Charlotte Krause her Life and Literature

Author(s): Shreeprakash Pandey
Publisher: Parshwanath Vidyapith

Page 16

Introduction
The present trend of comparative and critical Indological studies starts with the encounter of European-scholars to Indian heritage in the 19th century. Among these European scholars, who took keen interest in Indological studies ( the study of Indian philosophies, religions, culture and literature as well written in oriental languages such as Vedic Chāndas, Samskrta, Prākrta, Pāli, Apabhramsa, Old Gujarati and Rājasthānī), the Germans were on the top rank. The German poet Heinrich Heine has rightly remarked “Let the Portuguese, the Dutch and the English plunder India of her material wealth. We Germans would rather dip into her spiritual and intellectual riches." In the field of Indological studies the contribution of German scholars such as Maxmullar, Albrecht Weber, Hermann Jacobi, Ernest Leumann, Walther Schubring, Johannes Hertel, Helmuth Von Glasenapp, Ludwig Alsdorf, Gustav Roth, Klaus Bruhn and others is matchless. In the galaxy of these German scholars, who devoted themselves in Indological studies in general and Jainological studies in particular, the name of Charlotte Krause shines as a brighter star. She has made a significant contribution to the Indological studies. Born in Germany on May 18, 1895 Charlotte Krause received her Ph. D. Degree from Leipzig University on 'Nāsaketari Kathā: An Old Rājasthānī Tale' with a grammer of old Rājasthānī, in the year 1920 at the age of 25 years only. She had an opportunity to work with Johannes Hertel, an eminent scholar of Indian narrative literature. While working as a fellow and Assistant Professor of Indian Comparative Philology in Leipzig University, she wrote a critical and comparative exhaustive article on a newly discovered version of the Jaina Pañcatantra in old Gujarati and thus she established herself as a scholar of Indology in general and Jainology in particular. Her role in the establishment of