Georg Ludwig Weerth (1822-1856) was originally an accountant in Cologne and Bonn and later worked in England and Brussels. He was closely friends with Friedrich Engels, through whom he met Karl Marx. During the failed revolution of 1848/49, he worked as a feuilleton editor for the communist "Neue Rheinische Zeitung" published by Marx and Engels, after which he returned to business life. His posthumously published "Humorous Sketches from German Commercial Life" are an early example of addressing economic themes such as exploitation and speculation through satirical and literary means.