For most of his adult life Boswell was better known for his "Account of Corsica", which lead to the sobriquet Corsica Boswell, than for his friendship with Dr. Johnson.
Julius Carl Schläger - Librarian and antiquarian at Gotha
Julius Carl Schläger
Born Sep 25, 1706 in HannoverDied Jun 14, 1786
Biography:
Antiquarian and numismatist who became Hofrat (privy counsellor) and Director of the Ducal Library and kepper of the Cabinet of Medals in Gotha.
A student at the University of Helmstedt, he was appointed Professor of Greek and Oriental Philology there in 1736.1
Life with Boswell:
On October 18, 1764, while visiting Gotha on his Grand Tour, Boswell went to see the Duke's Cabinet of Medals. He wrote that "[t]he Gentleman who has care of the Cabinet, was very intelligent" presumably referring to Schläger. He further wrote that Schläger "told me that he could discover counterfeit antiques because the veritable antiques were round in the edges as anciently they coined in a different manner from what they do now."
Note 1: Sources include The Journal of his German and Swiss Travels, 1764, p. 171 and the Allgemeine Deutsche Biographie volume 31 (1890), pp. 327-329
Literature
Schläger wrote a number of tracts and essays, mostly in latin and concerning the history of coins and medals, including "Index scriptorum editorum et edendorum" (1742), "Commentatio de numo Alexandri M." (1736), "Numophylacii Burkhardiani Pars I." (1740), "Historiae litis de medicorum apud veteres Romanos degentium conditione" (1741), "Dissertatio de debitore obaerato secundum jus Hebraicum et Atticum creditori in servitutem adjudicando" (1741); "Commentatio de numo Hadriani plumbeo et gemma Isiaca" (1742); "Dissertationum rariorum de antiquitatibus sacris et profanis fasciculus" (1742) and "Fasciculus novus" (1744).
Comments
Schläger = Schlegel
In his journals for October 17 and 18 Boswell refers to a "Baron von Schlegel" and "M. de Schlegel", both apparently unidentified by the Yale editors in The Journal of his German and Swiss Travels, 1764. Could he perhaps be referring to J. C. Schläger in both cases?
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