Born Joseph Hammer in Graz, Styria, he received his early education mainly in Vienna. Entering the diplomatic service in 1796, he was appointed in 1799 to a position in the Austrian embassy in Istanbul, and in this capacity he took part in the expedition under Admiral William Sidney Smith and General John Hely-Hutchinson against France. In 1807 he returned home from the East, after which he was made a privy councillor. In 1824 he was knighted. For fifty years Hammer-Purgstall wrote prolifically on the most diverse subjects and published numerous texts and translations of Arabic, Persian and Turkish authors. He was the first to publish a complete translation of the divan of Hafez into a western language. By traversing so large a field, he laid himself open to the criticism of specialists, and he was severely handled by Heinrich Friedrich von Diez, who, in his Unfug und Betrug in der morgenländischen Litteratur, nebst vielen hundert Proben von der groben Unwissenheit des H. v. Hammer zu Wien in Sprachen und Wissenschaften, devoted to him nearly 600 pages of abuse. He also came into friendly conflict on the subject of the origin of The Thousand and One Nights with his younger English contemporary Edward William Lane. Hammer-Purgstall supported the foundation of the Austrian Academy of Sciences in Vienna and became the Academy's first president. The Austrian Oriental Society, founded in 1959 to foster cultural relations with the Near East, is formally named 'Österreichische Orient-Gesellschaft Hammer-Purgstall' in recognition of Joseph von Hammer-Purgstall's accomplishments. In 1847 he received a medal commissioned by a friend of his, Ludwig August von Frankl. The reverse references some of his works in pictures. He died in Vienna on 23 November 1856.
Works
Hammer-Purgstall's principal work is his Geschichte des osmanischen Reiches. Among his other works are
Geschichte der schönen Redekünste Persiens mit einer Blüthenlese aus zweyhundert persischen Dichtern
Morgenländisches Kleeblatt
Constantinopolis und der Bosporos
Sur les origines russes
an English language translation of the first two volumes of Evliya Celebi's travelogue Seyahatname
The History of the Assassins trans. O. C. Wood, an English language translation of Die Geschichte der Assassinen aus morgenländischen Quellen
Geschichte der osmanischen Dichtkunst
Geschichte der Goldenen Horde in Kiptschak
Geschichte der Chane der Krim
an unfinished Litteraturgeschichte der Araber
a four-volume biography of Melchior Cardinal Khlesl titled Khlesls, des Cardinals Leben. Mit der Sammlung von Khlesls Briefen und anderen Urkunden.
For a comprehensive list of his works see: Schlottmann, Constantin. Joseph von Hammer-Purgstall, Zurich, 1857.
Family
Hammer married Caroline von Henikstein, the daughter of Austrian Jewish financier Joseph von Henikstein in 1816. In 1835, upon inheriting the estates of the Countess Purgstall, the widow of his late friend Gottfried Wenzel von Purgstall, he acquired the title Freiherr and changed his family name to Hammer-Purgstall.
