Satirist of unsettled life and eccentric habits; born at Gera, Germany, in 1739; died in 1810. From the Moravian Institute at Elbersdorf, Bretschneider passed to the Gymnasium at Gera, and at seventeen entered the army. In 1778 he became librarian to the University of Ofen (Buda), and in 1782 Joseph II. gave him a government appointment. Of his numerous works, including plays and poems, the chief are his satires, Almanac der Heiligen für 1788 and Waller’s Leben und Sitten (1793).
