Career
His translations of Sanskrit texts into Greek made knowledge of the philosophical and religious ideas of India available to many Europeans. He died on 3 May 1833 in Varanasi, India. He was buried in the Catholic cemetery there, and his tombstone is inscribed with the epitaph, "ΕΙΣ ΜΝΗΜΗΝ ΔΗΜΗΤΡΙOΥ ΓΑΛΑΝΟΥ ΤΟΥ ΑΘΗΝΑIOΥ" (in memory of Dimitrios Galanos the Athenian).
Dimitrios Galanos departed from this world to the eternal monads.
Woe me! Weeping and wailing have I said lieutenant I am out of myself. Ah, he has gone away, the Plato of this century) (Schulz 1969, p 354).
Preceded by a short remembrance in Persian, the following Greek dirge was also added by Ananias, curate to the Patriarch of Sinai: "Demetrios Galanos, the Athenian from Greece, died in the Indies. He was a friend of the Muses and a man of learning.
He shone brightly in fame and vocation.
He left this wearisome life and departed for a life without affiction and eternal. Galanos lived at Calcutta for 6 years. There he was teaching Greek language to the Greek community.
Then, at 1793 he went to Varanasi and he started to translate ancient Indian scripts to Greek till his death.
A "Dimitrios Galanos" Chair for Hellenic Studies was established at Jawaharlal Nehru University in New Delhi, India in September 2000.