Carl Faulmann

Johann Christoph Carl Faulmann , usually Carl or Karl Faulmann for short, (born June 24, 1835 in Halle an der Saale , † June 28, 1894 in Vienna ) was a typesetter , private scholar, author and shorthand theorist.

Life

Frontispiece from Faulmann's Illustrated History of Writing (1880)

Carl Faulmann grew up as the son of a day laborer from Halle in poor circumstances. In 1849 he became an apprentice typesetter at the Gebauer und Schwetschke book printing company in Halle. After completing his apprenticeship, he went on a hike and came via Magdeburg , Berlin , Frankfurt / Oder , Silesia , Saxony , Thuringia and Coburg to Munich , where he arrived in 1854 at the time of the " General Exhibition of German Industrial and Commercial Products ".

At this exhibition he saw the types of printing exhibited by the Royal Court and State Printing House in Vienna in Stolze's shorthand . From this time on he was concerned with the plan to work out such types for Gabelsberger's widespread shorthand system . In fact, in 1855 he was employed by the director of the court and state printing works in Vienna, Aloys Auer, as “typesetter for foreign languages” and commissioned with the execution of his plan. In the following year he succeeded in creating a first version of his Gabelsberger types, which he then used in continuously improved versions for almost four decades to print shorthand magazines and textbooks.

In 1859 he left the service of the state printing company, worked as a shorthand teacher at secondary schools and as a typesetter. Faulmann managed to build a secure existence in Vienna: in 1860 he married Karoline Schmidt (the marriage had eleven children, four of whom survived him), in the following year he passed the teaching examination for shorthand and in 1866 he became an Austrian citizen . At the same time he expanded his language skills - largely autodidactically - especially with Hebrew , Persian and Sanskrit . He also improved his Gabelsberger types.

Faulmann's main occupation, however, remained shorthand, so that in 1868 he became a member of the teaching examination commission and from 1876 worked as a lecturer for shorthand at the University of Vienna. Further textbooks and historical representations of the shorthand systems showed Faulmann's theoretical penetration of the complex matter. His involvement in efforts to simplify Gabelsberger's system finally led Faulmann to develop his own, far simpler shorthand system called phonography in 1874.

As the name ("phonetic transcription") suggests, the phonography should be speed v. a. achieve by a radical simplification of the orthography , in that Faulmann's system did not record the usual spelling letter for letter, but sound for sound the pronunciation of words. Initially, the text was not published by Faulmann himself, who feared negative assessments because of private conflicts, but in 1874 by the Viennese school teacher Braut. It was not until 1880 that Faulmann identified himself as the inventor of his script and from then on called it "phonetic shorthand". After he revoked his own orthography in 1884 because of excessive resistance and otherwise revised the script again, Faulmann's System v. a. at times widespread in Austria; Around 1900 there were 17 phonography associations with 1351 members.

A page from Faulmann's Book of Scripture (2nd edition 1880)

In addition, Faulmann continued to experiment with the printing of foreign scripts and published books on the subject of script , some of which were reissued unchanged more than 120 years after their first publication in 1880. For example, on behalf of the Wiener Staatsdruckerei Auers Buch, he reworked characters from the entire globe , from which Faulmann's Buch der Schrift (1878, 2nd edition 1880) emerged, which dealt with all known writing systems in an unprecedented completeness. Faulmann compiled his alphabets on the basis of travel reports, grammars, specialist journals and works on cultural history. His collection of the world's various writing systems is very commendable. In his theoretical writings on the origin and development of scripts (especially the Illustrated History of Scripture , 1880), Faulmann turned to theories, for example, with which he wanted to establish connections between runes and hieroglyphics , which is scientifically unsustainable. However, the illustrated history of writing also retains its value to this day as an extensive collection of material and thanks to the then new way of rendering historical font examples in color lithograph .

Encouraged by his successes, Faulmann ventured into other areas of science, for example through an illustrated cultural history for readers of all classes (Vienna 1881), another illustrated history of science Im Reiche des Geistes (Vienna 1894) and an etymological dictionary of the German language ( Hall 1893). However, all of these works were unsystematic and the argumentation was often arbitrary, and the dictionary in particular received criticism. Nevertheless, Faulmann's achievements found wide public recognition: the Vienna World Exhibition brought him a medal of merit in 1873, in 1884 he was awarded the title of professor of shorthand for his services by the University of Vienna .

Carl Faulmann rests in the Matzleinsdorf Evangelical Cemetery (Group 21, No. 65) in Vienna.

Family of origin

According to oral family tradition, Carl Faulmann was a member of the Faulmann family in the Saale district, which has been documented in Lochau and in the neighboring town of Raßnitz near Halle since the 16th century. The male line of the Faulmanns died out in Raßnitz in the 40s of the 20th century.

Honors

A street in his place of birth Halle is named in honor of Carl Faulmann. In 1913 the Faulmanngasse in Vienna- Wieden (4th district) was named after him.

Fonts (selection)

• Revision of the Gabelsberger system of shorthand and the Dresden commission decisions . Rospini, Vienna 1861 digitized
• Foreign stenographic dictionary according to Gabelsberger's system, edited . 2 parts. F. Raspini in Comm., Vienna 1862–1864
• Development of the Gabelsberian system of shorthand. A festival . F. Klemm in Comm., Vienna 1868 digitized
• The Book of Scripture. Contains the characters and alphabets of all times and of all the peoples of the world. Publishing house of the Imperial and Royal State Printing House. Vienna 1878, 2nd verm. And verb. Edition 1880 digitized
• Phonography in its relation to Kurrentschrift and stenography: three popular scientific treatises . Bermann & Altmann, Vienna 1878 digitized
• Illustrated history of writing. A. Hartleben, Vienna / Pest / Leipzig 1880 digitized
• Illustrated cultural history for readers of all levels. A. Hartleben's Verlag, Vienna, Pest, Leipzig 1881 digitized
• Illustrated history of printing. A. Hartleben's Verlag, Vienna, Pest, Leipzig 1882 digitized
• Historical grammar of shorthand. Clear presentation of the systems of shorthand from the earliest times to the present, based on original studies. With many alphabets and script samples printed in the text. Bermann & Altmann, Vienna 1887.
• The invention of the art of printing according to the latest research. Hartleben, Vienna 1891 digitized
• Etymological dictionary of the German language based on our own new research . 10 booklets. E. Karras, Halle as 1891–1893.
• In the realm of the spirit. Illustrated history of the sciences . A. Hartleben's Verlag, Vienna, Pest, Leipzig 1894 digitized
• History and literature of shorthand. Bermann & Altmann, Vienna 1895 digitized

literature

• Christian Johnen:  Faulmann, Karl . In: Allgemeine Deutsche Biographie (ADB). Volume 48, Duncker & Humblot, Leipzig 1904, pp. 500-504.
• Leopold Elsinger: Professor Karl Faulmann's life and works . Vienna 1908
• Franz Kreuter, Karl W. Schmidt: Karl Faulmann, life and work. Commemorative sheets for the centenary 1835–1935 . 2nd edition Apitz, Berlin 1935
• Laurenz Schneider, Georg Blauert: History of the German shorthand . Wolfenbüttel, Heckners 1936
• Centenary for Professor Karl Faulmann. Halle-Vienna. 1835-1935 . Vienna 1937
• Karl W. Schmidt: From apprentice typesetter to professor. Professor Karl Faulmann talks about his youth . Berlin, Apitz 1937
• Christian Johnen : General history of shorthand . 4., completely reworked. Ed., Berlin Apitz 1940
• Rudolf Weinmeister:  Faulmann, Karl. In: New German Biography (NDB). Volume 5, Duncker & Humblot, Berlin 1961, ISBN 3-428-00186-9 , p. 32 f. ( Digitized version ).
• Eva-Maria Hanebutt-Benz, Dirk H. Veldhuis: From symbols to the alphabet. An epilogue to Karl Faulmann's “Illustrated History of Writing” . In: Faulmann, Illustrated History of Writing , reprint Nördlingen, Greno 1989, pp. 633–940
• Bernd Zimmermann: Strangers bring progress. On the 100th anniversary of Karl Faulmann's death . In: Saat - Evangelical Church Newspaper for Austria, 41st vol., No. 17, 4th Sept. 1994, p. 7.

Web links

Wikisource: Carl Faulmann  - Sources and full texts

Commons : Carl Faulmann (1835-1894)  - Collection of pictures, videos and audio files

• Literature by and about Carl Faulmann in the catalog of the German National Library