Georg Sauerwein

Georg Julius Justus Sauerwein (15 January 1831 in Hanover – 16 December 1904 in Christiania (now Oslo) was a German publisher, polyglot, poet, and linguist. He is buried at Gronau.

Sauerwein was the greatest linguistic prodigy of his time and mastered about 75 languages.

His father served as an evangelical minister in Hanover, Schmedenstedt and Gronau. From 1843 to 1848 Sauerwein went to the Gymnasium (comprehensive secondary school) in Hanover. At the age of 17, he studied Linguistics and Theology at Göttingen, but discontinued his studies in 1851 without completing a degree. At age 24 he published an English-Turkish dictionary. In 1873 he was appointed honorary doctor of the University of Göttingen.

During the years 1852–1860 Sauerwein made a living in private tutorships; first in Wales, where his introduction to Welsh culture and British concepts of freedom came to set the course of his future commitment to cultural and educational policy. In 1857 he got a position as the private tutor of princess Elisabeth of Wied, who later was to become celebrated Queen of Romania.

Later he earned his living as correspondent counselor of languages for the British and Foreign Bible Society. During the years 1857–1896 Sauerwein checked and revised a dozen translations for the British and Foreign Bible Society and translated parts of the Old Testament to Madagascan and the Gospel according to St. John to Kabyle.

As an acknowledged pacifist, Sauerwein was involved in opposition to what he perceived as the imperialism of German Empire Germany under the Kaiser. He was a supporter of the minority languages within the German Empire: Sorbian in Lusatia and Lithuanian in East Prussia.

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