After I moved to the UK in 1982 I sometimes saw these rows of books in people’s houses, the Encyclopedia Britannica. We had similar in Germany, but ours was called ‘der Brockhaus’.
Photo credit: Florian Hirzinger
The German encyclopedia is named after Friedrich Arnold Brockhaus, who was born in Dortmund on the 4th May 1772 and died on the 20th August 1823 in Leipzig.
His father wanted him to be a cloth merchant, which he did for a while. But he was more interested in languages and especially books! So, after a not too successful career as a cloth merchant he opened a bookshop which turned into a publishing house where he started the encyclopedia.
I found three German videos about him on YouTube which you might like to watch:
The Brockhaus Encyclpodia ceased to be a printed edition in 2014, but it’s still available online. Sadly, you need to pay to use it, but if you want to have a little insight of what they offer, have a look here: Brockhaus.de
Did you have an encyclopedia in your bookshelves at home? Do you still have yours?
