Max Johannes Steinbrecht (1848−po 1911)

He was born on April 1, 1848 in Tangermünde on the Elbe. His father was Edward Adolf Steinbrecht (1812-1881), pastor of the Church of St. Stefan, mother of Alwin née Groskurd. He was the older brother of Conrad Emmanuel Steinbrecht (1849−1923), head of the Management Board for the Reconstruction of the Castle in Malbork.

After graduating from gymnasiums in Stendal and Wernigerode, he studied classical philology at the universities of Tübingen, Leipzig and Berlin. In July 1872, at the Luther University in Halle, he obtained a doctorate in philosophy and passed the pro facultate docendi exam in Berlin, after which he was qualified to teach languages ​​- Latin and Greek. To pass the so-called trial year, he went to the Knight Academy in Brandenburg. After graduating (1875), he worked in middle schools in Wittstock / Dosse, Sondershausen, Kołobrzeg, Koszalin, Szczecin and Stargard. In 1885, as a teacher (Oberlehrer) of the Royal Cathedral Gymnasium and the Royal Real Gymnasium in Kołobrzeg, he published the work “Zur Methodik des deutschen Unterrichts”, ending it with the words: “You should study Molière, you should study Shakespeare, but above all and always Greek!” .

At the request of Brother Conrad, he composed a rhyming quatrain devoted to the Battle of Grunwald:

 

MCCCCX Juli XV

Zu Tannenberg ein blutger Tag

Des Ordens Kraft zu Toderlag

Des Leibes sind die Helden ledig

So sei Gott Aller Seelen gnedig

In 1911, Friedrich Schwarting (1883-1918) from Hanover, painting in the chapel of St. Anna, a polychrome depicting the homage to the Mother of God by fallen religious dignitaries, he made the above-mentioned inscription under the painting and on the jamb of the south-west window. They existed there until the castle siege in 1945.

Lit .: F. Kössler, Personenlexikon von Lehrern des 19. Jahrhunderts Berufsbiographien aus Schul-Jahresberichten und Schulprogrammen 1825−1918 mit Veröffentlichungsverzeichnissen. Band: Staa-Stutzki, Giessen 2008; State Archives in Malbork, Files of the Castle Reconstruction Board, sign. 9/206/59: Personalpapiere des Geheimen Baurats Steinbrecht 1849−1939.

(compiled by R. Rzad)