Isaak Iselin
![](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/7/7f/Iselin_Isaak.jpg/220px-Iselin_Isaak.jpg)
Isaak Iselin (7 March 1728 in Basel – 15 July 1782 in Basel) was a Swiss philosopher of history and politics.[1]
Iselin studied law and philosophy at the University of Basel and the University of Göttingen. In 1756 he became secretary of the republic of Basel. He was a co-founder of the Helvetic Society, the first national Swiss reform society.[1]
Iselin's Geschichte der Menschheit ("History of Humanity") was the first fully-fledged history of humanity in German. The Geschichte der Menschheit was provoked by what Iselin conceived as Montesquieu's climatological determinism and Rousseau's critique of progress and at the same time inspired by exponents of the Scottish Enlightenment such as Lord Kames. Iselin's pen-friend Moses Mendelssohn in his review of the first edition of 1764, lauded Iselin as one of the best German prose writers.
Works
- Philosophische und Politische Versuche, 1760
- Ueber die Geschichte der Menschheit, 1764
- Versuch über die gesellige Ordnung, 1772
- Träume eines Menschenfreundes, 1776
Recent edition of Iselin's works
- Gesammelte Schriften. Kommentierte Ausgabe. Schwabe Verlag, Basel 2014–2018.
- volume 1: Schriften zur Politik, ed. by Florian Gelzer, 2014, ISBN 978-3-7965-3339-6.
- volume 2: Schriften zur Ökonomie, ed. by Lina Weber, 2016, ISBN 978-3-7965-3442-3.
- volume 3: Schriften zur Pädagogik, ed. by Marcel Naas, 2014, ISBN 978-3-7965-3340-2.
- volume 4: Geschichte der Menschheit, ed. by Sundar Henny, 2018, ISBN 978-3-7965-3497-3 (open access).
References
- Béla Kapossy, Iselin contra Rousseau: Sociable Patriotism and the History of Mankind (Basel, Switzerland: Schwabe, 2006) (Schwabe Philosophica, 9).
- Andreas Urs Sommer, Geschichte als Trost. Isaak Iselins Geschichtsphilosophie (Basel: Schwabe, 2002) (= Schwabe Horizonte) (ISBN 3-7965-1940-7).
- Lucas Marco Gisi / Wolfgang Rother (ed.), Isaak Iselin und die Geschichtsphilosophie der europäischen Aufklärung (Basel: Schwabe, 2011).
See also
External links
- Articles with short description
- Short description matches Wikidata
- Articles with FAST identifiers
- Articles with ISNI identifiers
- Articles with VIAF identifiers
- Articles with WorldCat Entities identifiers
- Articles with BNF identifiers
- Articles with BNFdata identifiers
- Articles with GND identifiers
- Articles with J9U identifiers
- Articles with KBR identifiers
- Articles with LCCN identifiers
- Articles with NKC identifiers
- Articles with NLA identifiers
- Articles with NLG identifiers
- Articles with NTA identifiers
- Articles with PLWABN identifiers
- Articles with VcBA identifiers
- Articles with DTBIO identifiers
- Articles with Trove identifiers
- Articles with HDS identifiers
- Articles with SUDOC identifiers
- 1728 births
- 1782 deaths
- Swiss philosophers
- Political philosophers
- All stub articles
- Swiss people stubs