Jaan Puhvel, an Estonian–American linguist, died on April 25, 2026, at age 94.
Born in Tallinn, Estonia, on January 24, 1932, he was an Estonian comparative linguist and comparative mythologist who specialized in Indo-European studies. He fled Estonia with his family in 1944 after the Soviet occupation of the Baltic states and later settled in Canada.
Puhvel earned a Ph.D. in comparative linguistics at Harvard University and taught at the University of California, Los Angeles, where he was a professor of classical languages, Indo-European studies and Hittite. He also founded the Center for the Study of Comparative Folklore and the Hittite Etymological Dictionary.
Jaan Puhvel, 94, Estonian-American linguist.