Tag Archives: Obituary

Obituary: Typhaine Cann (1986–2025)

Typhaine Cann (1986–2025)

It was with profound shock and sorrow that we learned of the death of the exceptionally talented young French Mongolist and Cultural anthropologist, Typhaine Cann, who passed away on June 7, 2025. This devastating news is difficult to grasp; in our grief, we join Typhaine’s family, friends, and colleagues in mourning her loss.

Born in 1986 in Brest, a coastal city on France’s western edge, Typhaine devoted her studies to the exploration of cultures in their many dimensions. Alongside her work in anthropology, she pursued studies in political science (Institute of Political Sciences, Lille) and social sciences (UBO / Lycée de Kérichen, Brest).

Her first encounter with Mongolia came in 2005, when she began working as an intern at the French Embassy in Ulaanbaatar. This experience, renewed over several years, marked the beginning of a lifelong dedication to Mongolian culture and history.

Typhaine earned her master’s degree in 2009 and her first PhD in cultural anthropology in 2014 at the University of Western Brittany (UBO), Brest. Her dissertation, L’invention du paysage culturel sous-marin: le traitement en patrimoine des épaves de la Mer d’Iroise et ses ambiguïtés (link), examined how scuba divers engaged in preserving underwater cultural heritage appropriate and reinvent history – both collective and personal memory – through their practices. Her city of Brest, occupied by the German Navy for four years and later destroyed by Allied bombardments, provided a poignant context for her research on the weight of memory. In 2016, her dissertation was published as the monograph Secrets d’épaves, plongeurs, archéologues, collectionneurs (Presses universitaires de Rennes, link).

From 2014, Typhaine worked as a Research Associate at the University of Western Brittany, teaching courses on Anthropology and patrimonialisation, Material civilisation, Tourism and identity, Introduction to anthropology, and Maritime anthropology. Beginning in 2015, she conducted extensive fieldwork in Mongolia, often for several months each year, in association with the Academy of Sciences, Department of History and Archaeology, focusing especially on Zuungov’ province. Alongside her scholarly pursuits, she also served as an official interpreter of Mongolian for French courts.

It was the late Alexander Vovin who first drew my attention to Typhaine, and after our initial exchanges, I was honored to become the supervisor of her second PhD, this time in Mongolian studies. After long preparations, she began her doctoral training at the University of Szeged. This period of collaboration proved extraordinarily fruitful, thanks to her tireless energy and intellectual curiosity. Despite the disruptions of the covid pandemic, Typhaine relocated to Ulaanbaatar to gather crucial material for her dissertation. In 2021, she presented on site at PIAC’s only hybrid session in Ulaanbaatar, delivering her paper The invention of the national hero in socialist Mongolia: Magsarzhav, Sükhbaatar, Choibalsan.

Her stamina and dedication were remarkable. While completing and defending her second doctoral dissertation at the University of Szeged – Heroes, exemplars and mediators. The concept of patriotism in the Mongolian historical novel of the socialist era (link) – she simultaneously undertook the monumental task of translating one of Mongolia’s literary classics, Chadraabalyn Lodoidamba’s Tungalag Tamir, published in 2024 as La Tamir aux eaux limpides (Transboréal, link). This translation represented a major contribution to the dissemination of Mongolian literature in Europe, extending its reach well beyond a specialist readership.

Following her successful defense, Typhaine immediately began translating Byambyn Rinchen’s novel Üüriin Tuyaa. She was full of plans for the future: her next academic ambition was to pursue the Doctor of Science degree at the Mongolian Academy of Sciences. Yet time was too short, and this extraordinary path was cut short by her untimely passing in the country she had chosen as her second homeland.

For those of us who knew her, her death leaves an irreplaceable void.

Dear Teegii, Бурхны оронд тайван нойрсдоо!

 

Ákos Bertalan Apatóczky
August 30, 2025

Obituary: Michael Weiers

In Memoriam
Michael Weiers
(December 26, 1937 — July 17, 2025)

Michael Weiers was born in Bernried am Starnberger See, in one of the most beautiful landscapes of Bavaria, on the second day of Christmas of the year 1937. His grammar school years (the proper German term is Gymnasium) offered him a broad exposure to the world of classical languages as Greek and Latin were a mandatory part of the grammar school curriculum.

This exposure to the intellectual heritage of Europe is a core objective of the idea of humanism, a worldview the foundations of which are rooted in Classical antiquity.

It must have been this education in combination with the proximity of Bavaria to Italy (by far not only in the sense of geography, but also determined by those immaterial sentiments of life [“Lebensgefühl”, as the Germans would say] as reflected in Baroque decorative arts and religious life) that made the young Michael Weiers explore Italy during his university years. From 1958 onwards, he did not only attend university in Munich and (later) Bonn, but also spent years in Rome and Naples.

The subjects he studied truly reflected both the spirit of Renaissance Man, or, equally true, the ideals of the late 19th century idea of a linguist and philologist commanding a vast array of languages. He took courses in Semitic studies, followed by Manju, Mongolian, Chinese and Tibetan studies, and he broadened his horizon by taking classes in Turkology, Islamic studies, Central Asian studies in Language and Culture, as well as Comparative Religious studies. Throughout his academic life, his most productive focus was centered in the fields of Manju and Mongolian studies, assisted and supported by all the other fields he was interested in during his formative years at university.

During his university years (and later on), he had the privilege to attend classes held by the most prominent authorities in their respective fields. His curriculum vitae lists, among others, Herbert Franke, Helmut Hoffmann, Joachim Kissling, Giuseppe Tucci, Luciano Petech, Francesco Gabrieli, Alessio Bombaci and Walther Heissig, many of whom were later to become prominent contributors to the Permanent International Altaistic Conference (PIAC), or, in the case of Walther Heissig, one of the founding fathers of the PIAC.

In his scholarly work, Michael Weiers had a strong interest in the rule-based foundations of language in general, and their many expressions in linguistic and philological practice. His Ph.D. dissertation in 1965 on the historical grammar of preclassical Mongolian was considered outstanding (Latin: egregie) and was honoured with the Prize of the Association of Friends of the University of Bonn (short in German: “Geffrub-Preis”). He rose through the ranks of the University of Bonn which would become his life-long intellectual home base from where he undertook numerous expeditions. To name just one example, he conducted field work among the Moghol in Herat, Afghanistan (1969–1972); basis of an authoritative monograph and series of papers which qualified him for the post of professor in 1972. He would hold this status until his retirement in 2003.

One field in which he made singular contributions was the study and research of the so-called Old Manju Archive Materials, or Jiu Manzhou Dang 舊滿洲檔 being the precursor to—and sometimes erroneously taken for—the more widely known Manwen Laodang. He was the only European scholar working on this subject which traditionally was considered a Chinese and Japanese domain. His field work in Taiwan in 1971 brought a rich harvest of Manju and Mongolian materials, source for many of his later papers.

In his publications (his bibliography lists approximately 350 titles, the last one published recently, in 2022), he covered a number of fields. The languages of the Mongolian language family were but one of his fields of interest. He also was either editor or co-editor of journals like Zentralasiatische Studien or series like Aetas Manjurica, to name just two examples. Besides his scholarly work, he had a keen interest in disseminating the knowledge of his field to broader audiences. He contributed at least a dozen or more articles to the Brockhaus Enzyklopädie, a flagship of German encyclopediae with roots in the Age of Enlightenment. Yet, the encyclopedia as such was not only a means of disseminating knowledge, it was also subject of his research he conducted on the lexicology and lexicography of Mongolian and Manju. It is no wonder at all that he also contributed the article on “Mongolian Lexicography” in Wörterbücher. Ein internationales Handbuch zur Lexikographie (Dictionaries. An International Encyclopedia of Lexicography).

Michael Weiers attended three Meetings of the PIAC, in 1974, 1977 and 1984.

One of his closest colleagues broke the news of Michael Weiers’ departure to the author of these lines with the words “the ranks are thinning out”. True this is, and deeply saddening as well. The community of Altaic scholars mourns the loss of an outstanding peer.

Oliver Corff
Secretary General
July 20th, 2025

In Memoriam Roberte Hamayon (1939 — 2025)

The journal Études mongoles et sibériennes, centre-asiatiques et tibétaines (EMSCAT) and the Société des études mongoles et sibériennes are deeply saddened to announce the passing of Roberte Hamayon (Nicole Devaux in civilian life), on March 18, 2025.

An anthropologist and linguist, founder of Mongolian studies in France, of the “Centre d’études mongoles et sibériennes” (CEMS) and of our journal (originally titled Études mongoles at its inception in 1970, renamed Études mongoles et sibériennes in 1981, and then EMSCAT in 2006), director of studies at the École Pratique des Hautes Études (EPHE), an internationally recognized theorist of shamanism and play, Roberte Hamayon transformed the landscape of studies on Northern Asia in France and around the world. Her decisive contribution to understanding the mechanisms of belief, the uses of metaphor, and the ritual life of Mongolian and Siberian populations made her one of the great French anthropologists of our time.

***

Born in 1939 in Paris, Roberte Hamayon attended Évelyne Lot-Falck’s seminars at the EPHE from 1963, right after the creation of the Chair of Religions of Northern Eurasia and the Arctic that same year, upon Claude Lévi-Strauss’s initiative. After training in ethnology and linguistics and acquiring a strong command of Russian, she took the opportunity of the establishment of diplomatic relations between France and the People’s Republic of Mongolia in 1965 and the signing of an exchange protocol between the CNRS and the Mongolian Academy of Sciences to undertake her first research trip to Mongolia. Alongside Françoise Aubin (1932-2017), she was the first researcher from a “capitalist” country to visit the National University of Ulaanbaatar in 1967. She would return numerous times throughout the 1970s, as well as to the Soviet Union to work with Buryat populations.

Back from her first ethnographic fieldwork in the fall of 1967, she established a Mongolian language and culture program at the Institut National des Langues et Civilisations Orientales (INALCO, then known as the École nationale des langues orientales vivantes) in Paris, where she taught until 1973, when Jacques Legrand succeeded her.

After an initial position at the Musée de l’Homme as a librarian in 1960, she was recruited by the Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS) as a technical collaborator in 1963, then as a researcher in 1965. In 1968, she joined the Laboratoire d’Ethnologie et de Sociologie Comparative (LESC) at the University of Paris X Nanterre, founded the previous year by Éric de Dampierre. With his active support, she established the Centre d’études mongoles in 1969 (which became the Centre d’études mongoles et sibériennes in 1976) and founded the annual journal Études Mongoles the following year (renamed Études mongoles et sibériennes in 1976, and later Études mongoles & sibériennes, centrasiatiques & tibétaines in 2004).

In 1974, she was elected director of studies at the EPHE, succeeding Évelyne Lot-Falck in the Chair of Religions of Northern Asia, which she held until her retirement in 2007 (the chair, renamed Chair of the Anthropology of religions, is now held by Grégory Delaplace). During her years at the EPHE, while maintaining strong ties with the University of Paris X and the LESC, where she served as director from 1988 to 1994, she trained a new generation of researchers specializing in Mongolia and Siberia, who contributed alongside her to the development of the field.

Leaving the LESC in 2002, Roberte Hamayon joined the GEODE (now Sophiapol, EA 3932), before settling at the Groupe Sociétés, Religions, Laïcités (GSRL, UMR 8582) in 2004 and until her retirement. In 2002, the CEMS documentary collection was transferred from Nanterre to the EPHE before being integrated into the Grand Équipement Documentaire of the Humathèque. The EMSCAT journal, institutionally affiliated with the EPHE, is now published by the Société des études mongoles et sibériennes (SEMS), which Roberte Hamayon founded in 2013.

While her work was deeply rooted in North Asian ethnography, Roberte Hamayon’s influence extended far beyond the Siberian-Mongolian region. Her thought inspired anthropologists specializing in various cultural areas, as well as sociologists, historians, and philosophers in France, Canada, Japan, and beyond. She gained international recognition with the publication of her major work, La Chasse à l’âme. Esquisse d’une théorie du chamanisme sibérien (Société d’ethnologie, Nanterre, 1990), which established her as a key theorist of religions. The publication, 22 years later, of Jouer. Une étude anthropologique (Paris, La Découverte, 2012, translated in 2016 as Why We Play. An Anthropological Study, Chicago, Hau Books), exploring the power of metaphor and proposing play as a mode of action, further refined her decisive contributions to early 21st century social and cultural anthropology. Roberte Hamayon also made significant contributions to ethnolinguistics, notably with the publication of Éléments de grammaire mongole, co-authored with Marie-Lise Beffa (Paris, Dunod, 1975).

In 2006, she was awarded the CNRS Silver Medal in recognition of her entire career. The Mongolian state honoured her with the Medal of Friendship (Nairamdal, in 2005) and later with the Order of the Polar Star (Altan Gadas, in 2016), the highest distinction awarded to a foreigner. In 2016, she received the Onon Prize from the Mongolia and Inner Asia Studies Unit at the University of Cambridge for her contributions to Mongolian studies. In 2020, she was awarded an honorary doctorate by the University of Fribourg (Switzerland).

A first tribute volume was gifted to her upon her retirement, edited by Katia Buffetrille, Jean-Luc Lambert, Nathalie Luca, and Anne de Sales: D’une anthropologie du chamanisme vers une anthropologie du croire (EMSCAT, Special Issue, 2013), followed in 2023 by a special issue of Cahiers d’Extrême-Asie dedicated to the importance of her thought for religious studies in the Chinese world (vol. 30, 2021). The number and diversity of contributions in these two volumes reflect the vast intellectual legacy she leaves behind.

Beyond her exceptional scientific legacy, those who became her students and colleagues, both French and international, remember above all her dedication to students, her constant availability, her optimism, and her kindness. We have lost a mentor, a role model, and a friend, but we will continue for many years to come to harvest the fruits of what she had sown.

[Reproduced with permission by EMSCAT, March 31, 2025]

In Memoriam János Hóvári (1955 — 2023)

Ambassador János Hóvári in spring 2022

With shock and utter disbelief we had to learn of Ambassador János Hóvári’s untimely and totally unforeseeable death within a few days after the end of the 65th Annual Meeting of the PIAC in Astana, 2023.

János was a remarkable and outstanding person who excelled both as a scholar and a diplomat. Having graduated from Eötvös Loránd University with a diploma in Turkish history in 1979, he worked as a research associate at the Institute of History of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences, and at the same time he was a university lecturer at the Institute of History at the Teacher Training Faculty of Janus Pannonius University until 1992 when he entered the diplomatic service of Hungary. His first assignment was in the Department of Central Asia and Transcaucasia at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.  In 1997, he obtained a PhD in history from the University of Pécs. Since 2008, he held several posts as ambassador in Israel, Kuwait, Bahrain and Turkey. In his last position, he was the Executive Director of Hungary’s Representation Office of the Organization of Turkic States.

While János never formally was a participant of a PIAC meeting, he nonetheless closely followed PIAC affairs; his support was essential for organizing two PIAC meetings. Since it was impossible to hold the 64th PIAC Meeting 2022 in Moscow,  as originally announced, he opened doors in Hungary at the Institute of Oriental Languages and Cultures, Faculty of Humanities of Károli Gáspár University of the Reformed Church in Hungary and at the Organization of Turkic States. He also recommended his long-time friend Uli Schamiloglu (they had known each other for half of their lives) and Nazarbayev University, Astana (Kazakhstan) as a possible host for the 65th Annual Meeting of the PIAC, a recommendation to prove auspicious as we just held a wonderful meeting in Astana a week ago at the time of this writing. All words of gratitude for his contributions to the PIAC are too late, and thus their only place is here.

János is remembered as a sharp-minded, yet soft-spoken, gentle, and generous human being; his friends find no words for his sudden departure.

Oliver Corff
Secretary General
August 9, 2023

 

In Memoriam Giovanni Stary

– A Sublime and Humane Ambassador of Manju Scholarship –
Giovanni Stary
(March 27, 1946 – October 19, 2022)

Giovanni Enrico Stary (he rarely used his middle name) was born in Merano in South Tyrol, on March 27, 1946. It may be a coincidence that he was born in a city known through the ages as a residence of scholars and writers alike; it may be another coincidence that South Tyrol, an autonomous province in northern Italy, being home to Germans and Italians, enjoying a strong regional culture, is a prominent model of a region where multiple languages and cultures co-exist in a community. In a wider sense, this may also be said of the Manju nation, their language, culture and religion, subject of the life-long academic interest of Giovanni Stary.

Giovanni Stary studied Classical Chinese at the Istituto Universitario Orientale, at Naples. His doctoral dissertation, defended in 1969, was the ouverture to a lifelong occupation with Central Asia and China: “I primi rapporti tra Russia e Cina. Documenti e testimonianze” [Early relations between Russia and China. Documents and testimonies.], later published in Naples in 1974. A German treatise followed soon, in 1976: “Chinas Erste Gesandte in Russland”. Among these earliest envoys are the Manju diplomat Tulišen, whose report Lakcaha jecen de takûraha babe ejehe bithe [“Book of the remote border areas recorded by the embassy”; the title also being interpreted—rather than translated—as “Narrative of the Chinese Embassy to the Khan of the Tourgouth Tartars”] (in Chinese: 異域錄). Tulišen and his text have been known in the West since the end of the 18th century. Far less known is the fate of Tuoshi and Daisin missions, the Tuoshi mission being systematically purged from the record under Qianlong; the “Draft History of Qing” (清史稿) neither mentions Tuoshi nor Empress Anna or their encounters in 1731 and 1732 at all, only the “History of Qing from Beginning to End” (清史紀事本末), compiled in the early years of the Chinese Republic by Huang Hongshou, mentions Tuoshi’s mission and encounter with Empress Anna.

Beginning with his dissertation thesis, Giovanni Stary made Manju studies an integral element and later central foundation of his scholarly work. To him, Manju never was an extinct or dead language, and his occupation with and dedication to Manju studies never was what is known in some academic circles, occasionally in a mildly disparaging tone, as Hilfswissenschaft. Rather, Manju studies were to him an essentially contemporary field. Thus, he dedicated a considerable portion of his energy to researching Sibe, a modern, yet endangered branch of the Tungusic languages which is still spoken today in Xinjiang and is mutually intelligible with Manju. He published “Epengesänge der Sibe-Mandschuren” (1988), the “Taschenwörterbuch Sibemandschurisch–Deutsch” (1990) and the “‘Schamanenbuch’ der Sibe-Mandschuren” (1992). Whoever among his wide circle of friends happened to travel to China, or better, Xinjiang, was asked to buy every available publication in Sibe.

Beyond scholarly work, he also disseminated his knowledge and understanding of Manju culture to a broader audience. A representative title is “On the Tracks of Manchu Culture. 1644–1994. 350 Years after the Conquest of Peking” (1995). This book contains more than 200 illustrations reflecting the rich heritage of Manju history, inscriptions and material culture, both in the Manju heartland as well as beyond its borders. The book even offers a rare glimpse into the contemporary life of Cabcal Sibe Autonomous County during the year 1991; at that time, public signboards still showed Sibe Manju texts on top, with their Chinese equivalents below — a vivid demonstration of Sibe being indeed the primary language of Cabcal.

Besides his own writing, Giovanni Stary edited and published numerous sources (e.g. “Ars Poetica Manjurica”, 1989, and “Materialien zur Vorgeschichte der Qing-Dynastie”, 1996, to name just two titles), frequently in collaboration with life-long colleagues.

Giovanni Stary was a faithful friend of the PIAC family; he participated in at least 25 Annual Meetings and was the President of the 28th Annual Meeting which was held in Venice in 1985 (he also published the Proceedings volume of this meeting in 1989). His outstanding academic contributions to the field of Altaic studies were recognized with the Indiana University Prize for Altaic Studies, or PIAC Medal in short, in 2006.

Beyond his own research and writing, Giovanni Stary always played a catalytic role in the field. He published dozens of scholarly reviews (the author of these lines counted more than 70 but is not at all sure whether he found all reviews written by him), thus sharing his own broad knowledge of recent work and increasing the visibility of other scholars and their research within the community.

If anything more needs to be said, then that Giovanni Stary was a true bridge between generations of scholars; in prominent position, he mentions Walter Fuchs and Shunju Imanishi as academical teachers. A similar relationship holds true for the author of these lines who, over nearly 20 years, received continuous support and critical feedback from Giovanni Stary along his own humble steps of Manju studies. His guiding spirit will live on and his work will be a source of inspiration to continue Manju studies in a way which demonstrates the lasting significance of the field.

Giovanni Stary was an immediate child of the end of World War II; the peaceful end of the Cold War and the ensuing demise of the Eastern Bloc created a historical window of opportunity for research, academic collaboration and friendship across many borders, as his writings reflect. It must have been painful for him to see this window closing again.

Everybody who knew Giovanni was aware of his frail health in recent years, but everybody was devastated to hear that the wonderful human being he was no longer is with us. Over decades of fruitful collaboration, many of his colleagues become close friends, and we all mourn, with great sadness, his departure.

Oliver Corff
Secretary General
November 5th, 2022.

Obituaries

Dear Reader,

obituaries are an important means to share the memories of a person who has passed away. The writer of the obituary shares his or her knowledge of the deceased and, very often, shares the perceptions and sentiments related to that person. An obituary is thus a pathway to contribute to collective memory by sharing these individual observations and sentiments.

In a scholarly environment, collective memory is the essence of all academic pursuit. Without the achievements (and occasional errors) of our predecessors, meaningful reasoning would be simply impossible. It is thus understandable that writing obituaries is one of the many tasks of a scholar who takes history as the most important source of progress. In this tradition, PIAC members dedicate obituaries to their fellow members who have passed away.

References to obituaries dedicated to the following scholars, but published outside the domain of altaist.org, were added recently.

Oliver Corff, September 13, 2022

Mourning Alexander (Sasha) Vovin

The members of the PIAC community mourn Alexander (Sasha) Vovin, directeur d’études, Centre de recherches linguistiques sur l’Asie orientale (CRLAO), École des hautes études en sciences sociales (ÉHESS), who passed away in Paris on April 8, 2022. He leaves to the academic world a rich and complex oeuvre encompassing trail-blazing studies in historical linguistics on ancient and classical East Asian languages, in particular Japanese, Korean, Mongolic and Tungusic. His research interests and the vast number of his published works cover many more languages and approaches, and inspired and will continue to inspire a large circle of colleagues and students all over the world. Alexander Vovin was not only an exceptional scholar but also served the academic community in his capacity of academic teacher, editor, referee, convenor of conferences and recipient of research funds.

Sasha was a longtime friend and supporter of the PIAC. In 1986 he attended an Annual Meeting (Tashkent) for the first time. At the Meeting in 2017 (Székesfehérvár) which he attended with his wife Sambi Ishisaki-Vovin and two children, he presented first results of the spectacular analysis of the Brahmi Khüis Tolgoi and Bugut inscriptions, a project which he developed jointly with other PIAC colleagues D. Maue, M. Ölmez and E. de la Vaissière.

Sasha was a wonderful companion, sociable, outgoing and endowed with a rare sense of humour, not to forget his refreshing talent for constructive criticism. The PIAC community will greatly miss this unusually successful scholar and esteemed friend.

Barbara Kellner-Heinkele
Secretary General
April 10, 2022

In memoriam Dmitry D. Vasiliev (1946 – 2021)

Dmitry Vasilyev

Дмитрий Дмитриевич Васильев (October 11, 1946 – January 18, 2021)

On January 18, 2021, due to complications resulting from coronavirus infection, Dmitry D. Vasiliev (Дмитрий Дмитриевич Васильев, October 11, 1946 – January 18, 2021) PhD (Hist.) famous Russian orientalist-turkologist, head of the Department of History of the Orient, Institute of Oriental Studies, Russian Academy of Sciences, Moscow, passed away at the age of 75.

He was a talented organizer of science and particularly successful as the– head of epigraphic expeditions of the Institute of Oriental Studies, Russian Academy of Sciences, for the study of monuments of ancient Turkic writing in Southern Siberia. He was a vice-president of the Society of Orientalists of the Russian Academy of Sciences, a corresponding member of the Russian Academy of Natural Sciences, Honored Scientist of the Republic of Tuva, and an honorary member of the Atatürk Kültür, Dil ve Tarih Yüksek Kurumu (Atatürk Culture, Language and History High Authority).

The main field of Dmitry D. Vasiliev’s scientific investigations was research and systematization of monuments in ancient Turkic script. In 1983 he defended his PhD thesis on the topic “Paleographic systematization of monuments in the Turkic runic script of the Asian area”.

Dmitry D. Vasiliev is the author of a large number of scientific monographs and articles, including “Corpus of monuments in the Turkic runic script of the Yenisei basin” (1983), “Graphic fund of monuments in the Turkic runic script of the Asian area” (1983), “ORHUN” (1995), “Orthodox shrines of the Balkans” (co-authored) (2004), “Corpus of Turkic runic inscriptions of South Siberia” (2013), “From Central Asia to Anatolia. City and Man” (2013) (in Russian, English and Turkish), “Crimea in the Past in Old Photographs” (2006) (co-authored).

D. Vasiliev’s scholarly prestige was also underlined by his membership of editorial boards of Russian and foreign scientific periodicals such as “Vostok” (Orient), “Vostochnyy Archiv” (Oriental Archives), “Epigrafika Vostoka” (Epigraphy of the East), “Tyurkologiya” (Turkology) (Turkestan, Kazakhstan), “Vestnik Instituta Vostokovedeniya RAN” (Journal of the Institute of Oriental Studies RAS), “Vostochnyy kur’yer” (Oriental Сourier).

Paying great attention to scientific and teaching activities, D. Vasiliev taught since 1995 at the Russian State University for the Humanities where he held Turkish language classes and gave the courses “Introduction to Turkology”, “Country Studies”, and “Historiography of Turkey”. He educated a pleiad of young scholars who now successfully work in various Russian research institutes.

D. Vasiliev made a huge contribution to the development of Turkology in Russia. He had the honour of winning numerous awards, including the Kublai Khan medal (Mongolian Academy of Sciences), the medal “For services in the development of science of the Republic of Kazakhstan”, the commemorative medal “For the contribution to the study of history and culture of the Republic of Tuva”, the “I. Yu. Krachkovsky medal” of the Institute of Oriental Studies, the award “For services in the field of culture, history, language and literature of the world of the Turkic peoples” from the Turkish Foundation “International Valeh Hacilar Foundation of Science and Research”. In 2020, by the decree of the Government of the Republic of Tuva, D. Vasiliev was awarded the order “For Labor Valor” for his contribution to the development of science in the republic.

D. Vasiliev was a high-level professional, distinguished by deep knowledge of the subject of research, breadth of scientific interests, as well as high human qualities.

Dmitry Vasiliev’s sudden departure from life is an irreparable loss for his relatives, friends and colleagues.

Source: Homepage of the Institut Vostokovedenia RAN, translated by Elena V. Boykova.

The Institute of Oriental Manuscripts of the RAN also published an obituary.

The international PIAC family mourns D. D. Vasiliev who attended a number of Annual Meetings where his jovial presence, kindness and fine humour were appreciated by everybody.

Volker Rybatzki (1957–2018) in memoriam


As became known only now, the outstanding Altaist Volker Rybatzki passed away on June 13, 2018.

Volker was born in Hannover (Lower Saxony) on February 17, 1957. He was not particularly interested in school and left gymnasium three years before the final examination. His father wanted him to learn the profession of a wholesaler, but Volker did not like it, and left the apprenticeship after one year. On a trip through Finland, he became enchanted with the country and met Irmeli (Inkku) Arffman, the girl that, some years later, became his first wife. They started to be together, and soon Volker decided to live in Finland, learn Finnish and improve his formal education by attending evening school. Afterwards, Volker would have liked to study sinology which, however, was not available as a major at Helsinki University at that time. An alternative would have been Berlin (the only possible place, as he had not served in the army) but, as Irmeli wanted to study textile design and the Crafts and Design College of Kuopio replied faster than Berlin University, they decided to go there. Here, Volker took a training as cabinet-maker. After two years, Volker had become convinced that he would never become an outstanding craftsman and decided on studying, as of 1988, Turkology and Mongolistics (as the best choice after sinology) at Helsinki University. Concurrently, he worked at the Orientalia Library of the Institute for Asian and African Studies. To deepen and enlarge his knowledge, in 1997 he spent 9 months in Szeged (Hungary), studying Turkology with Prof. Árpád Berta and, later, he was in Venice (Italy) to study Manchu with Prof. Giovanni Stary.

In 1998 he co-organized the PIAC, in 1999 he took his master’s degree (with Die Toñuquq-Inschrift as a thesis) and was accepted as a Ph.D. student at the University. He then worked hard on his Ph.D. which he defended in 2006, under Prof. Juha Janhunen, and with Prof. Claus Schönig (Freie Universität Berlin) as opponent. His thesis Die Personennamen und Titel der mittelmongolischen Dokumente: eine lexikalische Untersuchung was a massive volume of 900 pages.

In 2007, Volker took his habilitation and thus became a docent (lecturer) of Altaic Studies. As it was difficult, however, to find a tenured position in this field anywhere, Volker accepted teaching and research jobs wherever available, e.g. at Stockholm University and at Minzu daxue in Beijing. Notwithstanding this, he always continued to teach his courses as a docent of Altaic Studies at Helsinki University.

Besides publishing scholarly articles, he worked assiduously on his major project, an etymological dictionary of the (middle) Mongolian language, a particularly challenging and ambitious enterprise to which he dedicated most of his academic career. Unfortunately, he had not the time to finish it.

His (second) wife, Alessandra Pozzi (a specialist on Manchu and Chinese), three children of his first, two of his second marriage, and two grandchildren survive him.

Most of Volker’s publications are listed (and downloadable) on: helsinki.academia.edu/VolkerRybatzki

Therefore, only his monographs are mentioned here:

Die Toñuquq-Inschrift. Szeged: Univ. 1997. 130 pp.

Writing in the Altaic world [proceedings of the 41st Annual Meeting of the Permanent International Altaistic Conference (PIAC)] (with Juha Janhunen). Helsinki: Finnish Oriental Society 1999. 326 pp.

Die Personennamen und Titel der mittelmongolischen Dokumente: eine lexikalische Untersuchung. Helsinki: [Helsingin yliopisto] 2006. XXXVI, 841 pp. (Publications of the Institute for Asian and African Studies 8.)

The early Mongols; language, culture and history; studies in honor of Igor de Rachewiltz on the occasion of his 80th birthday (with Alessandra Pozzi, Peter W. Geier, John R. Krueger). Bloomington, IN: D. Sinor Institute for Inner Asian Studies 2009. XXXIII, 217 pp.

Introduction to Altaic philology; Turkic, Mongolian, Manchu (with Igor de Rachewiltz).

Leiden: Brill 2010. XX,446 pp.

Biographical data may be found in:

Lotta Aunio & Juha Janhunen (eds.): Miten minusta tuli tohtori – Itämaiden tutkijat kertovat.

Helsinki: Suomen Itämainen Seura 2012, 282–291

Hartmut Walravens

Obituary: Roger Finch

In Memoriam
Roger Finch
(April 17, 1937 – October 4, 2019)

Let us all go cultivate our gardens.
(Voltaire, Candide)

Roger Finch was born on April 17, 1937, in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, son of Willard and Phyllis (Creek) Finch, and died on October 4, 2019, of cardiac arrest.

Roger Finch graduated from George Washington University with a B.A. majoring in music and Harvard University with a PhD in linguistics. In 1977, after graduating from Harvard he was offered a position in Tokyo, Japan, writing textbooks for Japanese learning English. He started teaching English at Waseda University. and later moved to Sophia University in Tokyo where he taught—besides English—Modern American Poetry and phonology as well as historical and comparative linguistics. Through an introduction by Professor Paul Takei, he accepted a tenured position at Surugadai University near Tokyo in 1990 when he had already been pondering a possible return to the United States, intending to settle at his house in Maine which he had bought a long time ago.

The position at Surugadai University proved to be most fortunate; as he once wrote, he was impressed by the modern, new, attractive and well-equipped premises of the University (which had only been established three years earlier, in 1987). Given his profound love for nature, the trees and the hilly surroundings of the university campus certainly were hugely attractive to him, as he confessed once when resigning from his post. Yet, it was most important to him that he quickly made friends with colleagues, staff members and students alike, developing lasting friendships. Of his students, he spoke in terms of admiration, affectionately praising their polite manners, desire to learn and profound attention. Prior to his return to the United States in 2008, he honoured these bonds developed over two decades by encouraging his friends to visit him in Maine.

After retirement, Roger Finch dedicated his life to the things he loved most: linguistic research, writing poetry, and music composition. He once estimated that the share of his scholarly work would decrease in favour of poetry and music, but nonetheless he continued to contribute substantial, well-researched papers, combining his favourite interests when writing. His papers about subjects as diverse as folk bird taxonomies in Japan (“日本の鳥類の民間分類”, [Nihon no chôrui no minkan bunrui], Surugadai daigaku ronsô, No. 36 (2008), pp. 49–80 (this is the Japanese version of a paper presented at the 49th Annual Meeting of the PIAC in Berlin, 2006), or „Christianity among the Cumans“ Surugadai daigaku ronsô, No. 35 (2008), pp. 75–96, or „The Reconstruction of Proto-Altaic *p-“, Surugadai daigaku ronsô, No. 28 (2004), pp. 69–99, or „Musical Instruments in Uigur Literature and Art“ Surugadai daigaku ronsô, No. 24 (2002), pp. 23–53, to mention just a few papers he published during his tenure at Surugadai University, demonstrate Roger Finch’s encyclopaedic scholarship. It is difficult to say whether his attention to minutiae, combined with a broad scope of diverse interests, as demonstrated in his scholarly work was an inborn personal trait or perhaps was acquired in the scholarly environment in Japan, but one way or the other, his personal mindset and Japan‘s scholarly values complemented each other in a most auspicious and beneficial way.

Over nearly two decades Roger Finch has been a faithful PIAC member, participating at least eight times since 1998, yet the earliest connection can be traced to 1989 when Denis Sinor announced some of Roger Finch‘s recent publications in the PIAC Newsletter. His contribution to the 56th Annual Meeting, Kocaeli 2013, waits to be published.

Roger Finch was also praised for his knowledge and command of Turkish. Let him describe, in his own translation of a prophetical masterpiece of Turkish poetry by Yahya Kemal Beyatli (1884-1958), the last voyage he embarked on:

Silent ship

If there comes a time to raise anchor from time, one day more,
A ship will set out from this harbor toward an unknown shore.
It makes way silently, as though it held no living soul;
At that unrocking parting no hand waves as the lines unroll.

Roger Finch leaves his spouse, Louis Hargan, equally faithfully a PIAC member, and his sisters, to whom I offer my deepest condolences.

Oliver Corff, October 12, 2019.

(Note: Edited the same day: two forgotten words added, and poem properly attributed to Yahya Kemal Beyatli. OC, 2019-10-12, 21:47 CEST/CEDT)