German family of marionettists. The family history goes back to Ernst Ritscher (1853-1943) who as a theatre assistant married into the Listner-Lippold family. The Ritschers practised the art of puppetry over seven generations. There were at least six different Ritscher companies, which travelled in the Erzgebirge and the Lausitz in Saxony. The best known members of this family were: Herbert Ritscher (1920-1970), a grandson of Ernst Ritscher, who founded the Staatliche Puppentheater Bautzen (State Puppet Theatre in Bautzen) in 1961, and Martha Ritscher, born Großmann (1906-1986) and her son Roland Ritscher (b.1931), who travelled with for the most part an unchanged, traditional theatre until 1986, attracting the attention of artists, historians and the media. Their completely intact stage can be found since 2003 in the Puppentheatersammlung Dresden (Dresden Puppet Theatre Collection).

(See Germany.)