Gregor Wilhelm Nitzsch
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Gregor Wilhelm Nitzsch (November 22, 1790-1861) was a German classical scholar known chiefly for his writings on Homeric epic.
Brother of Karl Immanuel Nitzsch, he was born at Wittenberg. In 1827 he was appointed professor of ancient literature at Kiel, but in 1852 was dismissed by the Danish government for his German sympathies. In the same year he accepted a similar post at Leipzig, which he held till his death on the 22nd of July 1861.
In opposition to F. A. Wolf and Lachmann, he maintained that the Iliad and Odyssey were not an aggregate of single short poems, but long complete poems, composed by one and the same author according to a uniform plan with a central dramatic idea.
His son, Karl Wilhelm Nitsch (1818-1880), became professor of history at Königsberg in 1862 and at Berlin in 1872.
The most important of his works were: Erklärende Anmerkungen zu Homers Odyssee, i.-xii. (1826-1840); Die Sagenpoesie der Griechen (1852); Beiträge zur Geschichte der epischen Poesie der Griechen (pub. 1862, ed. C. W. Nitzsch).
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- This article incorporates text from the Encyclopædia Britannica Eleventh Edition, a publication now in the public domain.
