Hans Sachs

SACHS, Hans. b. Nürnberg, 5 November 1494; d. Nürnberg, 19 January 1576. Born the son of a tailor, he attended the Latin school there. He was then apprenticed to a shoemaker, but also became a poet under the instruction of the Meistersinger Leonard Nunnenbeck. He combined his work as a shoemaker with his poetry, travelling in Europe for what were known as his ‘Wanderjahre’ from 1511 to 1516. He returned to Nürnberg in 1516, where he lived for the remainder of his life, working as a shoemaker but also becoming the most famous of the Nürnberg master-singers. He was admired by Goethe; and he is the principal character in Richard Wagner*’s opera Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg. He was a prolific...