Robert Motherby (23 December 1736 – 13 February 1801) was an

English English usually refers to: * English language * English people English may also refer to: Peoples, culture, and language * ''English'', an adjective for something of, from, or related to England ** English national ide ...

merchant in based in East Prussia, and a friend of

Immanuel Kant Immanuel Kant (, , ; 22 April 1724 – 12 February 1804) was a German philosopher and one of the central Enlightenment thinkers. Born in Königsberg, Kant's comprehensive and systematic works in epistemology, metaphysics, ethics, and ...

Early life

Robert Motherby was born in

Kingston upon Hull Kingston upon Hull, usually abbreviated to Hull, is a port city and unitary authority in the East Riding of Yorkshire, England. It lies upon the River Hull at its confluence with the Humber Estuary, inland from the North Sea and south-ea ...

, the son of George Motherby (born 20 December 1688) and his wife Anne (nee Hotham); the physician

George Motherby George Motherby M.D. (baptised 1731 – 1793) was an English physician and medical writer. He is noted for the early definition of the medical term ''placebo'' in the 1785 edition of his medical dictionary. Life He was born in Yorkshire, the son of ...

(died 1793) was his brother. His father died in 1748 when Robert was still young. Robert moved to Kongsberg around 1751, after Joseph Green, a fellow merchant from Hull, was seeking a reliable young Englishman who could become his partner. Motherby settled well in Konigsberg, despite a lack of

German language German ( ) is a West Germanic language mainly spoken in Central Europe. It is the most widely spoken and official or co-official language in Germany, Austria, Switzerland, Liechtenstein, and the Italian province of South Tyrol. It is als ...

skills and eventually took over ''Green, Motherby & Co.'' completely. In 1762 he married Charlotte Toussaint, a woman from a

Huguenot The Huguenots ( , also , ) were a religious group of French Protestants who held to the Reformed, or Calvinist, tradition of Protestantism. The term, which may be derived from the name of a Swiss political leader, the Genevan burgomaster Be ...

family. She was one of the daughters of Jean Claude Toussaint (1709-1774) and his wife Catherine, originally from France. Jean Claude Toussaint was a co-owner of the trading house ''Toussaint & Laval''. Charlotte and Robert Motherby had eleven children (six sons and five daughters. One of the sons was the doctor and farmer William Motherby. Robert Motherby died in

Königsberg Königsberg (, ) was the historic Prussian city that is now Kaliningrad, Russia. Königsberg was founded in 1255 on the site of the ancient Old Prussian settlement ''Twangste'' by the Teutonic Knights during the Northern Crusades, and was name ...

, aged 64.

Friendship with Kant

was a regular Sunday guest at Motherby's house; he played and joked with the children and had lunch. For his part, when Kant invited Robert Motherby to lunch, he sent his servant Martin Lampe in the morning with a written billet. Kant attached great importance to this formalism: the invited person should be given the freedom to say no if he did not like it. So this friendship was characterized by respect and respect. Kant trusted him in all financial transactions and invested his savings in profit.Deirdre N. McCloskey: "The Bourgeois Virtues: Ethics for Age of Commerce." University of Chicago Press, 2010, , p. 267

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Motherby, Robert 1736 births 1801 deaths People from Kingston upon Hull