against the central Asian theory of the origin of the Aryan race. He supported views which were later advocated by Theodor Benfey, Parker, Isaac Taylor, and others. The origin of the Indo-European languages was, in Latham's view, in Lithuania; and he strongly attacked Max Müller, proponent of the "Aryan theory", at the same time as did John Crawfurd arguing from rather different premises. The controversy over Latham's views on Indo-European languages following his Comparative Philology (1862) did permanent damage to his scholarly reputation. Later life Gordon Hake wrote in his memoirs of Latham's habit of pleading poverty and asking for money. In 1863 Latham obtained a civil list pension. In later life he was afflicted with aphasia, and died at Putney on 9 March 1888. Works In 1841 Latham produced a well-known text-book, The English Language. He devoted himself to a thorough revision of Samuel Johnson's Dictionary of the English Language, which he completed in 1870. He subsequently spent much time on a Dissertation on the Hamlet of Saxo Grammaticus and of Shakespeare. His works on the English language passed through many editions, and were regarded as authoritative till they were superseded by those of Richard Morris and Walter William Skeat. Other works included: An Elementary English Grammar for the Use of Schools, 1843 The Natural History of the Varieties of Mankind, 1850 The Ethnology of the British Colonies and Dependencies, 1851 Man and his Migrations, 1851 The Ethnology of Europe, 1852 The Native Races of the Russian Empire, 1854 On the Varieties of the Human Species, in Orr's Circle of the Sciences vol. 1, 1854 Logic in its Application to Language, 1856 Descriptive Ethnology, 1858 Volume I Volume II Opuscula: Essays Chiefly Philological and Ethnographical, 1860 A Smaller English Grammar for the Use of Schools, 1861 (with David Thomas Ansted) The Channel Islands, 1862; 2nd edition (1865). Elements of Comparative Philology, 1862 References Attribution External links 1812 births 1888 deaths People from Billingborough British ethnologists British philologists Alumni of King's College, Cambridge Fellows of King's College, Cambridge Fellows of the Royal Society