Claudius Rich was born on March 28 in Burgundy. At age 9, he developed a curiosity of Arabic manuscripts as well as oriental languages. His knowledge benefited him when he was appointed cadet into the East India Company’s service at the age 16. A man by the name of Robert Hall who knew Claudius in the service saw potential in the young man and said Claudius was an extraordinary young man who needs little or no assistance to get acquainted with many languages. He learned Latin, Greek, Hebrew, Chaldee, Persian, Arabic and a little bit of Chinese in his pursuit of knowledge. He relayed this information to Sir James Mackintosh, the Governor of Basra.
Claudius’s accomplishments landed him a position in the Bombay establishment. He also worked as secretary to Mr. Lock who was to going to Egypt as a consul-general in order to improve his Arabic and Turkish language skills. In the city of Malta, Italy, he learned to speak Italian and devoted much of his time to music. After returning to Egypt to serve under Mr. Lock as originally planned, Claudius found that Mr. Lock had passed away. So with the permission of the directors, he continued his oriental studies at Constantinople and Smyrna. After many journeys into the core of Asia Minor, he was appointed as an assistant to the new consul-general in Egypt. Here he perfected his Arabic skills and did some horsemanship as well as some other physical skills. As time went on he journeyed throughout the eastern part of the Middle East including such countries as Syria and Palestine.
He arrived in Basra onboard a ship on September 1, 1808. The governor of Basra (Sir James Mackintosh) knew of Claudius’s accomplishments from Robert Hall’s letter. He gave Claudius a warm welcoming to Basra. He resided with him and eventually married the governor's eldest daughter. When he was 23, Claudius was appointed the East India Company’s resident in Baghdad, Iraq. His trustworthiness and faithfulness by his people earned him a reputation as being an honorable man. During the six years in Baghdad, he collected and studied materials in Pashalik and Babylon contributing to his own knowledge as well as others who were involved. He helped them in the written documents of the ‘Mines d’Orient’ which involved the excursion of Babylon in 1811 of ancient ruins.
In 1813, Claudius got ill quite frequently and in an effort to combat the sicknesses, he and his wife moved to Constantinople to live with the Ambassador, Sir Robert Liston. A year later he started up his journey to go through the Balkan province and up to Vienna, making his way to Paris and back down through the Asia Minor to hit Baghdad for one last visit to Babylon. Even while ill, in 1820 he finished up his studies and research there and traveled through Kurdistan where he made his most memorable mark. He took a narrative approach of documenting his journey down the Tigris River to Baghdad. As a result, we have the first detailed description of his encounters of the geological factors of this region as well as the archeological information that was valuable. He wrote his encounters in a journal that was published later in the book Narrative of a Residence in Koordistan and on the Site of Ancient Nineveh.
During his visit to Shirâz, Claudius was helping the sick and caught cholera. Claudius James Rich died at the age of 33 on October 5, 182. His accomplishments live on and were definitely worthwhile. Some of his artifacts including a large collection of coins, Greek and oriental gems found at Babylon and Nineveh along with his manuscripts of his journey are displayed at the British Museum.
“Introduction to Archaeology” (5 Nov 1999) http://www.ukans.edu/~hoopes/history.html
The Dictionary of National Biography. Volume XVI, Pages 996-997 London: Oxford University Press, 1953
Written by Dustin Lozinski
Edited by Marcy L. Voelker, 2007