org/details/fieldiana15chicuoft
1917 The Beginnings of Porcelain in China, 1917 http://www.archive.org/details/fieldiana15chicuoft

[edit] Works in Tibetan Studies

1898-9. “Über das va zur. Ein Beitrag zur Phonetik der tibtischen Sprache”. Wiener Zeitschrift für die Kunde des Morgenlandes 12: 289-307. 13: 95ff.
1914. “Bird divination among the Tibetans (notes on document Pelliot no 3530, with a study of Tibetan phonology of the ninth century)” T’oung Pao 15. (1914): 1-110; Hartmut Walravens and Lokesh Chandra, eds. Sino-Tibetan Studies, vol 2. New Delhi: Rakesh Goel, 1987: 354-463.
1916–18. “Loan Words in Tibetan,” T’oung Pao 17, 404-552; Hartmut Walravens and Lokesh Candra, eds. Sino-Tibetan Studies. Vol 2. New Delhi: Rakesh Goel, 1987: 483-632.

[edit] Collections

Kleinere Schriften von Berthold Laufer. Hartmut Walravens, ed. (Sinologica Coloniensia ; Bd. 2, 7, 13). Wiesbaden : Steiner, 1976-1992. 3 volumes. (a collection of many of his essays and many relevant documents)
Sino-Tibetan Studies. Hartmut Walravens and Lokesh Candra, eds. 2 vols. New Delhi: Rakesh Goel, 1987

[edit] External links

Division of Anthropology, American Museum of Natural History - Objects from Laufer China Expedition 1901-1904 (section Collections Online, option Collections Highlights).