Rudolf Erich Raspe

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Rudolf Erich Raspe

Rudolf Erich Raspe (* March 1736 in Hanover , baptized March 28, 1736 there; † November 16, 1794 in Muckross near Killarney , County Kerry , Kingdom of Ireland , buried November 19, 1794 in Killeaghy) was a German librarian , writer and polymath in the time of the Enlightenment . He was best known for his satirical and at the time political Munchausen stories Baron Munchausen's Narrative of his Marvelous Travels and Campaigns in Russia .

Parentage, youth and studies

Rudolf Erich Raspe was the son of the Hanoverian mining official Christian Theophilus Raspe, who also worked as a mineral and fossil collector, and his wife Luise Catharina von Eine , who came from the Prussian landed gentry . He had a brother who died young and two sisters named Dorothea Frederica and Catharina Maria Sophia, the latter of whom married a governor in Uetze. He spent his youth with his family in Clausthal and Goslar . It was in this mining region in the Harz Mountains that he acquired his first knowledge of mining, which was later very useful to him in England.

In 1755 Raspe began studying law in Göttingen , in the meantime became the private tutor of a young, wealthy Prussian named von Lüden and moved to Leipzig in 1756 , returned to Göttingen in 1759 and passed his exam there in 1760.

Years in Hanover

Raspe worked as a clerk at the royal library in Hanover from 1761 and became library secretary at the same institute a year later. The devastating earthquake in Lisbon (1755), which killed up to 100,000 people, prompted Raspe to rediscover the forgotten book Lectures and Discourses of Earthquakes (1668, published posthumously 1705) by the English physicist and naturalist Robert Hooke and to write his own first treatise on geological subjects written in Latin, published in 1763 under the title Specimen historiae naturalis globi terraquei ( Introduction to the natural history of the globe ). In it he essentially agreed with Hooke's views, which he corroborated by fossil finds, cited newly formed islands and mountains as well as a number of hypotheses about their formation, and dedicated the book to the London Royal Society .

While working at the library in Hanover, Raspe discovered unknown writings by Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz , which he published in 1765 as Oeuvres philosophiques… du feu Mr. de Leibnitz . With this he initiated a renaissance of the great German philosopher. He also gave German readers two examples of English literature. First, in an essay in 1763 he discussed the allegedly ancient poems of a Gaelic poet Ossian "discovered" by the Scottish writer James Macpherson - which Macpherson had invented freely - and secondly, in 1766, genuine old ballads that the English poet and Bishop Thomas Percy wrote for a year previously published as Reliques of Ancient English Poetry . In 1764 Raspe tried himself as a poet with the extensive poem Spring Thoughts on the wedding of his sister. Two years later he achieved a more important achievement in this area with his allegorical, medieval theme, 89-stanza knight romance Hermin and Gunilde , which Heinrich Christian Boie described as the first romance of the Germans and which the German poet Gottfried August Bürger in 1774 Drafting the ballad Lenore initiated.

Raspe had become a member of the Freemason Lodge Friedrich in Hanover around 1766 and in 1766 became Secretarius perpetuus of the Lodge Zum White Pferde there . Under the name a Papilione he was a member of the Strict Observance ; he was acquainted with Johann Joachim Christoph Bode . In 1779 and 1782 he tried to get an honorable "cover" from the lodge in Hanover, but was dishonorably dismissed ("civiliter mortuus").

His library salary was insufficient for the lavish lifestyle led by Raspe, so that he was constantly in financial embarrassment. There he received the patronage of Johann Ludwig von Wallmoden-Gimborn , who later rose to the rank of imperial count , whose collection of ancient sculptures he cataloged in 1767 and in whose circle he made the acquaintance of important politicians and scholars such as Benjamin Franklin . He also maintained contacts with Johann Joachim Winckelmann and Johann Gottfried Herder, for example .

Museum curator and professor in Kassel

The art collector Wallmoden-Gimborn gave Raspe a post as curator at the Kunsthaus ( Ottoneum ) in Kassel in 1767 . Here he also became Professor of Antiquities at the Collegium Carolinum . Raspe organized the landgraves' collections in an exemplary manner, had a visitor's book created and cataloged in a twelve-volume catalog the coin and medal collection of around 14,000 objects belonging to the Hessian Landgrave Friedrich II von Hessen-Kassel . Getting caught in a deeper and deeper debt vortex, however, he took hold of the coins entrusted to him. In the following years, however, Raspe acquired extremely valuable medieval manuscripts (including the Hardehaus Gospels) for the landgrave's library and put together an extensive collection of sources on medieval history. With his design for a “Gothic or Old Teutsches Antiquitaeten-Cabinett” (1767) he, together with Johann Christoph Gatterer , is considered a pioneer in a re-evaluation of the previously under-appreciated Middle Ages. At the same time, the idea of ​​a cultural-historical museum is articulated here for the first time.

During a stay in Berlin , Raspe married the doctor's daughter Elisabeth Lange on April 9, 1771. Her dowry could only cover part of his debts. The couple had a son Friederich and a daughter Philippine Caroline, but divorced after 1782.

Raspe carried out further research in the fields of geology and geological history. In 1769, in the 59th volume of the Philosophical Transactions, he published a treatise in which he advocated the existence of elephants, the mammoths , who lived in prehistoric times in the northern regions of the earth . This script secured Raspe admission to the British Royal Society . In the next two years he published two more articles in the Philosophical Transactions and said, among other things, that the Hessian basalt was due to volcanic activities, a theory that was initially overshadowed in Germany by the success of the Neptunists under Abraham Gottlob Werner (Basaltstreit ), but then found recognition. In 1769 he translated a work by the Italian writer Francesco Algarotti as an experiment on architecture, Mahlerey and musical opera into German. In 1772 he also published a weekly magazine based on the model of English magazines, the Casselschen viewer , in which he commented on opera reform, but also on criminal problems of impostors. In addition, he reviewed in numerous scientific journals on topics of art, archeology, music and literature.

After Raspe traveled to Berlin in September 1774, his embezzlement was discovered by the administration of the coin cabinet. He hesitantly followed the request to return in February 1775, was immediately confronted with his misconduct and was only just able to escape arrest. He fled first to Holland, in August 1775 to England. According to the profile, he was a red-haired man of medium height and should have embezzled coins worth over 3,000 thalers. Since then he has been considered a notorious fraud. In December 1775 he was expelled from the Royal Society.

Living in the UK

Raspe stayed in the British Isles until the end of his life. In order to earn a living, he initially worked as a translator of geological treatises. In 1776, for example, he transferred his own work, which had been published in German two years earlier, into English as Account of some German volcanoes and their productions… . Conversely, he helped the German naturalist Georg Forster , whom he had met with his father Johann Reinhold Forster in the British capital, to translate his travelogue A Voyage round the World (1777) into German.

In 1779, Raspe, supported by some influential friends, went on a journey through his new home. With the discovery of the manuscript De arte pendingi by the medieval German monk Theophilus Presbyter in the Cambridge University Library , he made a significant discovery for the history of oil painting . With the help of this manuscript he was able to substantiate the theory that oil painting was invented before the Flemish painters and (supposed) brothers Hubert and Jan van Eyck . The English writer and art collector Horace Walpole had already expressed this opinion in 1762 and now saw himself confirmed by the discovery of the German exile. A tailor had Raspe arrested because of his debts. Walpole paid a release bail and also helped financially that Raspe could print his Critical Essay on the Origins of Oil Painting in 1781 , as well as the Theophilus manuscript and another manuscript he discovered in the Cambridge library, Heraclius de coloribus et artibus Romanorum .

In 1781, the Enlightenment author wrote moderately successful English translations of works of German literature, in particular the first translation of the drama Nathan the Wise by Gotthold Ephraim Lessing , but without any major success. So he had to continue to lead a relatively meager life.

Industrialist Matthew Boulton , who ran a company with James Watt , commissioned Raspe to develop mines in Cornwall . Employed at Boulton since 1782, Raspe lived in Redruth for a few years , got his own laboratory and in 1784 rose to the position of “master of assay”.

At the end of 1785 he published the first edition of gaudy "stories of lies" that were translated into English and allegedly told by Baron Karl Friedrich Hieronymus von Münchhausen , thus creating the starting point for one of the most widely read children's and folk books (see below). With this work he should (posthumously) establish his most lasting fame.

At the beginning of 1787 Raspe denounced Freiherrn vom Stein with a letter that he addressed to many personalities in London society. Stein was in England from late 1786 to mid-1787 to study mining technology and iron production there and to buy Boulton steam engines for Prussian state salt works. Raspe warned of Stein's activities and recommended that he deport him to Germany. This recommendation was not followed, but it was not without consequences. After that, Stein's contacts with Boulton and Watt, his visits to the mines and iron production of the great iron industrialist John Wilkinson, and his purchase negotiations were made so difficult that Stein finally had to return to Germany without success.

In London in 1784 the Scottish medal manufacturer James Tassie had a medal portrait of Raspe made, which is now in the National Portrait Gallery in Edinburgh . In 1790 Raspe began to systematically record the Scottish art collections and in 1791 published a two-volume catalog in English and French which described almost 16,000 gems and cameos - which Tassie had reproduced in glass paste from originals on loan . His introduction to this catalog introduced the reader to the history of stone carving. Tassie also involved him in his manufacture.

Among other things, Raspe invented the hardening of steel with tungsten . In 1790/91 he looked for mineral resources on behalf of the Highland Society in Northern Scotland. He claimed to have seen signs of great mineral wealth and enticed a local magnate, Sir John Sinclair of Ulbster, to invest a great deal of money in preliminary investigations, but disappeared before the project could bear fruit. He was suspected of adding Cornish ore to bogs to simulate rich mineral deposits. In 1792/93 he also researched economically viable minerals in Cornwall and Wales. At the end of 1793 he went to Ireland. Most recently, he advised the owner of the " Muckross " estate in south-west Ireland, Henry Arthur Herbert (1756–1821), on the development of the copper mines located there. Raspe fell ill with scarlet fever and died in November 1794. He was buried in an anonymous grave near Killarney in the Protestant cemetery "Killeaghy".

In the British Kingdom, Raspe was recognized early on, especially for his literary achievements. In his German homeland, however, he was morally disqualified for a long time and only recently have his services in the fields of geology, art and literature been given a fairer assessment.

Munchausen Book

Vade Mecum for Funny People 1774 001.jpg

Baron Münchhausen, known as the Baron of Lies , used to tell brilliant stories at his castle in Bodenwerder, to entertain a sociable group of friends, and to present hunting and war adventures garnished with strong gimmicks. Raspe might also be among his audience. In 1781 an anonymous author published sixteen and in 1783 another two short, funny purring stories called Mhs-nsche histories in the 8th and 9th part of the German anecdotal magazine Vade Mecum for funny people , edited by Friedrich Nicolai pseudonymously and published by August Mylius in Berlin has been. This anonymous author has often been identified with Raspe, who, incidentally, was good friends with Friedrich Nicolai - but without any definite proof. In any case, at the end of 1785, Raspe translated seventeen of the Mhs-n stories from Vade Mecum into English. He rearranged their order so that the previously incoherent anecdotes fit together better and let them be told here for the first time by the literary figure of "Baron Munchausen". He created a book of only 56 pages and published it anonymously as Baron Munchausen's Narrative of his Marvelous Travels and Campaigns in Russia . The Freiherr, bluntly named as the author of the stories, was deeply annoyed about the publication of this book, as it earned him the dubious fame of a master trickster and "baron of lies".

Further editions appeared in quick succession, from the third of which (May 1786) the original inventory of the book was continuously expanded to include subjects of interest to the island audience, especially sea adventures. For this purpose, anecdotes from the vera historia of the ancient Greek writer Lukian von Samosata were incorporated, further allusions to the balloon flights of Jean-Pierre Blanchard and the Montgolfier brothers at that time, and contemporary travel and adventure literature, e.g. B. A History of the Siege of Gibraltar (1783) by Colonel John Drinkwater Bethune , A Voyage towards the North Pole (1774) by Constantine Phipps, 2nd Baron Mulgrave , Tour through Sicily and Malta (1773) by Patrick Brydone as well as the bragging in the Mémoires sur les Turcs et le Tartares (1785) by François Baron de Tott . The third edition was called Gulliver revived - containing singular travels, campaigns, voyages and sporting adventures of Baron Munchausen .

As early as the end of 1786, Gottfried August Bürger created a very free (back) translation of the third English edition of Raspe's Münchhausen book into German, with extensive additions. It also appeared anonymously under the title Wonderful journeys on water and on land, campaigns and funny adventures of the Baron von Münchhausen . Bürger had a second increased edition in 1788 based on the fifth English edition. Münchhausen became a popular book in Germany, but also enjoyed great popularity in the English-speaking world due to the editions there. The material found its way into world literature and the adventures of the baron of lies have been filmed several times to this day.

Raspe never identified himself as the author of his Munchausen book. In addition, Bürger gave London as the alleged place of printing of his edition, while it was actually published in Göttingen. These were two of the reasons why for a long time Bürger was taken to be the author of the Münchhausen material. In 1824 Karl Reinhard , Bürger's close friend and biographer, presented the real facts in the Berlin partner and made Raspe well-known as the first author, but it took decades before this correct insight was generally accepted in literary studies. In 2015, a complete German edition of Raspe's Munchausen Adventures appeared for the first time.

Editions of the Münchhausen book

  • Rudolf Erich Raspe: Münchhausen's Adventure. The fantastic stories fully translated from English. Translated, edited and commented by Stefan Howald and Bernhard Wiebel, Stroemfeld, Frankfurt am Main 2015, ISBN 978-3-86600-243-2 .

literature

  • Andrea Linnebach (Ed.): The Münchhausen author Rudolf Erich Raspe. Science, art, adventure. euregioverlag, Kassel 2005, ISBN 3-933617-23-5 .
  • Jim Larner (Ed.): Killarney, History and Heritage. The Collins Press, Cork 2005, ISBN 1-903464-55-2 , pp. 261f.
  • Dennis R. Dean: Raspe, Rudolf Erich . In: Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. (ODNB). Volume 46: Randolph - Rippingille. Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2004, ISBN 0-19-861396-2 , pp. 75-78.
  • Uwe Meier:  Raspe, Rudolf Erich. In: New German Biography (NDB). Volume 21, Duncker & Humblot, Berlin 2003, ISBN 3-428-11202-4 , pp. 164-166 ( digitized version ).
  • Hubatsch, Walther: Der Freiherr vom Stein and England, Grote'sche Verlagsbuchhandlung, (Kohlhammer), Cologne 1977, A publication of the Freiherr-vom-Stein-Gesellschaft e. V. Cappenberg Castle, p. 24ff.

Web links

Commons : Rudolf Erich Raspe  - Collection of images, videos and audio files
Wikisource: Rudolf Erich Raspe  - Sources and full texts

Remarks

  1. ↑ Dennis R. Dean: Raspe, Rudolf Erich. In: ODNB. Volume 46, p. 76.
  2. ↑ Hans G. Bressler: The strange curriculum of the brother Raspe. In: The Brotherhood. 1967, No. 6, pp. 138-141; General Handbook of Freemasonry 1863. Volume 3, p. 17; Herm. Schüttler: Johann Joachim Christoph Bode… Neuwied 1994, p. 323, footnote 892.
  3. ↑ Visitor book
  4. ↑ Andrea Linnebach: The "Middle Ages" in the eyes of two German historians of the Enlightenment: Johann Christoph Gatterer and Rudolf Erich Raspe in exchange about a disregarded age. In: Journal of the Association for Hessian History and Regional Studies. Volume 119, 2014, pp. 105-124.
  5. ^ Rudolf Raab: Münchhausen, Karl Friedrich Hieronymus Freiherr von and Erwin Wackermann: Münchhausen and Münchhausiaden. In: Klaus Doderer (ed.): Lexicon of children's and youth literature. Weinheim / Basel, Volume 2, pp. 513-518; Karl Ernst Hermann Krause: Münchhausen, Hieronimus Karl Friedrich Freiherr von. In: Allgemeine Deutsche Biographie (ADB). Volume 23, 1886, pp. 1-5.
personal data
SURNAME Raspe, Rudolf Erich
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German librarian, writer and polymath
DATE OF BIRTH baptized March 26, 1736
PLACE OF BIRTH Hanover
DATE OF DEATH November 16, 1794
Place of death near Killarney , Kingdom of Ireland