Aston, W.G.

William George Aston
William George Aston, 1911
Born	August 28, 1840(1840-08-28) Derry, Ireland
Died	November 22, 1911(1911-11-22) (aged 70) Beer, Devon, England
Nationality	Anglo-Irish
Occupation	diplomat, educator

William George Aston (9 April 1841 – 22 November 1911) was a British diplomat, author and scholar-expert in the language and history of Japan and Korea.^[1]

Contents 1 Early life 2 Career 2.1 Japan 2.2 Korea 3 Later years 4 Research notes 5 Selected works 5.1 Articles 6 See also 7 Notes 8 References 9 External links

[edit] Early life

Aston was born near Derry, Ireland.^[2] He distinguished himself at Queen's College, Belfast (now Queen's University Belfast), which he attended 1859-1863. There he received a very thorough philological training in Latin, Greek, French, German and modern history. One of his professors was James McCosh.^[3][4]

[edit] Career

Aston was appointed in 1864 student interpreter to the British Legation in Japan. He mastered the theory of the Japanese verb, and in Edo began, with Ernest Mason Satow, those profound researches into the Japanese language which laid the foundations of the critical study of the Japanese language by western scholars.^[4] Aston passed the examination for entry to the Consular Service in 1884, and served in the British consular service in Tokyo, Kobe and Nagasaki.^[3]

From 1884-1885, Aston served as the United Kingdom's consul-general in Korea. He returned to consular duties in Tokyo as Secretary of British Legation in 1885.^[4] Aston retired from the foreign service on a pension in 1889 because of ill-health^[3][4] and settled in England.^[5]

[edit] Japan

Aston made a major contribution to the fledgling study of Japan's language and history in the 19th century. Along with Ernest Mason Satow and Basil Hall Chamberlain, he was one of three major British Japanologists active in Japan during the 19th century.

Aston was the first translator of the Nihongi into the English language (1896). Other publications were two Japanese grammars (1868 and 1872) and A History of Japanese Literature (1899). He lectured to the Asiatic Society of Japan several times, and many of his papers are published in their Transactions.^[4]

In 1912 Cambridge University Library acquired 10,000 rare Japanese volumes from the collections of Aston and Satow which formed the starting point of the Library's collection.

[edit] Korea

In 1884, Aston was the first European diplomatic representative to reside in Korea. Political instability caused him to leave in 1885.^[3] In 1885—1887, Aston continued Korean language studies in Tokyo with Kim Chae-guk. This Korean teacher composed a number of stories for Aston to use as practice.^[3] Aston donated these manuscript versions of Korean folk tales to the Asiatic Museum in St. Petersberg, Russia^[6] and they were published in 2004.^[7] This part of Aston's personal collection is now preserved in the Academy of Sciences in St Petersburg.^[3]

[edit] Later years

After retiring from the consular service, Aston published books on Japanese literature and Japanese religion as well as a number of articles on Korean subjects.^[3] He died November 22, 1911 at Beer, Devon.^[2] Along with the Japanese books already mentioned Aston's substantial collection of Chinese and Korean books was acquired by Cambridge University Library after his death.^[3]

[edit] Research notes

The only known likeness of Aston is in the National Portrait Gallery in London. A 1911 crayon drawing of Aston by Minnie Agnes Cohen only suggests what he might have looked like as a younger man. Very little is known about Aston's personal life because he left no letters or diaries.^[3]

[edit] Selected works

Aston's published writings encompass 92 works in 230 publications in 4 languages and 3,446 library holdings.^[8]

This is an incomplete list, which may never be able to satisfy particular standards for completeness. You can help by expanding it with reliably sourced entries.

• 1869 — A Short Grammar of the Japanese Spoken Language
• 1872 — A Grammar of the Japanese Written Language, with a short chrestomalthy
• 1877 — A Grammar of the Japanese Written Language
• 1888 — A Grammar of the Japanese Spoken Language
• 1889 — Early Japanese history
• 1896 — Nihongi; Chronicles of Japan from the Earliest Times to A.D. 697
• 1898 — A History of Japanese Literature
• 1899 — Toriwi--its derivation
• 1902 — Littérature japonaise
• 1905 — Shinto, the Way of the Gods.
• 1907 — Shinto, the Ancient Religion of Japan

[edit] Articles

• 1879 — "H.M.S. Phaeton at Nagasaki," Transactions of the Asiatic Society of Japan, Vol. 7, pp. 323-336.

[edit] See also

• Anglo-Japanese relations
• British Japan Consular Service

[edit] Notes

[edit] References

• Ruxton, Ian. (2008). Sir Ernest Satow's private letters to W.G. Aston and F.V. Dickins: the Correspondence of a Pioneer Japanologist from 1870 to 1918. Morrisville, North Carolina: Lulu Press. 13-ISBN 9781435710009/10-ISBN 1435710002; OCLC 237202832

[edit] External links

Wikisource has original works written by or about: William George Aston

• The History of Japanese Literature by W.G. Aston (Yokohama: Kelly and Walsh, 1899)

Persondata
Name	Aston, William George
Alternative names
Short description
Date of birth	1840-08-28
Place of birth	Derry, Ireland
Date of death	1911-11-22
Place of death	Beer, Devon, England