H. H. Wilson

Horace Hayman Wilson (26 September 1786 – 8 May 1860) was an English orientalist. He studied medicine at St Thomas's Hospital, and went out to India in 1808 as assistant-surgeon on the Bengal establishment of the British East India Company. His knowledge of metallurgy caused him to be attached to the mint at Calcutta, where he was for a time associated with John Leyden.

He became deeply interested in the ancient language and literature of India, and by the recommendation of Henry Thomas Colebrooke, he was in 1811 appointed secretary to the Asiatic Society of Bengal. In 1813 he published the Sanskrit text with a graceful, if somewhat free, translation in English rhymed verse of Kalidasa's charming lyrical poem, the Meghaduuta, or Cloud-Messenger.

He prepared the first Sanskrit-English Dictionary (1819) from materials compiled by native scholars, supplemented by his own researches. This work was only superseded by the Sanskritwörterbuch (1853–1876) of Rudolf Roth and Otto von Böhtlingk, who expressed their obligations to Wilson in the preface to their great work.

He was interested in Ayurveda and traditional Indian medical and surgical practices. He compiled the local practices observed for cholera and leprosy in his publications in the Medical and Physical Society of Calcutta.

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