Ferdinand Schneider Blumentritt

Ferdinand Blumentritt was born on 10 September

1853 in Prague (now the Czech Republic, in the former Austro-Hungarian Empire) Died on 20 September 1913 in Leitmeritz in Bohemia. He obtained a degree history and geography at the Karl's university in Prague He became a teacher at the secondary school in Leitmeritz in Bohemia part of Austria-Hungary. Later he would become the director of this school from 1900 to 1910. Ferdinand Blumentritt married Mrs. Rosa Mueller in 1878 they had three children: Friedrich (*1879), Dolores (*1880) and Konrad (*1883). During his time, he was considered one of the foremost experts on the Philippines, although he never visited the islands(because of his illness). He known for having been one of the closest friends of Philippine national hero Jos Rizal.

Blumentritt Works
Blumentritt called him the Spaniard by his schoolmates because of

eager curiosity in Spanish culture and the Spanish colonial world at a very young age. From Blumentritt's aunt, he started to learn the Spanish Language and started to write. 1. He wrote his first article about the Philippines in 1879. The article was entitled Die Chinesen auf den Philippines -(The Chinese in the Philippines) . 2. Then another famous work was published in Petermann's Mittheilungen in 1882 and it was entitled Versuch einer Ethnographie der Philippinen (An Attempt of an Ethnography of the Philippines). In this book, he included maps of the Philippines made by Ferdinand Blumentritt in which he corrected some mistakes.

The Blumentritt Philippine collection

The Blumentritt Philippine collection was immense.

According to a letter of Friedrich Blumentritt (son Ferdinand) it consisted of:

-A library of more than 800 titles -17,400 notes and sources referring to the scientific work of Blumentritt -1,721 scientific and political letters from Blumentritt's friends -More than 100 manuscripts -123 letters from Rizal to Blumentritt -More than 100 old maps

Rizal-Blumentritt Friendship
On May 13, 1877, 1:00pm, Dr. Jose Rizal and his friend Dr.

Maximo Viola arrived by train. The friends were met by Dr. Ferdinand Blumentritt and his family at Hotel Krebs.(The topic is Noli ) Earlier, Dr, Blumentritt and Dr. Jos Rizal had started a very scholarly correspondence (on Philippine ethnography) , and the correspondence became more and more communicative. In other words, it was no longer just a correspondence between scholars, but a meeting of the minds of two disparate individuals in terms of geography but so similar in sentiment. In time, they found their metier and exchanged their own philosophies: of life, of teaching, of religion, of the colonizers and of the oppressed.

Mein Bruder
50 Selected Letters between Rizal and Blumentritt Rizal: 31 July, 1886 (Heidelberg) Rizal: 16 August, 1886 (Leipzig) Rizal: 22 August, 1886 (Leipzig) Rizal: 2 October, 1886 (Leipzig) Rizal: 4 November, 1886 (Berlin) Blumentritt: 14 November, 1886 (Leitmeritz) Rizal: 22 November, 1886 (Berlin) Blumentritt: 23 November, 1886 (Leitmeritz) Rizal: 28 November, 1886 (Berlin) Rizal: 9 December, 1886 (Berlin) Rizal: 30 December, 1886 (Berlin) Blumentritt: 24 January, 1887 (Leitmeritz) Blumentritt: 16 February, 1887

(Leitmeritz) Rizal: 9 March, 1887 (Berlin) Blumentritt: 27 March, 1887 (Leitmeritz) Blumentritt: 27 March, 1887 (Leitmeritz) Rizal: 13 April, 1887 (Berlin) Rizal: 20 May, 1887 (Vienna) Rizal: 24 May, 1887 (Vienna) Rizal: 26 May, 1887 (Salzburg) Rizal: 29 May, 1887 (Munich) Rizal: 31 May, 1887 (Stuttgart) Rizal: 3 June, 1887 (Basel) Rizal: 13 June, 1887 (Geneva) Blumentritt: 25 July, 1887 (Leitmeritz)

Mein Bruder
Blumentritt: 24 August, 1887

(Leitmeritz) Rizal: 30 April, 1888 (San Francisco) Rizal: 23 June, 1888 (London) Rizal: 14 November, 1888 (London) Rizal: 25 December, 1888 (London) Rizal: 14 January, 1889 (London) Rizal: 31 January, 1889 (London) Rizal: 4 June, 1889 (Paris) Rizal: 17 April, 1890 (Brussels) Blumentritt: 29 September, 1890 (Leitmeritz) Blumentritt: 15 February, 1891 (Leitmeritz) Blumentritt: 26 April, 1891 (Leitmeritz) Blumentritt: 20 June, 1891 (Leitmeritz) Rizal: 23 August, 1891 (Gand) Blumentritt: 19 March, 1892

(Leitmeritz) Blumentritt: 16 July, 1892 (Leitmeritz) Blumentritt: 15 October, 1893 (Leitmeritz) Rizal: 19 December, 1893 (Dapitan) Rizal: 31 July, 1894 (Dapitan) Rizal: 15 January, 1895 (Dapitan) Rizal: 20 November, 1895 (Dapitan) Blumentritt: New Years Greetings, 1895 (Leitmeritz) Rizal: 5 April, 1896 (Dapitan) Rizal: 28 September, 1896 (en route to Spain) Rizal: 29 December, 1896 (Fort Santiago, Manila)