Frédéric Soret

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Frédéric Jacob Soret (born May 12, 1795 in Saint Petersburg , † December 18, 1865 in Plainpalais near Geneva ) was a Swiss private scholar and numismatist .

Frédéric Soret

Life

Soret's family came from Geneva, but his father was an artist at the Russian Tsar's court . After the family returned, he studied physics in Geneva. In 1822 he was employed by Grand Duke Karl August of Saxe-Weimar-Eisenach as a prince tutor. Even under his successor Karl Friedrich , it was Soret who took care of the education of the future Grand Duke Carl Alexander until 1836 . In Weimar he also translated some of the scientific works by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe , with whom he was friends. For him, he also characterized the morphology of the volcanic augites and amphiboles that came from the Bohemian volcanic crest of Wolfsberg . His results were then published in French in a journal published by Goethe (Zur Naturwissenschaft Ever) under the title Catalog Raisonné des variétés d´Amphiboles et Pyroxène rapportées de Bohème par HE Monsieur le Ministre d´État de Goethe .

After returning to Geneva, he began to deal with numismatics. His interest in oriental coins, possibly triggered by a discovery of medieval North African coins in Steckborn , Switzerland , led to the establishment of the most important private collection of his time in this field.

After Soret's death, through the intermediary of Johann Gustav Stickel , with whom Soret was in contact beyond the Weimar period , the Grand Duke bought his collection of around 5,000 coins for the Oriental Coin Cabinet in Jena .

literature

  • Édouard Favre: Les Études Orientales à la Société d'Histoire et d'Archéologie de Genève 1838–1894. Geneva 1894 (bibliography).
  • Louis André Gosse: Obituary. In: Rapport sur les travaux de la Société de Physique et d'Histoire Naturelle de Genève depuis Juillet 1865 à Juin 1866. Geneva 1866, pp. 21-26.
  • Stefan Heidemann : Library of the Grand Ducal Oriental Coin Cabinet. In: Friedhilde Krause (Hrsg.): Handbook of historical book stocks in Germany. Vol. 20: Thuringia HR. Olms-Weidmann, Hildesheim / Zurich / New York, p. 162 f. (via his numismatic library).
  • Stefan Heidemann: Maria Pawlowna and the upheaval in Oriental Studies: The founding of the Grand Ducal Oriental Coin Cabinet. In: Joachim Berger, Joachim von Puttkamer (ed.): From Petersburg to Weimar. Cultural transfers from 1800 to 1860 (= Jena Contributions to History. Vol. 9). Frankfurt a / M 2006, pp. 221-259.
  • Bernhard von Koehne : The Soret'sche collection. In: Berlin sheets for coin, seal and heraldry. Vol. 4 (1868), pp. 88-91.
  • Julius WahleSoret, Friedrich Jacob . In: Allgemeine Deutsche Biographie (ADB). Volume 34, Duncker & Humblot, Leipzig 1892, p. 692 f.

Literature on the relationship to Goethe and the Weimar court

  • Johannes Baier: Goethe's mineralogical studies in Bohemia. - Geohistor. Leaves, 30, 29-47; Berlin, 2019.
  • Johannes Baier: Goethe and the Wolfsberg (Vlčí hora; Czech Republic). - Z. geol. Wiss., 41/42, 209-216; Berlin, 2013/14 ( summary ).
  • Carl August Hugo Burkhardt (ed.): Goethe's conversations with Fr. Soret . Weimar 1905
  • Paul Hazard (ed.): Frédéric Soret: un Genevois a la cour de Weimar. Journal inédit de Frédéric Soret (1795–1865) , Paris 1932
  • Heinrich Hubert Houben (transl. And ed.): Frédéric Soret, Ten years with Goethe. Memories of Weimar's classic time. From Soret's handwritten estate, his diaries and his correspondence , Leipzig 1929
  • Hermann Uhde (ed.): Goethe's letters to Soret , Stuttgart 1877.

Web links