FUGGER, the name of a Swabian family which, by remarkable energy in industry and commerce, acquired enormous wealth, and rose to high rank in the state. The founder of the family was John Fugger, a respectable master-weaver at Graben, near Augsburg. His eldest son, John, associated trade in linen with weaving in Augsburg, of which he became a citizen by marriage in 1370. Here he rose to an honourable position, being one of the twelve councillors of the guild of weavers, and an assessor of the Fehmgericht, the much dreaded secret tribunal of Westphalia. He died in 1409, leaving a fortune of 3000 florins. His eldest son, by a second marriage, Andrew, was known as “the rich Fugger,” and became the founder of a noble line, Fugger vom Reh, which died out in 1583. Jacob Fugger, the second son of John, was the first of the family who possessed a house in Augsburg, where he greatly extended the business he inherited, and was made head of the guild of weavers. After his death in 1469, his three sons, Ulrich, George, and Jacob, who were men of unusual resource and industry, added immensely to the riches he had left them. Ulrich devoted himself to trade, and his operations were so varied that even the works of Albert Dürer reached Italy by his means. Jacob worked the mines of Tyrol, and his profits were vast enough to enable him, without difficulty, to lend the archduke of Austria 150,000 florins, and to build (in Tyrol) the splendid castle of Fug-gerau. The three brothers married ladies of noble families, and were themselves raised to noble rank by the emperor Maximilian, who, being always in need of money, was delighted to honour subjects whose power of aiding him was so extensive. In return for 70,000 gulden he mortgaged to them the county of Kirchberg and the lordship of ...