Cotta

Cotta, a publishing-house established at Tübingen in 1640, and still one of the most flourishing in Germany. The family came originally from Italy. Its most prominent members have been (1) Johann Friedrich (1701-79), a learned writer and theological professor at Tübingen, Göttingen, and Jena; (2) his grandson, Johann Friedrich, Freiherr Cotta von Cottendorf, born at Stuttgart in 1764, educated at Tübingen, and for some time an advocate. In 1787 he undertook the family business; and in 1795 established the famous Horen, a literary journal, under the editorship of Schiller, with the friendly co-operation of Goethe and Herder. Already in 1793 he had sketched out the plan for the Allgemeine Zeitung, which has appeared since 1798. The Almanach für Damen (1798) and other periodicals were no less successful. Cotta now began likewise to publish the works of Schiller, Goethe, Herder, Fichte, Schelling, Jean Paul, Tieck, Voss, the Humboldts, &c., establishing thereby a claim to the gratitude of the wide literary world. In the seventy years ending in 1864, the house had paid to Schiller and his heirs no less a sum than 528,966 marks, to Goethe and his heirs in the same period, 865,554 marks. In 1810 he changed his residence to Stuttgart, and in 1824 introduced the first steam printing-press into Bavaria. He died 29th December 1832. In the diet of Württemberg, and afterwards as president of the Second Chamber, he was ever the fearless defender of constitutional rights; he was, too, the first Württemberg proprietor who abolished servitude on his estates. He was succeeded by his son, Georg (1796-1863); and he by his son Georg Astolf (1833-76).