Friedrich von Logau

He was born the son of Georg von Logau, estate owner in Brockut near Nimptsch in Silesia (present-day Niemcza, Poland).

From 1614 to 1625 Logau was educated at the renowned gymnasium school in Brieg, benefitted by Duke John Christian, and subsequently studied law at the University of Altdorf near Nuremberg.

Finishing his studies two years later, he administered his family estates from 1633, but had to flee to the ducal court in Brieg from approaching troops under Albrecht von Wallenstein shortly afterwards.

[citation needed] In July 1648 he was admitted to the Fruitbearing Society (Fruchtbringende Gesellschaft) under the name Der Verkleinernde (literally "the diminishing one") by Prince Louis I of Anhalt-Köthen.

They appeared in two collections under the pseudonym Salomon von Golaw (an anagram of his real name, referring to Gohlau and the Proverbs of Solomon) in 1638 (Erstes Hundert Teutscher Reimensprũche) and 1654 (Deutscher Sinngedichte drei Tausend).

In the turbulent age of the Thirty Years' War he was one of the few men who preserved intact his intellectual integrity and judged his contemporaries fairly.

He satirized with unsparing hand the court life, the useless bloodshed of the war, the lack of national pride in the German people, and their slavish imitation of the French in customs, dress and speech.

See H. Denker, Beitrage zur literarischen Würdigung Logaus (1889); W. Heuschkel, Untersuchungen über Ramlers and Lessings Bearbeitung Logauscher Sinngedichte (1901).