Wolf, FERDINAND

Wolf, FERDINAND, a great Romance scholar, was born at Vienna, December 8, 1796, studied philosophy and jurisprudence at Graz, then accepted a post in the royal library at Vienna. He took an active part in the foundation of the Academy of Sciences, and died February 18, 1866. Among his books were Floresta de rimas modernas Castellanas (2 vols. 1837), Ueber die Leis, Sequenzen und Leiche (1841), Studien zur Geschichte der Spanischen und Portugiesischen Nationallitteratur (1859), and Histoire de la Littérature Brésilienne (1863). Together with C. Hofmann he edited a collection of the oldest Spanish romances, Primavera y flor de Romanes (2 vols. 1856). Besides he made numerous contributions of the greatest value on questions of Romance scholarship to the Vienna Jahrbücher der Litteratur, most of which were also dispersed as off-prints. He also contributed notes to the German translation of Ticknor's History of Spanish Literature, and left a supplement to it which was edited by his son (1867), who also printed a selection from his father's learned correspondence.