Ursula Klein - Technoscience in History: Prussia, 1750-1850

This book project began almost fifteen years ago at my home institution, the Max Planck Institute for the History of Science in Berlin. It would have been impossible to carry out research without the help of my home institution and the support by Hans-J rg Rheinberger, director of Department III, where the project began, and J rgen Renn, director of Department I, where it was completed. I am grateful to Hans-J rg Rheinberger and J rgen Renn for their advice and their financial support of the project. J rgen Renns intellectual challenges and generosity have been an invaluable experience, which stimulated the extension of the project well into the period of the industrial revolution and the establishment of the modern technosciences.

Over the years I have also benefited from numerous discussions with my colleagues at the Max Planck Institute and other institutions, among them Bruno Belhoste, David Bloor, Matthew Eddy, Dieter Hoffmann, Peter Kone n , Marcus Popplow, Maria Rentetzi, Dagmar Sch fer, Matthias Schemmel, Florian Schmalz, Emma Spary, Matteo Valleriani, and Norton Wise. I am particularly grateful to Alan Chalmers, Jonathan Harwood, Wolfgang Lef vre, Mary Jo Nye, Kathryn Olesko, J rgen Renn, Alan Rocke, and Matthias Schemmel, who read the entire book manuscript or parts of it. This book has been vastly improved by their queries, suggestions, and generous help.

The project became feasible not least with the longstanding aid of my research assistant Johannes Lotze, who helped to track down archival sources and transcribed some 4,000 pages of archival material. I owe him an immense debt. I am also grateful to the archivists of the Archive of the Berlin-Brandenburg Academy of Sciences and Humanities, the Secret State Archives Prussian Cultural Heritage Foundation, the Archive of the Royal Prussian Porcelain Manufactory in Berlin, and the Autograph Collection of the Library of Humboldt University.