Lazar Ercker (circa 1529-1594) - Prague mint master, chief metallurgist and metallurgical champion in the Czech kingdom during the reign of Rudolf II.

Ercker Lazar was born in the Saxon mining town of Annaberg in the Erzgebirge. From 1547 to 1548 he studied mathematics and science at the University of Wittenberg. U kurfi�tsk�ho Justice in Dresden working as acid-test examiner, but tried it and other professions in the field of mining and ore processing.

In 1567 he moved to the Czech Republic and ten years later he became the highest hormistrem Bohemian Kingdom. At that time, the production of gold and silver from Czech deposits at its zenith and further weakened, as reflected on the deteriorating quality of the new coins. Rudy had to conquer the miners still greater depths, ironworkers were looking for more effective ways to get out of the excavated material maximum pure metal. That should help just Ercker, whose reputation as an expert arrived in Bohemia long before his arrival.

Knowledge of metalworking Ercker recorded. His most famous work is the German-language book on the assaying of 1574. (The five-hundredth anniversary of her in Czech translation issued by the National Technical Museum in Prague - 1974).

In 1583 he was appointed to the office of Master of the Mint Royal Mint in Prague. This feature after his death for many years to held his wife Susan. Lazar Ercker contributed significantly to the modernization of mining and processing rub, in the service of the Bohemian kingdom worked twenty-six years.