Thomas Nugent

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Thomas Nugent (* approx. 1700; † April 27, 1772 at Gray's Inn , London ) was an Irish scholar, historian and travel writer. Today he is best known for his tour guides for the Grand Tour , the educational trip through Europe that was particularly popular with young English aristocrats. His detailed descriptions of what was then France, Italy, Germany and the Netherlands provide today's historians with a rich source of information on the situation in the second half of the 18th century.

Life

Little is known about his early years. Although he was from Ireland, he spent most of his life in London. There he worked as a writer and translator. In 1749 he published the multi-volume work "The Grand Tour - containing an exact description of most of the cities, towns and remarkable places of Europe" . This was the first comprehensive travel guide for English gentlemen who wanted to embark on the Grand Tour of Europe. It is not known whether Nugent had undertaken this trip himself, but based on the extremely detailed information and the obvious local knowledge, it can be assumed. Nugent devoted the following years to translating works by well-known scholars of his time, mostly from French into English. These include a translation of “Principes du droit politique” by the Swiss lawyer from Geneva Jean-Jacques Burlamaqui (1694–1748) into English (“Principles of Politic Law”, 1752), published in 1751, followed by a translation by Étienne Bonnot de in 1756 Condillac's “ Essay on the Origin of Human Knowledge”.

Also in 1756 his travel guide was reissued in an updated version, this time under the title "The Grand Tour, or, A journey through the Netherlands, Germany, Italy and France" . In 1759 he also published a translation of the French historian Philippe Macquer (1720-1770) on Roman history ( "Chronological abridgment of the Roman History" ). Then he devoted himself to the history of France by Charles-Jean-François Hénault ("Chronological abridgment of the History of France", 1762). In 1765 Nugent received his doctorate in law from the University of Aberdeen, Scotland . Then he planned to write a story of the vandals and went on a trip to Germany to study the sources. He traveled through northern Germany, from Hamburg via Lübeck to Mecklenburg, where he suspected the original home or the former settlement area of ​​the Vandals. Returning to England in 1766 he not only published his history of Vandalia ("The history of Vandalia Containing the ancient and present state of the country of Mecklenburg"), but also published his German travel experiences in 1768 in the form of several letters to a fictional friend who stayed at home. This work (original title: Travels through Germany: containing observations on customs, manners, religion, government, commerce, arts, and antiquities: with a particular account of the Courts of Mecklenburg in a series of letters to a friend ) describes Hamburg , Lübeck and numerous cities and villages in what was then Mecklenburg-Schwerin and Mecklenburg-Strelitz , including Schwerin , Rostock , Wismar , Ludwigslust , Doberan , Güstrow , Bützow , Waren , Neustrelitz , Mirow and Neubrandenburg .

In 1771 he wrote a book about the Florentine Renaissance sculptor Benvenuto Cellini . Stimulated by the success of his travel literature, he has now also translated a travel guide about London and thus for the first time a work aimed at foreign readers visiting England. This book (original title: "A tour to London, or, New observations on England and its inhabitants" ) was published in 1772, the same year that Nugent died in London.

After his death, his travel guides in particular continued to enjoy great popularity. In 1778 the third edition of his "Grand Tour" appeared. His two-volume travelogue about Northern Germany - Travels through Germany - published in 1768 now aroused interest there. The Mecklenburg professor Lorenz Karsten translated the work into German and published it in 1781 with Friedrich Nicolai . This book, in which, among other things, the Lübeck Dance of Death is translated and described in the text version by Nathanael Schlott , made Nugent known in Germany and was greatly abridged in 1938 and republished in 1998 and 2000 in an annotated version. Goethe's translation of the Life of Benvenuto Cellini from 1803 is based partly on the Italian original and partly on the English version by Thomas Nugent.

Digital copies

  • Travels through Germany: with a particular account of the court of Mecklenburg , Volume 1 , Volume 2 , London 1768
  • "The Grand Tour, or, A journey through the Netherlands, Germany, Italy and France", London, 1778, 4 volumes, volume 1 , volume 2 , volume 3 , volume 4
  • The History Of Vandalia , Volume 1
  • Riverston peerage. Case on behalf of William Thomas Nugent claiming to be baron Nugent of Riverston , digitized
  • The new pocket-dictionary of the French and English languages , London 1807, digitized

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Thomas Nugent: Travels through Germany and especially through Mecklenburg New ed., Edited. and annotated by Sabine Bock , 2nd edition. Illustrated and illustrated reprint of the travel letters written in 1766/67 and published in German in 1781/82, Thomas Helms Verlag Schwerin 2000, ISBN 3-931185-22-2 [1]
  2. ↑ The two books are originally from Pierre-Jean Grosley , Volume 1 , Volume 2 (Nugent's translation: Volume 2 ). A review by L. Davin in The Critical Review , p. 425f, digitized from 1772
  3. ↑ 1812 Chalmers' Biography: Thomas Nugent (? –1772), vol. 23, p. 270
  4. ↑ dodedans.com: Lübeck's Dance of Death - Thomas Nugent
  5. ↑ Thomas Nugent: Travels through Germany and especially through Mecklenburg New ed., Edited. and commented by Sabine Bock , 2nd edition. Illustrated and illustrated reprint of the travel letters written in 1766/67 and published in German in 1781/82, Thomas Helms Verlag Schwerin 2000, ISBN 3-931185-22-2 [2]
personal data
SURNAME Nugent, Thomas
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Irish scholar, historian and travel writer
DATE OF BIRTH around 1700
DATE OF DEATH April 27, 1772
Place of death Gray's Inn