Friedrich Conrad August Fick (May 5, 1833, in

Petershagen Petershagen is a town in the Minden-Lübbecke district, in North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. It lies on the Westphalian Mill Route. The core is formed by the districts of Petershagen and Lahde, located opposite each other on the Weser. Geograph ...

Germany Germany,, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It is the second most populous country in Europe after Russia, and the most populous member state of the European Union. Germany is situated betwe ...

– March 24, 1916, in

Hildesheim Hildesheim (; nds, Hilmessen, Hilmssen; la, Hildesia) is a city in Lower Saxony, Germany with 101,693 inhabitants. It is in the district of Hildesheim, about southeast of Hanover on the banks of the Innerste River, a small tributary of the Lei ...

or Breslau) was a German

philologist Philology () is the study of language in oral and written historical sources; it is the intersection of textual criticism, literary criticism, history, and linguistics (with especially strong ties to etymology). Philology is also defined as th ...

. He spent his life chiefly at

Göttingen Göttingen (, , ; nds, Chöttingen) is a college town, university city in Lower Saxony, central Germany, the Capital (political), capital of Göttingen (district), the eponymous district. The River Leine runs through it. At the end of 2019, t ...

, where he first studied philology under

Theodor Benfey :''This is about the German philologist. For Theodor Benfey (born 1925) who developed a spiral periodic table of the elements in 1964, see Otto Theodor Benfey.'' Theodor Benfey (; 28 January 1809, in Nörten near Göttingen26 June 1881, in Göttin ...

; became a teacher in the Gymnasium, and eventually in 1876 professor of

comparative philology Comparative linguistics, or comparative-historical linguistics (formerly comparative philology) is a branch of historical linguistics that is concerned with comparing languages to establish their historical relatedness. Genetic relatedness i ...

at the

university A university () is an institution of higher (or tertiary) education and research which awards academic degrees in several academic disciplines. Universities typically offer both undergraduate and postgraduate programs. In the United States, t ...

; in 1887 accepted a professorship in Breslau, but retired four years later; author of a variety of learned works on philology.Fick, Friedrich Conrad August
In: Neue Deutsche Biographie (NDB). Band 5, Duncker & Humblot, Berlin 1961, , S. 130 f.

Works

*"''Wörterbuch der indogermanischen Grundsprache'', 1868 – His "dictionary of Indo-European

parent language In the tree model of historical linguistics, a proto-language is a postulated ancestral language from which a number of attested languages are believed to have descended by evolution, forming a language family. Proto-languages are usually unattest ...

" is considered to be the first work of its kind. *"''Die ehemalige Spracheinheit der Indogermanen Europas : Eine sprachgeschichtliche Untersuchung''", 1873 – The former speech unit of the Indo-European: A linguistic historical investigation. *"''Die griechischen Personennamen : nach ihrer Bildung erklärt und systematisch geordnet''", 1874 – Greek personal names; according to formation and systematic order. *''"Vergleichendes Wörterbuch der indogermanischen Sprachen"'' Göttingen : Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1890-1909 (4th edition). OCLC: 63812989. – Comparative dictionary of the Indo-European languages. *"''Vorgriechische Ortsnamen als Quelle für die Vorgeschichte Griechenlands verwertet''", 1905 – Former Greek place names as a source for the history of Greece.Fick, August 1833-1916
OCLC WorldCat

Notes

1833 births 1916 deaths People from Petershagen German philologists University of Göttingen alumni University of Göttingen faculty University of Breslau faculty {{Germany-linguist-stub