This is a signed letter by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe 

(1749–1832), the man who is widely regarded as the 

greatest and most influential writer in the German language.

He is best known as the author of the famous play FAUST. 

Goethe's many novels, plays, stories, and poems mark him 

as being one of the giants of world literature. He also had 

a serious interest in the natural sciences, which include 

publishing a new theory on the perception of color, and 

making an interesting discovery in human anatomy. 

Goethe was greatly admired by such men as Beethoven, 

Hegel, Emerson, Napoleon, Carlyle, Nietzsche, Tesla, 

and Einstein, among many, many others.

This letter may have been sent to Alexander von 

Humboldt (1769-1859). There are some very old 

handwritten notes on this letter, written by someone 

other than Goethe, that identifies this letter as having

been sent to Humboldt. However, this is by no means

a certainty.

Alexander von Humboldt was a German scientist, 

geographer, naturalist, explorer, and proponent of 

Romantic philosophy and science. His explorations 

took him to many places around the world, including

both North America and South America. There are 

more than a dozen places in the United States alone 

that are named after him, including Humboldt County, 

California.

Both of these men are very famous. 

If you are unfamiliar with either of them, 

I refer you to their Wikipedia articles.

The letter is handwritten in ink on a folded piece 

of paper. Unfolded, it is about 10" by 8". 

The letter is dated July 21, 1825. 

The letter is signed by Goethe at the bottom 

right corner of the page. 

PLEASE NOTE: For purposes of comparison, 

the last two images in this listing show a close-up

of the signature on this letter, followed by a different 

image of Goethe's signature that I downloaded from 

the internet.

I cannot read German. However, using some tools

available on the internet, the following is an English

translation of this letter (no doubt there will be errors!):

Please forgive me if I repeat a well-founded 

request. It would give me great pleasure if 

I could receive the barometer readings for 

February of this year as soon as possible, 

as they were certainly observed at the 

observatory in Paris. But then it would be 

a great help to me if I could gradually receive 

the observations from other places for this 

same month, as they were recorded by other 

observatories, wherever they were, in Turin 

or the rest of the world. It is probable that 

many of these will come together at the 

Paris observatory.

Weimar, July 21, 1825.

On an otherwise blank section of the letter is 

a note that states "nach Paris " ("to Paris "). 

Humboldt was living in Paris at the time.

There is some additional writing along the left side 

of the letter, written vertically by an unknown person.

The translation of that writing reads as follows:

Unfortunately, I can only extend my warmest regards to your request. 

This was probably written by the person to whom Goethe

sent this letter.

There is also a note written on the reverse side, written by 

yet another unknown person, which translates as follows:

Joh. Wolfg. v. Göthe to Alexander v. Humboldt, 

according to its own

Immediately following that sentence a name appears,

which I cannot make out.

Again, no doubt multiple errors can be found in

these translations, which were achieved using 

apps available on the world-wide web.

 

The letter is in fair/good condition, with creases 

and general wear. There are two 3" tears along 

the middle crease of the letter, so that the letter

is at risk of splitting into two pieces. 

I acquired this document about ten years ago 

on eBay, as part of a group of unidentified 

documents written in languages that I cannot

read. I did not identify this document until 2024.

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