Matthias Alexander Castrén

Matthias Alexander Castrén studied at University of Helsinki and Imperial Alexander University. Training under Andreas Johan Sjögren is recorded. The recorded working language is Swedish, German and Finnish. The field of work recorded is linguistics and philology. Places of work recorded in the authority are Helsinki. Employment is recorded with University of Helsinki and Imperial Alexander University.

• Name — Matthias Castrén • Birth Name — Matthias Alexander Castrén • Born — 2 December 1813 • Died — 7 May 1852 • Birthplace — Tervola, Grand Duchy of Finland, Russian Empire • Place of death — Helsinki, Grand Duchy of Finland, Russian Empire • Workplaces — Professor at Imperial Alexander University • Education — Imperial Alexander University • Known for — researcher of Uralic languages

Castrén was born at Tervola, in northern Finland. His father, Christian Castrén, the parish priest and vicar in Rovaniemi, died in 1825. Castrén passed under the protection of his uncle, Matthias Castrén. At the age of twelve, he was sent to school at Oulu. On entering the Alexander University in Helsinki (now the University of Helsinki) in 1828, he first devoted himself to Greek and Hebrew with the intention of entering the church, but his interest was soon excited by the Finnish language, and even before his course was completed, he began to lay the foundations of a work on Finnish mythology. He received his bachelor's degree in 1836 and graduate degree in 1839.

• Illustration — Bust of Castrén in Töölö, with National Museum of Finland in the background The necessity of personal explorations among the still-unwritten languages of cognate tribes soon made itself evident. In 1838. he joined a medical fellow student, Dr. Ehrström, in a journey through Lapland. That was the first of the voyages Castrén undertook to investigate the kinship between Finnish and several other languages. He was later appointed in 1840 to associate professor in Finnish and the Norse languages at the University of Helsinki. The next year, he traveled in Karelia at the expense of the Literary Society of Finland. In 1841, he undertook with the Finnish philologist Elias Lönnrot a third journey, which ultimately extended beyond the Urals as far as Obdorsk and lasted three years. Before starting on the expedition, he had published a translation into Swedish of the Finnish epic of Kalevala. Upon his return, he gave to the world his (1844) and (1845). No sooner had he recovered from the illness, which his last journey had occasioned, than he set out, under the auspices of the Academy of St Petersburg and the Alexander University, on an exploration among the indigenous peoples of Siberia, which resulted in a vast addition to previous knowledge but seriously affected the health of the adventurous investigator. The first fruits of his collections were published in St. Petersburg in 1849 in the form of (1858). In 1850, he published the treatise and was appointed professor of the new chair of Finnish language and literature at the University of Helsinki. The following year saw him raised to the rank of chancellor of the university. He was busily engaged in what he regarded as his principal work, a grammar of the Samoyedic languages, when he died in 1852, at 38 years of age.

In 1850, he married Lovisa Natalia Tengström (1830–1881), whose father, Johan Jakob Tengström (1787–1858), was a professor of theoretical and practical philosophy at Alexander University. They were the parents of the newspaper publisher and elected official Robert Castrén (1851–1883).

• Matthias Castrén in 375 humanists 01.03.2015, Faculty of Arts, University of Helsinki

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