Эдвард Гранвилл Браун: британский иранист (1862–1926)

British Iranologist (1862–1926)

Edward Granville Browne FBA (7 February 1862 – 5 January 1926) was a British Iranologist. He published numerous articles and books, mainly in the areas of history and literature.

Browne was born in Stouts Hill, Uley, Gloucestershire, England, the son of civil engineer Benjamin Chapman Browne and his wife, Annie. He was educated at Trinity College, Glenalmond, Burnside's School in Berkshire, Eton College, and the Newcastle College of Physical Science. He then read natural sciences at Pembroke College, Cambridge. He also studied Arabic with Edward Henry Palmer and William Wright, Persian with Edward Byles Cowell, and Turkish with Sir James Redhouse, motivated by an interest in the Turkish people. After graduating in 1882 he travelled to Constantinople. Browne then spent a further two years at University of Cambridge studying the languages of India (defined then as Hindustani, Sanskrit, Persian, and Arabic) and also gained an M. B. in London. In 1887 he was made a Fellow of Pembroke, and then paid an extended visit to Iran. He returned to become a university lecturer in Persian. In April 1902 he was elected Sir Thomas Adams's Professor of Arabic at the University of Cambridge. Browne was mainly responsible for the creation at Cambridge of a school of living languages of Asia, in connection with the training of candidates for the Egyptian and Sudanese civil services, and the Lebanese consular service. He was on his sixtieth birthday the recipient of a large Festschrift. Browne was one of the original trustees of the E. J. W. Gibb Memorial, an organisation which since 1905 has published the Gibb Memorial Series.

In London (1885), Browne met Haji Pirzadeh Naeini, a famous intellectual mystic and world traveler of the Qajar dynasty period, through whom he broadened his interest and knowledge of Persian history, culture, and language. Naeini gave Browne a set of Soufi garb, and received the title of "Mazhar e Ali" "Manifestation of Ali." Browne wore the garb in his meetings with Persians and used the title in signing all his Persian correspondence and writings. In return, Browne called Pirzadeh "the guide of the path" and "the repository of the secrets of truth" and "the sage seeker of the path". This relationship led Browne not only to broaden his knowledge and interest in Persia (Iran) but also to ask the British Foreign Office to be assigned consul at the British Embassy to Tehran, which eventually resulted in his publishing A Year Amongst The Persians in 1893.

Browne married Alice Caroline (daughter of Francis Henry Blackburne Daniell) in 1906, including the judge Sir Patrick Browne. He died in 1926 in Cambridge.