(CHINA MISSIONARY) JOSEPH EDKINS
(1823-1905), British Protestant missionary in China; Sinologist, specializing in Chinese religions, especially Buddhism; authored many books. A.L.S., 2pp. 8vo., Peking, Aug 25, 1870, to unknown recipient, excellent content regarding his new book. In part: : "…My forthcoming little book the title of which is 'China's place in philology' is much in need of editing, especially for Asiatic words. Knowing as I do that you have specially attended to Sanscrit [sic] to the Dravidian Languages and to Chinese, I venture to ask if you will do the great kindness to correct this part of the proofs as they go through the press...My views on the connection of European Languages with Chinese are be given in this work. I take the connecting links to be the Turanian and Semitic languages chiefly, and attempt to show that the roots are the same in these families and that the residence of the European languages is based in great part with Turanian systems in declension and conjugating already in existence…" In the book mentioned in the letter, Edkins tried to show that the languages of Europe and Asia have a common origin by comparing the Chinese and the Indo-European vocabularies.