German family of architects, draughtsmen and engravers. Wilhelm Dilich (b Wabern, 1571–2; d Dresden, April 1655) studied in Wittenberg and Marburg and entered the service of the Landgrave Moritz of Hesse-Kassel in 1592, touring Hesse as a topographer and historiographer. In 1596 he also visited Hamburg and Bremen, producing drawings and engravings of views of towns that were later copied by Matthäus Merian I. On a journey to Holland he studied the art of building fortifications, which enabled him to work as a building engineer from 1607. Later he fell out of the Landgrave’s favour, and he was imprisoned in 1621. On his escape in 1625 he went to Dresden, where he was employed as an architect, cartographer and military engineer at the electoral court. His first commission was to place vaulting over the Riesensaal in the Residenzschloss (destr. 1701) and to design its painting, completed by Kilian Fabritius (d 1633) and Christian Schiebling (1603–63) in 1650. In 1626–9 he documented the Saxon towns in 140 drawings, and in 1632 he modernized the fortifications in Altendresden (Dresden-Neustadt). He also wrote textbooks on fortification, Peribologia (Frankfurt am Main, 1640) and Kurtzer Underricht Bollwercke anzulegen (1645), and revised his Kriegsbuch (1607).