Name Josip Mikoczy-Blumenthal | Died March 22, 1800 | |
Dr. Josip Mikoczy-Blumenthal (Hungarian: Mikóczy-Blumenthal József; February, 1734 in Zagreb – 22 March 1800 in Zagreb) was a Croatian historian and founder of the Theory of Croatian Iranian origin in 1797.
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Biography
Josip Mikoczy-Blumenthal was born in Zagreb on 2 March 1734. He finished Jesuit gymnasium in Zagreb and became professor in university in Trnava, Slovakia. Since 1773 he worked as a professor of rhetoric and Greek language. He became librarian in Faculty of Law in Zagreb in 1792 and from 1793 until 1797 he worked in its historiographical department. Dr. Mikoczy-Blumenthal died in 1800.
Work
Important works of Dr. Mikoczy-Blumenthal include Josephi Mikocsi otiorum Croatiae liber unus in 1806 which was the first historiographical debate in Croatia and Banorum Dalmatiae, Croatiae et Slavoniae ad seculum XIV. perducta series 1792 in which he gave detailed and thorough list of all Croatian bans through five centuries. Others non published works include Lexicon historicum et topographicum and Geographica descriptio Croatiae et Slavoniae.
However, his most important work is "Hrvati rodom Slaveni, potekli od Sarmata potomaka Medijaca" (eng. "Croats of Slavic group originated from Sarmatians descending from Medians") which he defended as a doctoral dissertation in Royal Academy in Zagreb in 1797. With this work he became the founder of Croatian Iranian origin theory. According to him Croats were people descending from Medes from western Iran. His dissertation mysteriously disappeared during Yugoslavia in which this theory was officially banned and punishable by law.