Dr. Thomas Leiper Kane (January 27, 1822)
Who He Was: He was a brilliant American linguist, scholar, and orientalist who dedicated roughly 45 years of his life to studying the languages and culture of Ethiopia.
The Dictionary: Published in 1990, his monumental two-volume Amharic-English Dictionary spans over 2,350 pages. It is widely considered by language students and academics to be the most comprehensive and definitive Amharic dictionary ever produced.
Other Major Works: He also published a massive Tigrinya-English Dictionary in 2000 and wrote extensive analyses of Ethiopian Literature in Amharic.
His Legacy: Following his death in 2000, his massive, rare collection of historical Ethiopian and Eritrean books, papers, and pamphlets was acquired by the United States Library of Congress, where it is preserved today as the Thomas Kane Pamphlet Collection.
