Archives – Personal Papers

Our Personal Papers include material from the founding members of the Society, prominent Orientalists and other figures associated with the work of the Society.

Below are some examples of the catalogued Personal Papers within the Society’s collections, arranged in alphabetical order by surname. The individual catalogues may be accessed by clicking on ‘Papers’ and a webpage or blogpost about the individual may be accessed by clicking on their name.

A-C

• The Papers of William Edward David Allen (1901-1973) – Caucasian historian
• The Papers of John Drew Bate (1836-1923) – Baptist missionary and creator of Hindi dictionary
• The Papers of Francis Buchanan-Hamilton (1762-1829) – Scottish physician, geographer, zoologist, botanist
• The Papers of Richard Francis Burton (1821-1890) – eccentric explorer, adventurer, soldier, writer and orientalist
• The Papers of James Caulfeild (1782-1852)  – soldier and political officer in India
• The Papers of Ram Gharib Chaube (d. 1914) – collector of Indian religious and folk songs for William Crooke
• The Papers of John Cecil Cloake (1924-2014) – Foreign Office diplomat
• The Papers of Henry Thomas Colebrooke (1765-1837) – eminent Sanskrit scholar and founder of the RAS
• The Papers of Sir Charles Colville (1770-1843) – East Indian Company soldier and administrator
• The Papers of Major J. R. Cunningham – Indian government official

D-G

• The Papers of Samuel Davis (1760-1819) – East India Company administrator, surveyor and artist
• The Papers of Clinton Thomas Dent (1850-1912) – surgeon and pioneer of mountaineering in the Caucasus
• The Papers of Henry Miers Elliot (1801-1853) – East India Company administrator and historian
• The Papers of Alexander Gerard (1792-1839) – East India Company soldier, explorer
• The Papers of Sir Michael Cavanagh Gillett (1907-1971) – Consul service in China and Afghanistan
• The Papers of Daniel John Gogerly (1792-1862) – missionary and Pali translator
• The Papers of Frederic John Goldsmid (1818-1908) – linguist, Director of Indo-European Telegraph Company
• The Papers of Dora Gordine (1895-1991) – sculptor
• The Papers of Angus C. Graham (1919-1991) – lecturer in Classical Chinese

H-K

• The Papers of Major-General Thomas Hardwicke (1756-1835) – naturalist, East India Company soldier
• The Papers of Alexander Hamilton (1762-1824) and Graves Chamney Haughton (1788-1849) – linguists
• The Papers of John Hansman and David Stronach – archaeologists
• The Papers of Raymond Head (b.1948) – composer, musician and author of “A Catalogue of the Paintings and Drawings in the Royal Asiatic Society, London”
• The Papers of Benjamin Heyne (1770-1819) – botanist
• The Papers of Brian Houghton Hodgson (1801-1894) – pioneer of Himalayan studies
• The Papers of Edward Walter Hutchinson (1880-1972) – British Consul in Chiang Mai, Thailand
• The Papers of Alexander Johnston (1775-1849) – Colonial administrator and Chief Justice of Ceylon
• The Papers of  Sir William Jones (1746-1794) and Lady Anna Maria (Shipley) Jones – renowned philologist and founder of the Asiatic Society in Calcutta
• The Papers of Major J. Stuart King – Vice Consel at Zeila

L-O

• The Papers of Edward William Lane (1801-1876) – Arabic Scholar and writer
• The Papers of David Lockhart Robertson Lorimer (1876-1962) and Emily Overend Lorimer (1881-1949) – linguists, authors, explorers of the Gilgit region.
• The Papers of James Low (1791-1852) – military officer in Penang, Thailand and Burma
• The Papers of Fleming Mackenzie (1897-1980) – military officer and escort to the Trade Agent to Tibet in 1938-39
• The Papers of Thomas Manning (1772-1840) – Chinese scholar, first Englishman to Lhasa, Tibet
• The Papers of William Adair Nelson (1907-1993) – author, administrator at Aberdeen University
• The Papers of Thomas John Newbold (1807–1850) – East India Company soldier, scientist and orientalist
• The Papers of Captain Henry Ormsby (d.1857) – Commander Indian navy, surveyor

P-R

• The Papers of William Claxton Peppé (1852-1936) – discovered Buddhist archaeological remains at Piprahwa
• The Papers of William Pettigrew (1869-1943) – missionary and Manipuri scholar
• The Papers of Abraham Poliak (1910-1970) – historian and lecturer in Israeli culture
• The Papers of Iltudus Thomas Prichard (1826-1874) – India army, barrister and writer
• The Papers of Captain James Purefoy (d. 1846) – merchant seaman
• The Papers of Bernard Quaritch (1819-1899) – specialist bookseller
• The Papers of Hugh George Rawlinson (1880-1957) – teacher, Indian historian
• The Papers of Edward Rehatsek (1819-1891) – linguist, Arabic and Persian translator
• The Papers of Alexander Rogers (1825-1910) – Indian civil servant and author
• The Papers of Michael John Rowlandson (1804-1894) – Arabic and Persian translator

S-Z

• The Papers of Professor Edward H. S. Simmonds (1919-1994) – linguist, academic of South East Asian languages and literatures
• The Papers of Aurel Stein (1862-1943) – explorer and archaeologist
• Notes on Cuddapah by Mrs Skinner
• The Papers of Maurice Patrick O’Connor Tandy (1912-1986) – consul service
• The Papers of Gerald Tibbetts (1926-1999) – librarian, writer in medieval Arabic navigation
• The Papers of Colonel Sir John Fisher Turner (1881-1958) – engineer, WWII decoy expert
• The Papers of Walter Melville Wace (d. 1942) – writer, rubber plantation manager
• The Papers of Laurence Austine Waddell (1854-1938) – explorer, Indian Medical Service, Professor of Tibetan
• The Papers of Horace Geoffrey Quaritch Wales (1900-1981) – archaeologist, served the Siamese (Thai) government in the 1920s
• The Papers of Edward William West (1824-1905) – engineer, Pahlavi and Zoroastrianism scholar
• The Papers of Sir Arnold Talbot Wilson (1884-1940) – Civil Commissioner, Baghdad