erk'man shat tre ahN', the joint name of two French-Alsatian writers of fiction. EMILE ERCKMANN (1822-1899) was born at Pfalzburg, and ALEXANDRE CHATRIAN (1826-1890) was born at Soldatenthal, near Pfalzburg. The scenes of most of their stories are laid in the district in which they were both born, which then belonged to France, but which was afterward annexed to Germany. They formed a literary partnership in 1847, but it was not until 1859 that success attended them. In their list of novels the best-known and most popular are The Conscript, Friend Fritz and Waterloo, a sequel to The Conscript.