Paper short abstract:

Pál Almási Balogh (1794-1867) was a physician who tried to establish the science of anthropology in Hungary. He compiled the first ethnography of the aborigins of Australia (1835), and a survey of the Inuit of Boothia, Canada. His work was a failure, but his legacy provides important lessons.

Paper long abstract:

The Library Voyages of Pál Almási Balogh (1794-1867) and Their Failure in Hungary. Lessons for Historians of Anthropology

Pál Almási Balogh (1794-1867), a member of a Protestant circle of scholars in Buda-Pest, was the physician of Count István Széchenyi and Governor Lajos Kossuth, who tried to establish the science of universal ethnography / anthropology in Hungary. On the one hand, he turned to the Georg Augusta University of Göttingen for a model, and on the other to French and British scholarship. His anthropological-ethnological legacy includes, for example, the first ethnographic monograph written in Hungary about the aborigins of Australia (cca1835), but also a German-language summary of the way of life of the Inuit of the Boothia Peninsula, Canada, both testifying his passionate interest in indigenous peoples outside Europe. Almási Balogh was the primary promoter of Alexander von Humboldt (and seemingly also Charles Darwin) in Hungary. His life's work, however, was ultimately a failure: neither institutionally nor in terms of writings and textbooks did he succeed in realising his scientific ambition. He remained an armchair scholar, but his legacy (cca. 20 archival boxes) contains a huge amount of manuscript notes and letters which are to be taken into consideration in any attempt to write the history of early anthropology in Hungary.