Karl Gok

Karl Gok

Karl Christoph Friedrich Gok , also Gock (born October 29, 1776 in Nürtingen , † October 27, 1849 in Stuttgart ) was a German administrative officer, viticulture expert, author and archaeologist. He was a half-brother of Friedrich Hölderlin .

Life

Karl Gok was a son of the chamber councilor and later mayor of Nürtingen, Johann Christoph Gok, and Johanne Christiane Gok , née Heyn, widowed Hölderlin. He lost his father in early childhood and attended the Nürtingen Latin School , but did not complete an expensive education or university for financial reasons. Instead he was trained as a scribe in Nürtingen and from 1797 in Markgröningen . From 1800 he was an invoice probator in Lichtenstern near Löwenstein , in 1802 he became a substitute in Nürtingen, in 1803 he was clerk and clerk in Zwiefalten . He married Marie Eberhardine Blöst, a distant relative, with whom he had two children, and in 1810 became town clerk in Tettnang . From 1811 he was camera administrator in Schwäbisch Gmünd , in 1816 he became court and finance councilor in the Department of the Interior and finally in 1817 court and domain councilor of the court domain chamber. In 1842 he retired.

Relationship to Friedrich Hölderlin

He was in lively correspondence with his older half-brother Friedrich; apparently the latter used him at times as the recipient of his official mail. In 1797 Friedrich Hölderlin invited Karl Gok to Frankfurt and introduced him to Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel and Isaac von Sinclair , among others . In the correspondence, Holderlin also referred to Gok's own literary plans; the relationship between the half-brothers cooled down temporarily after an inheritance dispute after the mother's death, but this was not of lasting effect. When the edition of all of Holderlin's poems was being prepared in the 1840s , Gok took part in this work. In particular, it was important to him to refute some statements "by Waiblinger and some other writable rascals" - according to Gok to Cotta , the word "rascals" was later replaced by a more harmless one in a biographical outline . A letter from 1822 or 1823 to Karl Gok is probably the last surviving letter from Friedrich Hölderlin.

Own works

Grave site on the Hoppenlauffriedhof. The memorial plaque of the Swabian Heimatbund (2009) reads Gock

Gok also wrote his own works. He was a specialist in viticulture in Württemberg and published Die Weinrebe with its types and varieties in 1829 , on viticulture on Lake Constance , on the Upper Neckar and the Swabian Alps [sic!] In 1836 and on The Wine Vine and its Fruits from 1836–1839 . In addition to ampelography , he also dealt with the history of the country, as evidenced by his writing documents and contributions to the older history of Swabia and Southern Franconia from the years 1846/47.

Karl Gok was buried in the Hoppenlauf cemetery in Stuttgart . A neo-Gothic sandstone monument marks the grave where Gok's wife rests. His estate is in the Hölderlin archive of the Württemberg State Library .

Honor

Deserving viticulture expert Karl Gok was built by King I. Wilhelm of Württemberg in 1831 with the Knight's Cross of the Order of the Württemberg Crown excellent, which with the elevation to personal nobility ( ennoblement was connected).

literature

• Udo Dickenberger, Waltraud and Friedrich Pfäfflin, The Stuttgarter Hoppenlau-Friedhof as a literary monument , Marbach am Neckar 1992, ISBN 3-928882-34-1 , pp. 218-220

Web links

• Literature by and about Karl Gok in the catalog of the German National Library

Commons : Karl Gok  - collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Hölderlin archive
2. ↑ Royal Württemberg Court and State Manual 1839, page 36