During his work on Don Carlos (1787, q.v.) and the Philosophische Briefe (1786) in November 1785, Johann Christoph Friedrich Schiller delivered the tale “Verbrecher aus Infamie. Eine wahre Geschichte” [“Criminal of Infamy. A True Story”], a psychological study on the development of a criminal, to his publisher Göschen in Leipzig, where it appeared anonymously in his journal Thalia in February 1786. Der Verbrecher aus verlorener Ehre. Eine wahre Geschichte [The Criminal of Lost Honour. A True Story], as it has become better known since its republication in Schiller’s Kleinere prosaische Schriften [Shorter Prosaic Writings, 1792], was inspired by his professor Jakob Friedrich Abel, either at the Karlsschule or during Abel’s visit in Mannheim in November 1785. Abel’s father had interrogated the historical “criminal” Friedrich Schwan from Ebersbach, who was executed in Vaihingen in 1760. Abel...
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Citation: High, Jeffrey L.. "Der Verbrecher aus verlorener Ehre". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 28 June 2006 [https://www.litencyc.com/php/sworks.php?rec=true&UID=16912, accessed 09 June 2026.]
