The New Student's Reference Work/Tauchnitz, Karl Christoph Traugott

Tauchnitz (touk′nits), Karl Christoph Traugott, a famous German printer and bookseller, was born at Grosspardau, near Leipsic, Germany, in 1761. Bred a printer, he began a small printing-business of his own in Leipsic in 1796. Publishing and type-founding were added, and it became one of the largest establishments of the kind in Germany. In 1809 he began to issue classic works in such fine and cheap editions that they circulated throughout Europe. By offering a prize of a ducat for every error pointed out, he brought out a remarkably correct edition of Homer. In 1816 he introduced stereotyping into Germany and applied it to music, an experiment which had not been tried before. The well-known Tauchnitz edition of English authors, which numbers over 3,700 volumes, was begun in 1842 by his nephew. The older Tauchnitz died in 1836.