MULLER, JOHANN, historian of Switzerland, was b. Jan. 3, 1752, at Schaffhausen, where his father was clergyman and rector of the gymnasium. He studied at Gottingen under Heyne, Schlozer, Welch, and others. In 1772 he was appointed professor of Greek at Schaffhausen, and in the same year published his first work, Bellum Cimbricum 1772). Already he had commenced to devote his leisure hours to the investigation of SWiSP, chronicles and documents. By the advice of his friend Bonstetten, he went to Geneva in 1774, where he became a private tutor; and also (1778) delivered a series of lectures on " Universal History," afterwards published in 24 volumes. In 1781 he was called to the Collegium Carolinum at Cassel, as professor of statistics, and a little earlier published the first volume of his great work, Geschichte der Schweizer. In 1786 he was appointed librarian and councilor of state to the elector of Mainz; here be finished the 2d volume of his Swiss history; his Darstellung des Fiirstenbundes (Leip. 1787); and
Briefe zweier Dennherren (Frankfurt, 1787). In 1792 he went to Vienna, where the em peror Leopold gave him a situation in the privy council, and, in 1800, appointed him first imperial librarian. In 1804 he left Vienna for Berlin, where he wrote (Aber die Geschichte F•iedrich's Ueber den Untergang der Freiheit der Allen Volker,Versuck fiber die Zeit7 i?ch nungen der Vorwelt, and an additional volume of his Swiss history. Introduced to Napoleon after the battle of Jena, he was appointed by him (1807), having been previously dis missed from the Prussian service, secretary of state in the new kingdom of Westphalia; but died at Cassel, May 29, 1809. Muller 's Sammtliche Werke were published, 27 vols. Stuttgart, 1810-19; new edit., 40 vols., 1831-35.