Can you speak a second language? Or have you studied a second or third language? Everybody who has, whether they’ve succeeded in becoming fluent or not, has experienced how difficult it can be. And everybody who hasn’t probably imagines that it’s at least that difficult, if not more so. So it’s time to be impressed by Emil Krebs, who was born November 15, 1867 in the North German Confederation, which more or less where today’s Federal Republic of Germany is.
Krebs studied Latin, French, Hebrew, Classical Greek, Modern Greek, English, Italian, Spanish, Russian, Polish, Arabic, and Turkish — during his elementary education! By the time he enrolled at the University of Breslau he spoke 12 languages. He only stayed at the University of Breslau for the summer semester, and then enrolled in the University of Berlin. He enrolled as a law student, but his real interest was the new department that taught Mandarin Chinese. He was interested because everybody at the time said that it was the most difficult language. But within two years he was able to speak Chinese fluently.
In addition to language studies, he really did study law, and became a lawyer in Berlin. He kept studying languages in night classes, though, and in 1893 he got a job as an interpreter and was sent to Beijing. He became the chief interpreter for Germany in 1901, and became a close acquaintance to the Empress Dowager Cixi.
Mandarin Chinese is not the only language spoken in China, and Krebs learned Mongolian, Manchu, and Tibetan while he was in China. He even assisted Chinese officials by translating letters sent by Mongolian rebels. And he was always looking for new languages to learn. One contemporary told the story of Krebs hearing two travelers speaking a language he didn’t know, and when he discovered it was Armenian, Krebs learned that language in only nine weeks.
Krebs accumulated a huge library of volumes in and about different languages. He eventually had over 3500 books, which are now stored in the US Library of Congress. They’re in about 120 different languages, and the collection includes Krebs’ own notes, which he wrote in 68 different languages. He used some of the languages he learned to study other languages. For example, he learned a whole set of languages by studying them in English, rather than his native German. He did the same thing with Russian and Spanish, even learning Basque dialects like Gipuzokan and Biscayan.
Krebs died at 62, while working on another translation. His abilities were well known by then, and so extraordinary that a researcher preserved his brain as an “elite brain.” It’s still kept in the C. & O. Vogt Institute for Brain Research in Düsseldorf.
