Allgemeine Encyclopädie der Wissenschaften und Künste
Encyclopedia
Johann Samuel Ersch
Johann Samuel Ersch was a German bibliographer, generally regarded as the founder of German bibliography.-Biography:...
and Johann Gottfried Gruber
Johann Gottfried Gruber
Johann Gottfried Gruber was a German critic and literary historian.-Biography:Gruber was born at Naumburg on the Saale....
, therefore also known as the "Ersch-Gruber." One of the most ambitious encyclopaedia projects ever, it remained uncompleted.
It was designed and begun in 1813 by Professor Ersch to satisfy the wants of Germans, only in part supplied by foreign works. It was stopped by the war
Napoleonic Wars
The Napoleonic Wars were a series of wars declared against Napoleon's French Empire by opposing coalitions that ran from 1803 to 1815. As a continuation of the wars sparked by the French Revolution of 1789, they revolutionised European armies and played out on an unprecedented scale, mainly due to...
until 1816, when Professor Gottlieb Hufeland
Gottlieb Hufeland
Gottlieb Hufeland was a German economist and jurist.Born in Danzig , in the province of Royal Prussia, Hufeland was educated at the gymnasium of his native town, and completed his university studies at Leipzig and Göttingen. He graduated at Jena, and in 1788 was there appointed to an extraordinary...
joined, but he died on November 25, 1817, while the specimen part was at press. The first volume appeared in Leipzig in 1818. The editors of the different sections at various times were some of the best-known men of learning in Germany, including Gruber, M.H.E. Meier
Moritz Hermann Eduard Meier
Moritz Hermann Eduard Meier was a German classical scholar, born at Glogau. When 24 years of age he became professor extraordinarius at the University of Greifswald, and in 1824 was made professor ordinarius at Halle, where he remained until his death...
, Hermann Brockhaus
Hermann Brockhaus
Hermann Brockhaus was a German Orientalist born in Amsterdam. He was a leading authority on Sanskrit and Persian languages...
, W. Müller and A.G. Hoffmann
Andreas Gottlieb Hoffmann
Andreas Gottlieb Hoffmann was a German Protestant theologian and Orientalist born in Welbsleben. He was a leading authority on Syriac and Hebrew languages....
of Jena. Naturalist Eduard Poeppig wrote most of the articles on the Americas
Americas
The Americas, or America , are lands in the Western hemisphere, also known as the New World. In English, the plural form the Americas is often used to refer to the landmasses of North America and South America with their associated islands and regions, while the singular form America is primarily...
.
The work is divided into three sections: (1) A-G (99 vols.), (2) H-N (43 vols.), (3) O-Z (25 vols.). All articles bear the authors' names, and those not ready in time were placed at the end of their letter. By 1889 the encyclopaedia had reached 167 volumes when it was abandoned. The article about Greece alone covered 3,668 pages, spanning eight volumes. Section 1 was completed, but section 2 only up to the entry "Ligatur", and section 3 up to "Phyxios".
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