Karl Ludwig Fernow

While serving his time he had the misfortune accidentally to shoot a young man who came to visit him; and although through the intercession of his master he escaped prosecution, the untoward event weighed heavily on his mind, and led him at the close of his apprenticeship to quit his native place.

Having formed an acquaintance with the painter Asmus Jacob Carstens, whose influence was an important stimulus and help to him, he renounced his trade of druggist, and set up as a portrait-painter and drawing-master.

He now renewed his intercourse with Carstens, who had settled at Rome, and applied himself to the study of the history and theory of the fine arts and of the Italian language and literature.

[citation needed] Fernow self-proclaimed to have made rapid progress, he was soon semi-qualified to give a course of lectures on archaeology, which was attended by the principal artists then at Rome.

[1] In 1804, he accepted the post of librarian to Amalia, Dowager Duchess of Weimar, which gave him the leisure he desired for the purpose of turning to account the literary and archaeological researches in which he had engaged at Rome.