Peter Percival

Peter Percival (24 July 1803 – 11 July 1882) was a British born missionary and educator who opened religious schools in Sri Lanka and South India during the British colonial era. ) During his stay in Jaffna, he led the effort to translate the Authorized King James Version of Bible into the Tamil language, working with the Tamil scholar Arumuka Navalar – a Shaiva Hindu. Percival's work influenced Robert Bruce Foote. Percival began his career in British held Sri Lanka and Bengal as a Wesleyan Methodist missionary. He was instrumental in starting and upgrading a number of Christian schools within the Jaffna peninsula. After returning to England, he converted to Anglicanism. Subsequent to his posting in South India, he severed his association with the Anglican Missionary Society that had sent him to India and worked as an educator in Presidency College in Madras Presidency.

First edition of Tamil proverbs with their English translationcompiled by Rev Percival was published in 1842. Proverbs were arranged in alphabetical order.In its preface, written on Christmas day, Jaffna, Percival wrote, "It is presumed that the translation generally conveys the sense of the original, although not always with its force, nor with the elegance that might be desired." The second edition of this work was published in 1874, with a cumulative count of 6156 proverbs. Percival also published English-Tamil and English-Telugu dictionaries as well as a number of books on Indian culture and religion. He died in 1882 in Yercaud in present-day Tamil Nadu.

Career

British Ceylon Peter Percival, aged 23, was sent to Jaffna peninsula in British Ceylon (now Sri Lanka) in 1826 by the Wesleyan Methodist Mission, with concerns whether his appointment is risky in "an atmosphere of immoral heathenism". At his arrival the missionary society and its efforts had not produced results expected by their original expectations and goals. A number of previous missionaries had returned to Europe after short stints due to illness. Percival spent most of his early adult life in Jaffna peninsula until 1851, with a short stint in Bengal (1829–32). As a Protestant missionary, Percival favored the teaching of Christian texts in the local vernacular (Tamil) rather than English or Portuguese. Percival's preference of education over evangelism created friction with other Wesleyan missionaries but it also influenced the educational practices of all those who were trying to improve the literary levels of 19th-century Sri Lankan Tamil society.

England In 1851, he returned to England with the intention of coming back to Ceylon but due to differences with the Methodist hierarchy in London, he renounced Methodism. In 1852, he was ordained deacon by the Anglican Bishop of London. During the next two years, he worked as a lecturer at St Augustine's College, Canterbury, teaching a course about India and its religions.

British India In 1854, he went to Madras, Madras Presidency in southern British India with the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel in Foreign Parts, an Anglican missionary society. He became an Anglican priest ordained by Bishop of Madras in 1855. In 1856 after becoming the Registrar of Madras University and Professor of Sanskrit and Vernacular Literature in Presidency College, he severed his relationship with the missionary society.

Later life

In India he was known a scholar in Tamil and Telugu. After having published the Tamil translation of the Bible, he wrote the book Land of the Veda: India Briefly Described in some of its Aspects, Physical, Social, Intellectual and Moral. His other publications include, a book on Tamil proverbs in English, English-Tamil and English-Telugu dictionaries, and a bilingual Tamil and Telugu journal Dinavartamani.