High Quality Content by WIKIPEDIA articles! Alois Auer, born 1813 in Wels, Austria, died 11 June 1869; was a printer, inventor and botanical illustrator, most active during the 1840s and 1850s. He produced a number of works in German and other languages, including the first regarding the nature printing process. He was the director of the Austrian State Printing House, which produced illustrated volumes of scientific interest. His name, in the full title of the hereditary knighthood he was given, is Alois Auer Ritter von Welsbach (Knight of Welsbach).