Nikolai Anderson

Nikolai Karl Adolf Anderson ( – ) was a Baltic German philologist who lived in the Russian Empire. He specialized in comparative linguistics of Finno-Ugric languages. he attended the Gouvernements-Gymnasium (Grammar School of the Governorate) in Reval where he was a student of Leo Meyer who in the same year had been appointed as the university's professor of Germanistics and Comparative philology. While at university he became interested in Finno-Ugric languages and quickly became an expert in the field.

In 1871 Anderson worked as an hourly paid teacher at the Gymnasium in Dorpat before taking up a post as teacher for classical languages at the Gymnasium in Minsk (now in Belarus) in 1872, Walter Anderson (born 1885), and Oskar Anderson (born 1887), who all went on to choose academic careers.

In 1876 Anderson submitted the results of his research, comparing Finno-Ugric and Indo-Germanic languages to the University of Tartu, for which he was awarded a degree in Comparative philology. Still working as a teacher in Minsk, he continued his research, and in 1891 he gained a Magister degree in Comparative Linguistics. which was granted to Anderson in the same year.

In January 1894 Anderson was offered a professorship in Finno-Ugric languages at the University of Kazan (Russia) to replace Mihkel Veske, which he accepted, as this allowed him to take up an academic career that would allow him more time for his research. As a professor he had the rank of Статский советник (State Councillor), meaning that he held personal nobility in the Imperial Russian hierarchy.

Works

In his work, Anderson not only compared different Finno-Ugric languages but also argued for a genetic relationship between Finno-Ugric and Indo-Germanic languages, making him one of the first scholars to investigate possible links between these two language families. At the time of his death, Anderson was the only professor for Finno-Ugric languages in the Russian Empire.

Honours and awards link=Order of St. Anna Imperial Russian Order of St. Anna, 3rd class (awarded 1877)

link=Order of St. Anna Imperial Russian Order of St. Anna, 2nd class (awarded 1889) link=Order of St. Vladimir Imperial Russian Order of Saint Vladimir, 4th class (awarded 1904)