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However the academy was in a crisis for two decades at mid-century,[268] due in part to scandals and internal rivalries such as the debates between Newtonianism and Leibnizian views, and the personality conflict between Voltaire and Maupertuis. [193] The functionality and stability of the reform made the Prussian monetary system the standard in Northern Germany. Seven Years War (1756-1763) | Encyclopedia.com [208] He continued to support them after their suppression by Pope Clement XIV. [1] He was born sometime between 11 and 12 p.m. on 24 January 1712 in the Berlin Palace and was baptised with the single name Friedrich by Benjamin Ursinus von Br on 31 January. Because of his military genius, he earned the title Frederick the Great. [97] To strengthen his strategic position against this coalition,[98] on 29 August 1756, Frederick's well-prepared army preemptively invaded Saxony. [229], Frederick was a patron of music,[230] and the court musicians he supported included C. P. E. Bach, Carl Heinrich Graun and Franz Benda. ", In his 1769 will, Frederick wrote "I have lived as a philosopher and wish to be buried as such, without pomp or paradeLet me be deposited in the vault which I had constructed for myself, on the upper terrace of San Souci. [192] However, the fixed ratio between gold and silver led to the gold coins being perceived as more valuable, which caused them to leave circulation in Prussia. Frederick Wilhelm thought these interests were effeminate,[12] as they clashed with his militarism, resulting in his frequent beating and humiliation of Frederick. As soon as you get away from the frontier, the Jews become a disadvantage, they form cliques, they deal in contraband and get up to all manner of rascally tricks which are detrimental to Christian burghers and merchants. His rather incomplete victory at Chotusitz in May nonetheless forced Maria Theresa to cede almost all of Silesia by the Treaty of Berlin of 1742 in July. However, upon ascending to the Prussian throne, he attacked and annexed the rich Austrian province of Silesia in 1742, winning military acclaim for himself and Prussia. [110] Frederick hoped these two victories would force Austria to negotiate, but Maria Theresa was determined not to make peace until she had recovered Silesia, and the war continued. Frederick's position became even more desperate in 1761 when Britain, having achieved victory in the American and Indian theatres of the war, ended its financial support for Prussia after the death of King George II, Frederick's uncle. This programme created roughly 60,000 hectares (150,000 acres) of new farmland, but also eliminated vast swaths of natural habitat, destroyed the region's biodiversity, and displaced numerous native plant and animal communities. [124], At the beginning of 1760, the Austrians moved to retake Silesia, where Frederick defeated them at the Battle of Liegnitz on 15 August. Robert Citino describes Frederick's strategic approach: In war he usually saw one path to victory, and that was fixing the enemy army in place, maneuvering near or even around it to give himself a favorable position for the attack, and then smashing it with an overwhelming blow from an unexpected direction. [302] Esteemed for their efficiency and success in battle, the Prussian army of Frederick became a model emulated by other European powers, most notably by Russia and France. Frederick was a supporter of enlightened absolutism, stating that the ruler should be the first servant of the state. [222] He told Voltaire, "Whoever improves the soil, cultivates land lying waste and drains swamps, is making conquests from barbarism". Corrections? [155] He also thwarted Polish efforts to create a stable economic system by building a customs fort at Marienwerder on the Vistula, Poland's major trade artery,[149] and by bombarding Polish customs ports on the Vistula. [243] He also attempted to broaden access to opera by making admission to it free. Under the terms of the Treaty of Dresden, signed on 25 December 1745, Austria was forced to adhere to the terms of the Treaty of Breslau giving Silesia to Prussia. [18] When Frederick William heard rumours of their relationship, Keith was sent away to an unpopular regiment near the Dutch frontier. [157] Poland was predominantly Roman Catholic, but approximately ten per cent of Poland's population, 600,000 Eastern Orthodox and 250,000 Protestants, were non-Catholic dissenters. He was well aware, however, that his situation was far from secure. This did not in itself threaten Frederick, but he soon became convinced that a Russo-Austrian attack on him, with French support, was imminent. Famous Political Figures Frederick II Frederick II, known as Frederick the Great, was Prussia's king from 1740 to 1786. [103] This action, along with his initial invasion of neutral Saxony brought him widespread international criticism;[104] but the conquest of Saxony also provided him with significant financial, military, and strategic assets that helped him sustain the war. Kaiser Wilhelm II - WWI, Abdication & Death - HISTORY [284] Even more important were his operational successes, especially the use of interior lines to prevent the unification of numerically superior opposing armies and defend the Prussian core territory. [7] The political and personal differences between Frederick's parents created tensions,[8] which affected Frederick's attitude toward his role as a ruler, his attitude toward culture, and his relationship with his father. Frederick's army, which consisted of a substantial number of quickly recruited, half-trained soldiers,[119] attempted to check them at the Battle of Kunersdorf on 12 August, where he was defeated and his troops were routed. His father was Frederick William I, king of Prussia. Moreover, Great Britain, under George II, seeking an effective continental ally against France, seemed to be moving closer to Maria Theresa and Elizabeth. [213], The success in integrating the Jews into areas of society where Frederick encouraged them can be seen by Gerson von Bleichrder's role during the 19th century in financing Otto von Bismarck's efforts to unite Germany. Frederick III, German Emperor - Wikipedia [304], Near the end of his life, Frederick grew increasingly solitary. [69] Disappointed with the performance of his cavalry, whose training his father had neglected in favour of the infantry, Frederick spent much of his time in Silesia establishing a new doctrine for them. [87] Frederick then turned towards Dresden when he learned the Saxons were preparing to march on Berlin. [200], Though Frederick started many reforms during his reign, his ability to see them to fulfillment was not as disciplined or thorough as his military successes. [78] In late August 1744, Frederick's army had crossed the Bohemian frontier, marched directly to Prague, and laid siege to the city, which surrendered on 16 September 1744 after a three-day bombardment. [141] Frederick also financed the war by devaluing the Prussian coin five times; debased coins were produced with the help of Leipzig mintmasters, Veitel Heine Ephraim, Daniel Itzig and Moses Isaacs. [278], Contrary to his father's fears, Frederick became a capable military commander. Though his reign was regularly involved in war, he did not advocate for protracted warfare. [256], Though Frederick used German as his working language with his administration and with the army, he claimed to have never learned it properly[257] and never fully mastered speaking or writing it. [46] Frederick's years dedicated to the arts instead of politics ended upon the 1740 death of Frederick William and his inheritance of the Kingdom of Prussia. [1] As a prince-elector of the Holy Roman Empire, he was Frederick IV Margrave of Brandenburg. Victorious in war, he became known as Frederick the Great and was nicknamed der alte Fritz . Frederick II, king of Prussia (174086), was a brilliant military campaigner who, in a series of diplomatic stratagems and wars against Austria and other powers, greatly enlarged Prussias territories and made Prussia the foremost military power in Europe. [201], In contrast to his devoutly Calvinist father, Frederick was a religious sceptic, who has been described as a deist. Maria Theresa had only reluctantly agreed to the partition, to which Frederick sarcastically commented, "she cries, but she takes". [292], Frederick the Great believed that creating alliances was necessary, as Prussia did not have the resources of nations like France or Austria. [b] Acting in this role, Frederick helped transform Prussia from a European backwater to an economically strong and politically reformed state. He was titled King in Prussia because his kingdom included only part of historic Prussia; he was to declare himself King of Prussia after the First Partition of Poland in 1772. Reception to the law code was mixed as it was often viewed as contradictory. Frederick was deeply alarmed by this: a hostile Austro-Russian alliance backed by British money seemed to threaten the destruction of Prussia. The situation is summed up in a widely translated and quoted aphorism attributed to Mirabeau, who asserted in 1786 that "La Prusse n'est pas un pays qui a une arme, c'est une arme qui a un pays"[50] ("Prussia was not a state in possession of an army, but an army in possession of a state"). He also had a violent temper and ruled Brandenburg-Prussia with absolute authority. He did not admire the encyclopdistes or the French intellectual avant-garde of his time,[249] though he did shelter Rousseau from persecution for a number of years. He was in personal union the Prince-elector of Brandenburg and (via the Orange-Nassau inheritance of his grandfather) sovereign prince of the Canton of Neuchtel. With the exception of his first battlefield experience at the Battle of Mollwitz, Frederick proved himself courageous in battle. [135] More significantly, Russia's about-face from an enemy of Prussia to its patron rattled the leadership of Sweden, who hastily made peace with Frederick as well. He spent his time reading, watching and acting in dramatic plays, as well as composing and playing music. [19], In the mid-1720s, Queen Sophia Dorothea attempted to arrange the marriage of Frederick and his sister Wilhelmine to her brother King George II's children Amelia and Frederick, who was the heir apparent. "[54] Such devotion, consequently, had to be tempered by political realities. Heritage History - Products [129] In this battle, Frederick became a casualty when he was hit in the chest by a spent bullet. [132] On 6 January 1762, Frederick wrote to Count Karl-Wilhelm Finck von Finckenstein, "We ought now to think of preserving for my nephew, by way of negotiation, whatever fragments of my territory we can save from the avidity of my enemies". [37] After his father died and he had secured the throne, Frederick separated from Elisabeth. Wilhelmine recorded that the two "soon became inseparable. In August, he fought the Russian forces to a draw at the Battle of Zorndorf, in which nearly a third of Frederick's soldiers were casualties. [168], Late in his life Frederick involved Prussia in the low-scale War of the Bavarian Succession in 1778, in which he stifled Austrian attempts to exchange the Austrian Netherlands for Bavaria. This was a project he believed would take a century or more. History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Called Frederick the Great Because he died childless, he was succeeded by his nephew, Frederick WilliamII. Frederick Ii (prussia) | Encyclopedia.com Frederick also promoted the use of German instead of Latin in the field of law, as in the legal document Project des Corporis Juris Fridericiani (Project of the Frederician Body of Laws), which was written in German with the aim of being clear and easily understandable. Moreover, military victory had now made Prussia at least a semigreat power and marked Frederick as the most successful ruler in Europe. [215] In Polish Prussia, he confiscated the Roman Catholic Church's goods and property,[167] making clergy dependent on the government for their pay and defining how they were to perform their duties. Near the end of World War II, German dictator Adolf Hitler ordered Frederick's coffin to be hidden in a salt mine to protect it from destruction. und die stericherin Maria Theresa konnten Rivalen kaum sein. By 1770, after two decades of punishing war alternating with intervals of peace, Frederick had doubled the size of the huge army he had inherited. Accordingly, he renewed his alliance with France and preemptively invaded Bohemia in August 1744, beginning the Second Silesian War. These claims particularly were popular in the 19th century. He was rescued from this threatening situation by the prowess of his army; victories at Hohenfriedberg in June 1745 and at Soor in September were followed by a Prussian invasion of Saxony. 1712-1786 F REDERICK THE G REAT Frederick the Great, King of Prussia during the War of the Austrian Succession and the Seven Year's War, was a distinguished tactician who gained much of his fame for his many victories against the far larger Austrian army. [324] During the second half of the 20th century, political attitudes towards Frederick's image were ambivalent, particularly in communist East Germany. Frederick William I died on May 31, 1740, and Frederick, on his accession, immediately made it clear to his ministers that he alone would decide policy. Johansson, Warren (2016). Updates? [70], Encouraged by Frederick's victory at Mollwitz, the French and their ally, the Electorate of Bavaria, entered the war against Austria in early September 1741 and marched on Prague. Frederick II was a King in Prussia from the Hohenzollern dynasty. Frederick II combined the qualities of a warrior king with those of an enlightened despot. He was also the sovereign prince of the Principality of Neuchtel. After allowing them across,[a] Frederick pinned them down and decisively defeated them at the Battle of Hohenfriedberg on 4 June 1745. [188] Graumann's currency reform slightly lowered the silver content of Prussian thaler from .mw-parser-output .frac{white-space:nowrap}.mw-parser-output .frac .num,.mw-parser-output .frac .den{font-size:80%;line-height:0;vertical-align:super}.mw-parser-output .frac .den{vertical-align:sub}.mw-parser-output .sr-only{border:0;clip:rect(0,0,0,0);clip-path:polygon(0px 0px,0px 0px,0px 0px);height:1px;margin:-1px;overflow:hidden;padding:0;position:absolute;width:1px}112 Cologne mark of silver to 114,[189] which brought the metal content of the thaler into alignment with its face value,[190] and it standardised the Prussian coinage system. Frederick I | King of Prussia, Territorial Aggrandizement Jackson Shoobert, Exploring Frederick (II) the Great's Sexuality in the wake of the Sexual Revolution. Despite his father's intention, Frederick appeared to have adopted a sense of predestination for himself. This once more allowed Habsburg forces to be concentrated against France and Bavaria, and 1743 and the early months of 1744 saw Maria Theresas position in Germany become markedly stronger. [274], When Frederick ascended the throne in 1740, he reinstituted the Prussian Academy of Sciences (Berlin Academy), which his father had closed down as an economy measure. Frederick III or Friedrich III ( German: Friedrich Wilhelm Nikolaus Karl; 18 October 1831 - 15 June 1888) was German emperor and King of Prussia for 99 days between March and June 1888, during the Year of the Three Emperors. His sense of aesthetics can be seen in the picture gallery at Sanssouci, which presents architecture, painting, sculpture and the decorative arts as a unified whole. He is often admired for his tactical skills, especially for his use of the oblique order of battle,[283] an attack focused on one flank of the opposing line, allowing a local advantage even if his forces were outnumbered overall. Prussia greatly increased its territories and became a major military power in Europe under his rule. Frederick William II of Prussia - Wikipedia [321], After the defeat of Germany after 1945, the role of Prussia in German history was minimised. [63] It nearly doubled Prussia's population and increased its territory by a third. [24] After the English marriages became impossible, Frederick plotted to flee to England with Katte and other junior army officers. [182] He protected his industries with high tariffs and minimal restrictions on domestic trade. [72] Subsequently, he was elected as the Holy Roman Emperor CharlesVII on 24 January 1742. [102] When the Saxon forces in Pirna finally capitulated in October 1756, Frederick forcibly incorporated them into his own army. In his 1797 book, Mmoires pour servir l'histoire du Jacobinisme (Memoirs Illustrating the History of Jacobinism), Barruel described an influential conspiracy theory that accused King Frederick of taking part in a plot which led to the outbreak of the French Revolution and having been the secret "protector and adviser" of fellow-conspirators Voltaire, Jean le Rond d'Alembert, and Denis Diderot, who all sought "to destroy Christianity" and foment "rebellion against Kings and Monarchs". [5], Frederick WilliamI, popularly dubbed the "Soldier King", had created a large and powerful army that included a regiment of his famous "Potsdam Giants"; he carefully managed the kingdom's wealth and developed a strong centralised government. [81] In the interim, Frederick also successfully claimed his inheritance to the minor territory of East Frisia on the North Sea coast of Germany, occupying the territory after its last ruler died without issue in 1744. But he was just, intelligent, and skilled in the management of affairs it was through his efforts, through his tireless labour, that I have been able to accomplish everything that I have done since. To stop Joseph II's attempts to acquire Bavaria, Frederick enlisted the help of the Electors of Hanover and Saxony along with several other minor German princes. [56] To strengthen Prussia's position, he fought wars mainly against Austria, whose Habsburg dynasty had reigned as Holy Roman Emperors continuously since the 15th century. As a child, his father, Frederick William I, made young Frederick work in the region's provinces, teaching the boy about the area's agriculture and geography. [273], As a great patron of the arts, Frederick was a collector of paintings and ancient sculptures; his favourite artist was Jean-Antoine Watteau. In his youth, Frederick was more interested in music and philosophy than in the art of war, which led to clashes with his authoritarian father, Frederick William I of Prussia. [14], Although his father, Frederick WilliamI, had been raised a Calvinist in spite of the Lutheran state faith in Prussia, he feared he was not one of God's elect. [66] Though Frederick had served under Prince Eugene of Savoy, this was his first major battle in command of an army. Language links are at the top of the page across from the title. [32] Instead, Eugene persuaded Frederick William, through Seckendorff, that the crown prince should marry Elisabeth Christine, who was a Protestant relative of the Austrian Habsburgs. This action has been more actively debated by historians than any other event of Fredericks reign because it raised in an acute form the general issue regarding the morality of preventive military action. Paintings by different schools were displayed strictly separately: 17th-century Flemish and Dutch paintings filled the western wing and the gallery's central building, while Italian paintings from the High Renaissance and Baroque were exhibited in the eastern wing. Frederick the Great Quotes (Author of Instructions for His Generals) [232] He was also a talented musician and composer in his own right, playing the transverse flute,[233] as well as composing 121 sonatas for flute and continuo, four concertos for flute and strings, four sinfonias,[234] three military marches and seven arias. [116] He then headed south to face the Austrian army in Saxony. In the early eighteenth century, Prussia was one of dozens of minor German states, and it was far from the most . His rule must be personal. [71] Meanwhile, Frederick, as well as other members of the League of Nymphenburg, sponsored the candidacy of his ally Charles of Bavaria to be elected Holy Roman Emperor. [192], Although Frederick's debasement of the coinage to fund the Seven Years' War left the Prussian monetary system in disarray,[191] the Mint Edict of May 1763 brought it back to stability by fixing rates at which depreciated coins would be accepted and requiring tax payments in currency of prewar value. [158] Soon Protestants were barred from public offices and the Sejm (Polish Parliament). Frederick also encouraged immigrants of various nationalities and faiths to come to Prussia, although he enacted oppressive measures against Catholics in Silesia and Polish Prussia.