Heinrich Brockhaus

Heinrich Brockhaus (4 February 1804 – 15 November 1874) was a German book dealer and publisher who became a liberal politician.

Life Heinrich Brockhaus was born into a protestant family in Amsterdam, a principal commercial centre in the Batavian Republic (today the Netherlands) where his father had set up his business in 1802 after falling out with a business partner in the family's former home city, Dortmund. Heinrich's father was the German publisher Friedrich Arnold Brockhaus (1772-1823).

Under Heinrich's direction, the business flourished. In 1831 he purchased the publishing house J.F. Gledisch, a firm which could trace its origins back to the seventeenth century.

A notable autodidact, Brockhaus traveled widely across Europe, also visiting the near-east and North Africa and always, when travelling, on the look-out for new business opportunities. In the words of one source, he was able to understand seven modern languages, and was at home with literature and the fine arts. The publishing house also expanded internationally, with subsidiaries in Paris, Vienna and beyond. He also took a close interest in authors' rights, a subject in which his involvement continued when he entered into the world of politics. In 1848 he was a member of the Frankfurt "pre-parliament" ("Vorparlament ") which planned the elections to the Frankfurt Parliament. A decade later he was a co-founder of the German National Association ("Deutscher Nationalverein").