Paul Kirchhoff (1900 – 1972)

[KALKI]

Paul Kirchhoff (17 August 1900, Halle, Province of Westphalia – 1972) was a German-Mexican anthropologist, most noted for his seminal work in defining and elaborating the culture area of Mesoamerica, a term he coined.

Paul Kirchhoff was born in the German locality of Hörste, in the region of Westphalia. He commenced his undergraduate studies in Protestant theology and comparative religion at the University of Berlin, moving later to Albert Ludwigs University of Freiburg. In the mid-1920s he undertook further studies at the University of Leipzig in ethnology and psychology, where he first developed his abiding interest in the indigenous cultures of the Americas.

completing his studies in 1927.[2]

He was the co-founder of Mexico's National School of Anthropology and History in 1938, and held a research position at the National Autonomous University of Mexico.

Kirchhoff was instrumental in defining the concept of Mesoamerica, a cultural region sharing a number of common characteristics throughout most of pre-Columbian history, geographically defined as central and southern Mexico and northern Central America.

Also, Kirchhoff was a left communist who was a militant of a group called the Grupo de Trabajadores in Mexico. Kirchoff had formerly been a member of the Communist Workers Party of Germany (KAPD) and then formed an opposition tendency within the Revolutionary Workers League (Oehlerite) in the USA.

He died in Mexico City in 1972.

[KALKI]

Discussing the diffusion of Indian religions to Mexico, a recent scholar, Paul Kirchhoff (1900 - 1972) German anthropologist from the University of Frankfurt, in "The Diffusion of a Great Religious System from India to Mexico" had even suggested that it is not simply a question of miscellaneous influences wandering from one country to the other, but that China, India, Java, and Mexico actually share a common system."

Kirchhoff has sought

"to demonstrate that a calendaric classification of 28 Hindu gods and their animals into twelve groups, subdivided into four blocks, within each of which we find a sequence of gods and animals representing Creation, Destruction and Renovation, and which can be shown to have existed both in India and Java, must have been carried from the Old World to the New, since in Mexico we find calendaric lists of gods and animals that follow each other without interruption in the same order and with attributes and functions or meanings strikingly similar to those of the 12 Indian and Javanese groups of gods, showing the same four subdivisions."

(source: India and World Civilization - By D P Singhal part II p. 62 – 63).

[KALKI]

Discussing the diffusion of Indian religions to Mexico, a recent scholar, Paul Kirchhoff (1900 - 1972) German anthropologist from the University of Frankfurt, in "The Diffusion of a Great Religious System from India to Mexico" had even suggested that it is not simply a question of miscellaneous influences wandering from one country to the other, but that China, India, Java, and Mexico actually share a common system."

Kirchhoff has sought

"to demonstrate that a calendaric classification of 28 Hindu gods and their animals into twelve groups, subdivided into four blocks, within each of which we find a sequence of gods and animals representing Creation, Destruction and Renovation, and which can be shown to have existed both in India and Java, must have been carried from the Old World to the New, since in Mexico we find calendaric lists of gods and animals that follow each other without interruption in the same order and with attributes and functions or meanings strikingly similar to those of the 12 Indian and Javanese groups of gods, showing the same four subdivisions."

(source: India and World Civilization - By D P Singhal part II p. 62 – 63).

[KALKI]

"The Diffusion of a Great Religious System from India to Mexico" in XXXV International Congress of Americanists. 1962. Minutes and Proceedings Mexico 1 Mexico, National Institute of Anthropology and History, 1964 [1962], pp. 73-100.