Karl Witte

Johann Heinrich Friedrich Karl Witte, mostly: Karl Witte and Carl ( o) Witte ( born July 1, 1800 Lochau, Saalkreis; † 6 March 1883, Halle) was a German jurist and one of the main researchers Dante and Dante translator the 19th century.

Karl Witte was born on July 1, 1800 in the parsonage Lochau in Halle ( Saale). The pastor Karl Heinrich Gottfried Witte raised his son with a special commitment and success, so this 10 years passed his Matura at the Thomas School in Leipzig and has already received his doctorate in 1813 for the first time in Giessen. He then began an academic career as a lawyer at the universities of Breslau and Halle. The father Wittes described the method of education of his son to a child prodigy in the book Karl Witte or educational history thereof ( 2 volumes, 1819), but earned that representation in Germany above all criticism and was soon forgotten. Since 1834 he was a member of the Masonic Lodge Halle to three swords.

In Breslau, he befriended closely with journalists and writers Karl Schall and Carl von Holtei and the Dante - specialist Karl Ludwig Kannegießer and Prince John of Saxony (later King John of Saxony; pseudonym " Philalethes "). A special profile developed Witte but not as a lawyer, but with his commitment to philological high-level issues of the Divine Comedy ( German: The Divine Comedy ) by Dante Alighieri, he founded in 1865 the German Dante Society.

On 28 June 2008 have been unveiled in honor of the " child prodigy of Lochau " at its birthplace in Kirchwinkel a plaque. This will set the most famous citizen of Lochau a lasting monument. Another plaque is located since 2007 at Witte 's former residence in Halle, Large Brauhausstraße 16