May 2020: 300 years since the Birth of Baron Münchhausen
Hieronymus Karl Friedrich von Münchhause was a nobleman who fought for the Russian Empire in the Russo-Turkish War of 1735–1739 and the inspiration for the fictional character of Baron Münchhausen.
Upon retiring in 1760, he became a minor celebrity within German aristocratic circles for telling outrageous tall tales based on his military career. After hearing some of Münchhausen's stories, Raspe adapted them anonymously into literary form, first in German as ephemeral magazine pieces and then in English as a book, published in 1785 by an Oxford bookseller, Baron Munchausen's Narrative of his Marvellous Travels and Campaigns in Russia.
