baron de Charles Henri Gleichen

Born on November 27, 1733, at Goldkronach and dead on April 5, 1807, at Regensburg, Charles-Henri de Gleichen — also known as Karl Heinrich von Gleichen — was a German diplomat and memoirist. French and German sources identify him as the author of Souvenirs, the work for which he is best remembered.

According to the French Wikipedia entry on him, he studied at the University of Leipzig around 1750 and spent time in the circle of the writer Christian Fürchtegott Gellert. He later returned to Bayreuth, served at court, and began the kind of wide-ranging travel and diplomatic life that would shape his memoirs.

His Souvenirs, published after his lifetime and preserved in editions listed by Project Gutenberg, Google Books, and Gallica, are valued for their firsthand glimpses of European courts and notable figures of the 18th century. For modern listeners, he stands out less as a novelist than as a lively witness to his age — someone who turned experience at court and on the road into readable, personal history.