JANOS

ERDELYI (1814-1868)  , Hungarian poet and author, was born in 1814 at Kapos, in the county of Ungvar, and educated at the Protestant college of Sarospatak . In 1833 he removed to Pest, where he was, in 1839, elected member of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences . His literary fame was made by his collection of Hungarian national poems and folk-tales, Magyar Nepkoltesi Gyiijtemeny, Nepdalok es Monddk (Pest, 1846-1847) . This work, published by the Kisfaludy Society, was supplemented by a dissertation upon Hungarian national poetry, afterwardspartially translated into German by Stier-(Berlin, 1851) . Erdelyi also compiled for the Kisfaludy Society an extensive collection of Hungarian proverbs—Magyar Kozmonddsok konyve (Pest, 1851),-and was for some time editor of the Szepirodalmi Szemle (Review of Polite Literature) . In 1848 he was appointed director of the national theatre at Pest; but after 1849 he resided at his native town . He died on the 23rd of January 1868 . A collection of folklore was published the year after his death, entitled A NO Kolteszete npdalok, nepmesek es kozmonddsok (Pest, 1869) . This work contains 300 national songs, 19 folk-tales and 7362 Hungarian proverbs .