Johann Friedrich Böttger

Johann Friedrich Böttger (also Böttcher or Böttiger; February 4, 1682 – March 13, 1719) was a German alchemist. He was born in Schleiz, and died in Dresden and is normally credited with being the first European to discover the secret of the creation of hard-paste porcelain in 1708, but it has also been claimed that English manufacturers or Ehrenfried Walther von Tschirnhaus produced porcelain first. Certainly, the Meissen factory, established 1710, was the first to produce porcelain in Europe in large quantities and since the recipe was kept a trade secret by Böttger for his company, experiments continued elsewhere throughout Europe.

Around 1700, as an apprentice chemist with the pharmacist Zorn in Berlin, Böttger locked himself up to discover in private the Alltinktur or Goldmachertinktur, an alchemist's secret substance with which supposedly any disease could be cured and base metals converted into gold. His activities did not stay secret for long and soon he was regarded as an adept in alchemy. When King Frederick I of Prussia learned of this, he requested that Böttger be taken into "protective custody". Böttger escaped, but was detained and taken back to Dresden. The monarch of Saxony Augustus II of Poland, who was always short of money, demanded that Böttger produce the so-called Goldmachertinktur in order to convert base metals into gold. In 1704, von Tschirnhaus was ordered to oversee the goldmaker. Presumably by involving Böttger in his experiments, he spared him the fate that overtook former alchemist adventurers. Böttger, however, was not interested, and refused any cooperation until September 1707. He did not want to be involved with porcelain, which he thought was von Tschirnhaus' business. Only when ordered by the king did Böttger start to cooperate.

In December 1707 the king went to the new laboratory that had been furnished for von Tschirnhaus in what is today Brühlsche Terrasse in order to examine the invention.

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