Christian Wilhelm von Dohm

Christian Wilhelm von Dohm; portrait by Karl Christian Kehrer (c.1795)

Christian Wilhelm von Dohm (German: [doːm]; 11 December 1751 – 29 May 1820) was a German historian and political writer.

Biography

Dohm was born in Lemgo on 11 December 1751. The son of a Lutheran pastor at Lemgo's St. Mary's Church, he was a radical advocate for Jewish emancipation. He entered Prussian officialdom in 1779, first as archivist in Berlin. In 1781, Dohm published a two-volume work entitled Ueber die bürgerliche Verbesserung der Juden ("On the Civil Improvement of the Jews"), which argued for Jewish political equality on humanitarian grounds. It was widely praised by the Jewish communities in Berlin, Halberstadt, and Suriname. In 1786 he was ennobled (untitled nobility), gaining him the nobiliary particle von before his surname.

Dohm died on his Pustleben estate near Nordhausen on 29 May 1820.

References

•  This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Singer, Isidore; et al., eds. (1901–1906). "Dohm, Christian Wilhelm Von". The Jewish Encyclopedia. New York: Funk & Wagnalls.