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Christoph Gottlieb von Murr (6 August 1733 – 8 April 1811) was apolymathic German scholar, based inNuremberg. He was a historian and magistrate. He edited and contributed to significant cultural and scientific journals. A notablenaturalist von Murr was a Member of theGesellschaft Naturforschender Freunde zu Berlin (Berlin Society of Friends of Natural Science) and theBayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften (Bavarian Academy of Sciences). He was also an art historian, the author of the first bibliography of books on painting, sculpture, and engraving. He published extensively on illuminated manuscripts, early printed books, the history of libraries, the history of the Jesuit missions, the history of the Jews in China, Arabic and Chinese literature. Familiar with most of the European languages, he was an active correspondent with many of the most distinguished scholars of the period. He had a vast library.[1]
Christoph Gottlieb von Murr studied at theUniversity of Altdorf and received his doctorate in law in 1754. In addition to law, Murr was interested innatural history, philosophy, mathematics, archaeology and history. After completing his doctorate, he first devoted himself to a history of theHohenstaufen emperors, especiallyFriedrich II. On his study trips made from 1756–61 through the Netherlands, England, Austria and Italy, he established relationships with numerous scholars with whom he was in active correspondence throughout his life, and he acquired an extensive collection of art and autographs. After returning from his trips, Murr became a customs and toll official in Nuremberg. In addition, he published numerous literary, art and general historical works, especially on the history of art, craft and culture in Nuremberg. He was also the editor of the Journalszur Kunstgeschichte und zur allgemeinen Literatur (transl. Journal of Art History and General Literature) and desNeuen Journals zur Litteratur) and desNeuen Journals zur Litteratur und Kunstgeschichtethe (transl. New Journal of Literature and Art History).Friedrich Schiller used Murr's monograph (based on archives in Vienna) on the history of the Thirty Years War[2] as a basis when he wroteWallenstein. Von Murr was a regular contributor toDer Naturforscher (transl. "The Naturalist") as C. G. von M.
During a stay in Strasbourg, the Protestant Murr also came into contact with theJesuit order and became a journalist writing about Jesuit issues and thesuppression of 1773. He was one of the few German Protestants during theEnlightenment to defend the order and the Jesuit China mission.[3] Von Murr reproduced in 1790 the book published in 1553 byMichael Servetus entitledChristianismi restitutio. The original books were burned when Servetus himself was burned at the stake in Geneva. Von Murr used as model the exemplar in theNational Library in Vienna, one of the three surviving exemplars.
Peter Wolf, « Protestantischer ‘Jesuitismus’ im Zeitalter der Aufklärung : Christoph Gottlieb Murr (1733–1811) und die Jesuiten »,Zeitschrift für bayerische Landesgeschichte, LXII, 1999, p. 99-137.
