Encyclopedia of Early Modern History Online

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Contrafaction
(1,513 words)

1. Literature

Contrafaction in literature denotes a procedure in which constitutive elements of an original are used to formulate a new version that may run contrary to the spirit of the original. The term derives from the Late Latin contrafacere (“to make against”), and is related to “counterfeit” (i.e. “forge”) and the German Konterfei (“likeness”), konterfeien (“to depict,” equivalent to Latin delineare; Grimm, DWB 2, 635, 65), and Abconterfeter (“painter”) [9. 11–21]. In the stricter sense of a genre term, contrafaction is a neolo…

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Robert, Jörg and Appuhn-Radtke, Sibylle, “Contrafaction”, in: Encyclopedia of Early Modern History Online, Editors of the English edition: Graeme Dunphy, Andrew Gow. Original German Edition: Enzyklopädie der Neuzeit. Im Auftrag des Kulturwissenschaftlichen Instituts (Essen) und in Verbindung mit den Fachherausgebern herausgegeben von Friedrich Jaeger. Copyright © J.B. Metzlersche Verlagsbuchhandlung und Carl Ernst Poeschel Verlag GmbH 2005–2012. Consulted online on 19 March 2024 <http://dx.doi.org/10.1163/2352-0272_emho_COM_022573>
First published online: 2015
First print edition: 20170206



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