Obituary Notice – Jean Przyluski

Summary

This obituary commemorates Jean Przyluski (1885–1944), a renowned French scholar of Asian studies. Born in Le Mans, Przyluski served as a colonial administrator in Indochina, where he learned Annamese and studied local cults. He published early works on Tonkinese tree worship and divination and earned a diploma from the Ecole des Langues Orientales. Returning to France, he became an assistant at the Ecole des Langues Orientales and later taught comparative grammar of Indochinese languages. During World War I he served with the Zouaves before resuming academic work. Przyluski wrote on Buddhism using Chinese and Tibetan sources and emphasised that scholars must compare Pali and non‑Pali texts. He contributed chapters on Sino‑Tibetan and Tibeto‑Burman languages to "Les Langues du Monde" and published numerous articles on loanwords from non‑Aryan into Indo‑Aryan languages. His research combined linguistics, anthropology and religious studies under the thesis that religious ideas underlie philosophical and scientific thought and must be studied in their cultural contexts. The obituary praises his ability to synthesise diverse materials into a coherent whole and notes that his death leaves a significant void in Asian studies.