Johann Christian Gottlieb Ernesti (1756 in Arnstadt, Thuringia – 5 June 1802 in Kahnsdorf, near Leipzig), was German classical scholar.

From 1774 to 1777 he studied philosophy, philology and theology at the University of Leipzig, where he was a student of his uncle, Johann August Ernesti. In 1782, he was made an associate professor of philosophy at Leipzig; and following the death of his cousin August Wilhelm Ernesti in 1801, was professor of rhetoric for five months. ^{[1] [2]} At the university he gave lectures on exegesis of the New Testament and on Greek and Roman writers. ^[3]

His principal works were:

• Editions of Aesop's Fabulae (1781).
• Edition of the Glossae sacrue of Hesychius (1785).
• Editions of Suda and Favorinus (1786).
• Edition of Silius Italicus' Punica (1791–1792).
• Lexicon Technologiae Graecorum rhetoricae (1795). ^[4]
• Lexicon technologiae Latinorum rhetoricae (1797). ^[4]
• Cicero's Geist und Kunst (1799–1802). ^{[1] [2]}

•  This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain:  Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). " Ernesti, Johann Christian Gottlieb". Encyclopædia Britannica. Vol. 9 (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. p. 753.