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Edward Washburn Hopkins

American historian and orientalist (1857–1932)

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Record originEnglish Wikipedia
Text licenseCC BY-SA 4.0
Source revisionAug 29, 2026
Entity authorityQ5345815
Source-derived summary

Edward Washburn Hopkins, Ph.D., LL.D. (September 8, 1857 – July 16, 1932), an American Sanskrit scholar, was born in Northampton, Massachusetts.

He graduated at Columbia College in 1878, studied at Leipzig, where he received the degree of Ph.D. in 1881, was an instructor at Columbia (1881–1885), and professor at Bryn Mawr (1885–1895), and became professor of Sanskrit and comparative philology in Yale University in 1895.

He became secretary of the American Oriental Society and editor of the Journal of the American Oriental Society, to which he contributed many valuable papers, especially on numerical and temporal categories in early Sanskrit literature. He wrote:

Caste in Ancient India (1881)

Manu's Lawbook (1884)

Religions of India (1895)

The Great Epic of India (1901)

India Old and New (1901)

Epic Mythology (1915)

History of Religions (1918)

Origin and Evolution of Religion (1923)

The Ethics of India (1924)

References

This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). "Hopkins, Edward Washburn". Encyclopædia Britannica. Vol. 13 (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press.

Editorial summary

This brief starts where responsible research should: with the source description of “Edward Washburn Hopkins” as american historian and orientalist (1857–1932). Everything that follows is an evidence route, not borrowed authority.

Editorial reviewA useful biographical orientation record, particularly for establishing names, roles and a first chronology. The current lead gives the account dated anchors—1857, 1932, 1878, 1881—that can be checked directly. The selected authority fields contribute no independent date. The account is most persuasive where Edward, Washburn and Hopkins can be independently traced.
Editorial analysis

Why this record matters

The subject matters to the people & ideas register because the source frames it as american historian and orientalist (1857–1932). Its deeper value depends on whether names, dates, institutions and citations support that framing.

Evidence profile

Chronology provides the most reliable spine for this subject; interpretation should follow only after identities and dates are secure. The source revision retrieved here is dated Aug 29, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q5345815. The first chronological checks are 1857, 1932, 1878 and 1881.

Critical limits

Public reputation and documentary evidence do not always develop together; absence from a summary is not evidence of historical absence. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.

How to read it

Read biographical claims against dates, named institutions and the cited references. Distinguish a subject’s later reputation from evidence produced during their lifetime.

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  • Establishing names and roles
  • Building a first chronology
  • Locating cited institutions
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  2. Expand the search: follow Edward Washburn Hopkins primary sources, Edward Washburn Hopkins archive and Edward research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
  3. Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.

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Source & attribution

This entry incorporates text from Edward Washburn Hopkins” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.