Baron Münchhausen

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The baron surprising artillerymen by arriving mounted on a cannonball, illustration from a 19th-century edition of The Adventures of Baron Munchausen by Rudolf Erich Raspe.

The baron recovering his silver casket, which had bounced up to the Moon, illustration from a 19th-century edition of The Adventures of Baron Munchausen by Rudolf Erich Raspe.

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Baron Munchhausen. tall tale. Munchausen surprises artillerymen by arriving mounted on a cannon ball. From The Travels and Surprising Adventures of Baron Munchausen by Rudolf Erich Raspe first published 1785. Chromolithograph, French edition, c1850.

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Baron Münchhausen: Facts & Related Content

Written and fact-checked by The Information Architects of Encyclopaedia Britannica

Facts

Also Known As	Karl Friedrich Hieronymus, Freiherr von Münchhausen • Baron Münchausen
Born	May 11, 1720 • Hanover
Died	February 22, 1797 (aged 76) • Hanover
Notable Works	“Vademecum für lustige Leute”

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Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

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Friedrich Nietzsche

German philosopher

Friedrich Schiller

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Gotthold Lessing, detail of an oil painting by Georg May, 1768; in the Gleimhaus, Halberstadt, Ger.

Gotthold Ephraim Lessing

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Thomas Mann

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Heinrich Heine

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Bertolt Brecht

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Friedrich Hölderlin

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Ludwig Meidner

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Heinrich von Kleist

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Günter Grass

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Arno Schmidt

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August Wilhelm von Schlegel

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