Georg Gottfried Gervinus, a German historian and statesman, born in Darmstadt, May 20, 1805, died in Heidelberg, March 18, 1871. He was educated at the university of Heidelberg, afterward spent several years in Italy, and on his return to Heidelberg in 1835 was appointed extraordinary professor, he had already published Geschichte der Angehachsen im Ueber-blich (1830), and Historische Schriften (1833), and in 1836 he was appointed professor of history and literature at Gottingen. He had now begun Die Geschichte der poetisrhen Na-tionaUiteratnr der Deutschcn (1835-'8), which was supplemented by the Neuere Geschichte, etc. (1840-"42). In the latest edition (5 vols., Leipsic, 1871) these two works are comprised under the general title Geschichte der deutschen Dichtung. In them the author traces the development of poetry in its relations to. the progress of civilization and of society, He lost his chair at Gottingen in 1837 by signing the famous university protest against the abolition of the Hanoverian constitution. In 1838 he made another journey to Italy, renewed his historical researches at Rome, and returned to Heidelberg, where he became honorary professor in 1844. He now took part in the political affairs of Germany, advocating liberal ideas.

In 1847 he was one of the founders of the Deutsche Zeitung, the organ of the constitutional party, and in 1848 was elected a member of the Germanic diet, and subsequently of the parliament at Frankfort, and had a prominent part in forming the constitution eventually adopted by the latter assembly. In 1850 he went to England, where he made unsuccessful efforts in behalf of the duchies of Schleswig and Holstein, and on his return to Heidelberg resumed his historical writings. Among his later works are: Shakspeare (4 vols., 1849-50); Geschichte des neunzehnten Jahrhunderts (8 vols., 1855-'66, besides an introductory volume published in 1854), beginning with the fall of Napoleon and brought down to the year 1831; Handel und Shakspeare (1868); and Handel's 0ratorientexte, published posthumously by his son in 1873.