Frédéric I

## Souverän von Preußen

### Reign

29th April 1688 – 18th January 1701 (As Duke of Prussia & Elector of Brandenburg)
18th January 1701 – 25th February 1713 (As King of Prussia)

### Coronation

18th January, 1701, Chapelle Royale, Château de Königsberg, Königsberg, Duchy of Prussia, Kingdom of Prussia

### Predecessor

Frédéric-Guillaume de Brandebourg, le Grand Électeur

### First Ministers

Eberhard von Danckelman (1688-1697)
Johann Kasimir Kolb von Wartenberg (1698-1711)

Heinrich Rüdiger von Ilgen (1711-1713; continued as Minister of State until 1728)

## Biography

### Born

11th July, 1657, Château de Königsberg, Königsberg, Duchy of Prussia; Electorate of Brandenburg-Prussia

### Died

25th February, 1713, Château de Charlottenburg, Charlottenburg, Kingdom of Prussia

### Burial

Crypte Royale, Cathédrale Évangélique Suprême, Berlin, Kingdom of Prussia

### Spouse

Élisabeth-Henriette de Hesse-Cassel † (1678-1683)
Sophie-Charlotte de Hanovre † (1684-1705)

Sophie-Louise de Mecklembourg-Schwerin † (1708-1713)

### Issue

Louise-Dorothée Sophie de Prusse †Frédéric-Auguste de Prusse †

Frédéric-Guillaume I de Prusse †

### Father

Frédéric-Guillaume de Brandebourg, le Grand Électeur

### Siblings

Charles-Émile de Brandebourg †
Philippe-Guillaume de Brandebourg-Schwedt †

Marie-Amélie de Brandebourg †

Albert-Frédéric de Brandebourg-Schwedt †

Charles-Philippe de Brandebourg-Schwedt †

Élisabeth-Sophie de Brandebourg, Margravine Suo-Jure de Bayreuth-en-Haute

Chrétien-Louis de Brandebourg-Schwedt †

### Religion

Protestant Calvinism

**Frédéric I de Prusse** (11th July 1657 - 25th February 1713) of the illustrious House of Hohenzollern was **Duke of Prussia (1688-1713)*,* Prince-Elector of Brandenburg (1688-1713)** and most notably the first **King of Prussia (1701-1713).** A man of great ambition, eccentric fortitude and an infamous infatuation of the French culture, Frédéric I sought to unify his domains and holdings under a singular crown, splitting his loyalties between then-reigning Emperor Leopold I of Austria and King Jan II Kazimierz of Poland; he consolidated his holdings to forge an iron crown, silver throne and Caesar-like self-proclamation to elevate himself as the first King of the Prussians.

The Hohenzollern's had gained considerable wealth, fame and pedigree by the era of Frédéric's father, the Great Elector. They had secured an arms deal and grown an alliance with Peter the Great's new Russian Empire; Several generations of Brandenburg-Prussian princesses had supplied Swedish and Danish queens; and the safeguarded union with the House of Orange meant that the Hohenzollern's were the leading Protestant power against the Catholic threats of France.

A weak child from birth, Frédéric suffered from terrible scoliosis, leading those around him to adorn the petty moniker of *''Leaning Fritz''.* Born in a time of great turmoil and uncertainty, Frédéric was the third-born of six children from his father's marriage to Louise-Henriette d'Orange; He would end up becoming the third-eldest of some 12 other siblings from both of his father's marriages. From the moment of birth, it was assumed he'd be a rather sickly child, given his noted deformities, which included a hunched back and poor leg. He was not expected to inherit the throne until the sudden death of his elder brother, the Electoral Prince Charles-Émile during the Dutch War, aged just 19 when he was leading the combined Imperial-Brandenburg forces against those of Louis XIV of France.

Frédéric was noted for his opposition to France, in contrast to his father who had sought an alliance with Louis XIV; Many attributed this to the death of his late brother who died in Strasbourg while leading an assault during the Dutch War. Almost immediately after becoming Elector, Frédéric took Brandenburg into the *League of Augsburg* against France, and in 1689, led his forces into the field as part of the allied coalition against the Sun King. That year an army of 32,500 under his command besieged and captured Bonn. Despite this opposition to France *(a characteristic that was even more prominent in his son and heir)* he was fond of French culture, and styled his court in imitation of that of Louis XIV; The epitaph of this admiration would be the completion of the lavishly-appointed Château de Charlottenbourg in 1699- a direct imitation of Louis XIV's masterpiece, *Versailles,* in the Prussian Baroque.

The dawn of the 18th-century saw Frédéric furnish himself with greater vanity, challenging the strength of the Holy Roman Empire: In return for providing the services of his newly-reformed Electoral Army of some 50,000 troops, Frédéric demanded a crown of his own in return. Sparing no costs of the glorious occasion, Frédéric crowned himself as the King of Prussia on the freezing morning of January 18th, 1701, with immense pomp and ceremony held in the *Chapelle Royale* of his family's ancient seat, the Château de Königsberg.

Now reigning as King *and* Elector in his own right, Frédéric had a staunch and resolute spirit, with a firm belief in his divine - and absolute - right to rule over the various realms he had come to hold. Almost immediately, Frédéric began to reform the state that he had inherited from his father, expanding the military achievements, exploiting his resources and forging one of the most eccentric and lavish courts in Europe. Embarking on a quest of divine glory, the newly-crowned King reformed the financial and political structure of the realm, governing through a system of intendants and prefects, with a streamlined tax structure and system of accountability creating brutally efficient monarchical state. Throughout his reign, Frédéric was well known for his flamboyant lifestyle and for his patronage of the arts. While not as pious as either of his three wives, it is was known that he confided greatly in his faith and knew when to advance his pious tendencies.

During Frédéric's reign, the Prussia experienced on the one hand a financial decline due to the lavish courtship and the corrupt three-count cabinet lead by the deceiving Comte de Wartenberg, but on the other hand a cultural renaissance through the admission of persecuted French *Huguenots* , the founding of the later ***Académie Royale des Arts et des Sciences*** and the expansion of Berlin into a baroque royal seat, rivalling the greatness of Paris, London and even Saint-Petersburg. In his twilight, Frédéric's legacy grew into that of lying the foundation for Prussia's development into a major European power.

Frédéric's policy as sovereign was based on a strong, centralised and reformed military and a brilliant court that was able to compete with the richest countries in Europe. This seemed to him the outward embodiment of a dignity that should equate him with the highest rulers of Europe, notably Louis XIV. Yet, despite an immense legacy of nation-building, the boding downfall of the great legacy of Prussia's first king was the considerable amount of debt and financial hardships facing the land in his twilight.

In several historical treatises, Frédéric's illustrious grandson, the great Frédéric II criticised his grandfather with such prudent words:

***“Friedrich was indeed without firmness, vain and lustful, but not without benevolence and good-naturedness, but on the whole big in small things and small in big things. His misfortune was that in the story he was placed between a father and a son, both of whom were superior to him in spiritual powers. He was more interested in the dazzling shine than in the useful, which is simply dignified. He sacrificed 30,000 subjects in the various wars of the emperor and the allies in order to obtain the royal crown. And he only wanted her so ardently because he wanted to satisfy his penchant for ceremonies and justify his lavish pomp on sham reasons. He showed rulership and generosity. But at what price did he buy the pleasure of satisfying his secret desires?"***