HEINECKEN, Christian Heinrich (1721-1725), a child remarkable for extraordinary precocity of intellect, was born on February 6, 1721, at Lübeck, where his father was a painter. Able to speak at the age of ten months, by the time be was one year old he knew by heart the principal incidents in the Pentateuch. At two years of age he had mistered all the sacred history; at three he was intimately acquainted with history and geography, ancient and modern, sacred and profane, besides being able to speak French and Latin; and in his fourth year he devoted himself to the study of religion and church history. This wonderful precocity was no mere feat of memory, for the youthful savant could reason on and discuss the knowledge he had acquired. Crowds of people flocked to Lübeck to see the wonderful child; and in 1724 he was taken to Copenhagen at the desire of the king of Denmark. On his return to Lübeck he began to learn writing, but his sickly constitution gave way, and he died, June 22, 1725.

The Life, Deeds, Travels, and Death of the Child of Lubeck were published in the following year by his tutor Schöneich. See also Teutsche Bibliothek, vol. xvii., and Mémoires de Trévoux, Jan. 1731.