Johann Friedrich Pfeffinger

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Johann Friedrich Pfeffinger (born May 5, 1667 in Strasbourg ; † August 27, 1730 ) was a German legal scholar . In the field of German constitutional law , he wrote his main work Vitriarius Illustratus , which is a commentary on the Justinian Institutions reference work Institutiones iuris publici by the legal scholar Philipp Reinhard Vitriarius .

Life

Johann Friedrich Pfeffinger was the son of the leather manufacturer Daniel Pfeffinger, who came from a well-respected family. His mother Susanne Bebel was the daughter of a white tanner and the sister of the Strasbourg professor Balth. He attended high school in his native city and then started at the local university 's academic career. Rebhan, Schrag and Kulpis were his authoritative teachers in the field of law , which he chose for his profession. In philosophy he heard Faust, Zentgraf and Scheidt's lectures. His maternal uncle, Balthasar Bebel, expanded his historical knowledge . He continued his studies in Leipzig from the summer of 1687. There he found a patron in Professor Leonhard Baudiss who trained him to become a competent legal scholar.

In his leisure hours Pfeffinger occupied himself with mathematics and geography . He had also learned new languages ​​thoroughly and was able to teach French , for example . The outstanding reputation of the historian Konrad Samuel Schurzfleisch drew him to Wittenberg in 1690 . But he did not stay here long, as Cellesche Geheime Rat (Minister) and Vice Chancellor Weipart Ludwig von Fabrice soon offered him a favorable position as court master . Pfeffinger accepted this post and until the end of 1692 acted as tutor of the eldest son of his employer, Johann Ludwig von Fabrice . On January 12, 1693 he came to the knight school in Lüneburg as a professor of mathematics , which was elevated to an academy in 1712. In 1708, after Theodor Georg Rosenhagen's death, he was promoted to inspector of the institution. His advanced age and poor health prompted him to turn down the librarianship position in Hanover , which the state government had given him in 1724 after the head of the royal book room, Johann Georg von Eckhart , had fled because of urgent debts. His sickness, especially a severe stone disease from which he had suffered for several years, compelled Pfeffinger to apply for his release in 1729. It was granted to him in September 1729, with a pension of 300 Reichstalers and the rank of Royal British Councilor. However, he died on August 27, 1730 at the age of 63.

Pfeffinger had been married since 1709 to the widow of his predecessor Rosenhagen, a born Sievers who survived him. Their marriage was childless.

Pfeffinger was very respected as a person. His contemporaries praise his restless activity and his modest, undemanding and moral character. Many of his actions speak for his mildness and benevolent disposition. His portrait in front of the history of the Braunschweig-Lüneburg house printed from his estate is said to have more resemblance to him than another before his Vitriarius Illustratus .

Works

Vitriarius Illustratus

Pfeffinger had extensive knowledge of mathematics, history and genealogy . But he made a particular contribution to the processing of German constitutional law . He surpassed his predecessors by diligently using all the resources available to him, some of which were offered by his own collection of books and others by other libraries. At the age of 24 he wrote his famous commentary on the Institutiones iuris publici by Professor Philipp Reinhard Vitriarius from Leiden under the title Vitriarius Illustratus, seu Institutiones Iuris Publici Romano-Germanici… (Freiburg 1691) . But since he did not make himself known as an author, he gave rise to manifold assumptions about the author of that work. There has been public criticism that his work is an immature work. A few years later, Pfeffinger published a second, greatly increased and improved edition in two volumes (Gotha 1698 and 1699), in which he now identified himself as the author. The third edition appeared in 1712 and 1718, followed by a third volume in 1725 and a fourth volume published in 1731 after the death of the author von Gebhardi .

Pfeffinger dedicated the second volume of Vitriarius Illustratus to Prince Friedrich Ludwig of Wales , the third to King George I. The dedication to the monarch mentioned above is quite extensive and contains an outline of the history of the British Empire . In addition to a short list of the most important writers in the field of constitutional law, the fourth volume of this new edition also contained in an appendix the electoral surrender of Emperor Joseph I , the peace treaties of Rijswijk , Rastatt and Baden, and the pragmatic sanction of Emperor Charles VI. Christian Gottlieb Riccius remedied the lack of a general register of the here and there scattered news with a repertory written in Latin (Gotha 1741).

A nephew of Pfeffinger undertook a work that was underestimated with an extract from that work ( Vitriarius illustratus et in Compendium redactus , Strasbourg 1728). This excerpt, which only includes part of the first book, appeared in the form of a treatise , but, as a factory work, found little acceptance with the learned public. Pfeffinger's larger work held for longer in its recognized value, which gives it the diligent use of the historical sources and the communicated, sometimes rare documents and state files. Pfeffinger would have done even more important work if he had moved away from the one-sided method of Vitriarius of establishing German constitutional law in the manner of Justinian's civil laws and had followed his own system. This made the book seem a bit haphazard and difficult to use without precise indexes. Nevertheless, the work, especially as a document collection, maintained its value until the 19th century.

Other works

In addition to his main work Vitriarius Illustratus , Pfeffinger wrote oddities of the 17th century , which book was printed in Hamburg in 1706 in a strong quarto of 113 sheets, but only contains the first 20 years. He provided more statistics than an actual description of the earth in his Geographia curiosa (Leipzig 1690), in which he not only names cities, rivers, mountains, islands, etc. all over the world, but also a list of all popes, emperors, and electors etc. along with a concise overview of the most important world events. From his estate, his nephew of the same name, Johann Friedrich Pfeffinger, published a very inadequate copy of a history of the Braunschweig-Lüneburg house (3 volumes, Hamburg 1731–34). Using the text of the Rehtmeier Chronicle as a basis, he processed the sometimes valuable collections of his uncle into a work that was of little use to his uncle's fame. According to a manuscript that was left behind, Pfeffinger's historical-genealogical report was also printed by the Lords of Thun (in the collection of unprinted documents explaining Lower Saxony's history and antiquities , Göttingen 1751, 3rd St., pp. 7-64).

Among Pfeffinger's little writings, his Problèmes mathématiques (Leipzig 1688) and the Manière de fortifier à la Vaubanne (Amsterdam 1690) should also be mentioned. He dealt with this subject in more detail in the Nouvelle fortification, ou recueil de differentes manières de fortifier en Europe (Amsterdam 1698). Among the numerous manuscripts that Pfeffinger left behind, some of which were sold by his relatives, some of which fell into strange hands, there was a carefully worked out diplomatic history of all noble families and monasteries in Lüneburg , a continuation of the curiosities of the 17th century , Collectanea theologico-politiica , a Catalogus Pontificum Romanorum novem priorum saeculorum , Collectanae de Coenobio illustri Michaelitano Luneburgensi and others on Lüneburg related writings, of which Johann Friedrich Jugler in his contributions to the legal biography (4th vol., P. 173 ff.) A complete Directory supplied. The privy councilor von Praun acquired Pfeffinger's genealogical writings .

literature

personal data
SURNAME Pfeffinger, Johann Friedrich
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German legal scholar
DATE OF BIRTH May 5, 1667
PLACE OF BIRTH Strasbourg
DATE OF DEATH August 27, 1730