Born in Neuwundsdorf on 7 April 1736, Johann-Christian Neuber was apprenticed at the age of seventeen to Johann-Friedrich Trechaon. On 13 July 1762, he became a master of the goldsmith's guild in Dresden and by 1775 he had been appointed Hofjuwelier to the court of Frederick-Augustus III the Just, to whom he had supplied a side table, a gift of the city of Freiburg in 1769. However, the earliest dated piece by Neuber is a box formerly in the Green Vaults which bore the date 1770. Apart from ambitious projects such as table decorations for the court, Neuber's workshops produced boxes, watchcases, chatelaines, carnets and chains. He appears to have been prosperous enough to rent several quarries and between 1786 and 1798 he had seven apprentices. However, he was not a successful businessman and in 1788 held a lottery to alleviate his financial position. Neuber died a poor man at his son's house in Eibenstock on 1 January 1808.