The New International Encyclopædia/Hermann, Gottfried

HERMANN, Gottfried (1772-1848). A German philologist. He was born at Leipzig, November 28, 1772; studied there and at Jena, and was made in 1798 professor extraordinary of philosophy at Leipzig. In 1803 he was professor of eloquence, becoming in addition professor of poetry in 1809, and in this position he remained till his death, December 31, 1848. The first department which he began to cultivate on original principles was metre, of which he attempted to develop a philosophical theory from the categories of Kant; and on this subject he wrote, besides his Handbuch der Metrik (1798), several Latin treatises, among which his Epitome Doctrinæ Metricæ (1818) reached a third edition in 1852. Of wider importance, however, was the new method which he introduced into the treatment of Greek grammar. The principles of this method are not only explicitly developed in his De Emendenda Ratione Græcæ Grammaticæ (1801), but are practically illustrated in his numerous editions of the ancient classics. Hermann's power of dealing with chronological, topographical, and personal questions is shown in his Opuscula (7 vols., Leipzig, 1827-30), which also contain some poems. Consult: Jahn, Gottfried Hermann, eine Gedächtnisrede (Leipzig, 1849); Köchly, Gottfried Hermann (Heidelberg, 1874); Bursian, Geschichte der klassischen Philologie in Deutschland (Munich, 1883).