Wilhelm Uhden

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Wilhelm Uhden (full name Johann Daniel Wilhelm Otto Uhden , born August 23, 1763 in Berlin ; † January 21, 1835 ibid) was a Prussian civil servant and diplomat, envoy to the Vatican , archaeologist and co-founder of Berlin University .

family

Wilhelm Uhden was the only child of the chamber judge Johann Otto Uhden and his wife Charlotte Amalia Uhden, née Flesche. His father died in 1766 at the age of 41. Ten years later, his mother also died, as a result of which Wilhelm grew up as an orphan with his father's grandparents in Berlin. His grandfather was the court judge and secret councilor Johann Christian Uhden (1695–1783), who was also Generalfiskal under Friedrich II . Wilhelm Uhden attended the Friedrichswerder high school until he graduated from high school .

Life

Study time

From 1782 to 1786 Wilhelm Uhden studied law and camera studies in Halle . After the death of his grandparents, Uhden inherited a small fortune and returned to Berlin after completing his studies as an apprentice court trainee . There he became a trainee lawyer at the Kurmärkischen War and Domain Chamber in 1786. In 1788 he took part in Friedrich Gedike's seminar. Two seminar papers by Uhden from this period are still preserved. Uhden's main area of ​​interest, however, was antiquity research. Therefore he went to Göttingen in 1789 to listen to Christian Gottlob Heyne's lectures on archeology and to prepare for a private trip to Italy. Uhden only stayed in Göttingen for a year, but in this short time he seems to have made a big impression on Heyne, because Heyne wrote later (1808) to Karl Viktor von Bonstetten: “I wish that one of our young German humanists who were there How H [he] r Uhden, who was a good pedestrian, put his Virgil in his pocket, and from the point where the Trojans ' camp would have made all the way to Torre Paderno, once in the plain and again over the hills. "

Christoffer Wilhelm Eckersberg : Anna Maria Magnani

The years in Rome (1790–1802)

Wilhelm Uhden lived as a private scholar in Rome from 1790 to 1795. This was made possible by the inheritance from grandfather. During this time he dealt extensively with archeology, traveled all over Italy , visited important excavations and acquired all kinds of art treasures. In addition, he quickly made friends with a large circle of intellectuals and artists (mainly Germans and Danes). In this circle Uhden also met the Danish archaeologist and consul general at the Vatican Georg Zoëga and met the attractive, spirited, but less educated and cultivated Anna Maria Magnani (1772-1846) in his household, with whom he fell in love.

In 1795 Wilhelm Uhden became deputy Prussian managing director at the Vatican and on March 6, married Anna Maria (for which he converted to the Catholic faith). On December 24th of the same year they had their first daughter Carlotta Vincenza. Their second daughter, Friederike Wilhelmina Franziska, was born on January 1, 1798. Uhden followed Pope Pius VI. from 1798 to 1799 in exile in Florence and separated from Anna Maria in 1799, who had had a love affair with the Danish sculptor Bertel Thorvaldsen (1770–1844) for about two years . It was not until September 30, 1802 that Anna Maria agreed in writing to the permanent separation. At this point in time, Uhden had already returned to Berlin and took his daughter Carlotta Vincenca with her - Friederike Wilhelmina Franziska had died on August 1, 1800.

Wilhelm Uhden was appointed the first Prussian resident at the Vatican in 1798. He took over this office from the Italian abbot Matthieu Ciofanie on his death and stayed at the post until Wilhelm von Humboldt took over the office of resident on November 27, 1802; Uhden left Rome in December 1802 to return to Berlin.

Back in Berlin

Since his successor was introduced to office, Uhden was able to leave Rome at the end of 1802. Together with his now seven-year-old daughter and the painter Susanne Elisabeth Huth , whom he had met in the German-Danish artist colony in Rome, he set off for Berlin. Due to the divorce from Magnani and his return to Protestantism , he was able to marry Susanne. On the way to Berlin, they made a stopover in their native city of Frankfurt am Main to get married there on February 21, 1803.

Shortly after their arrival in Berlin, the Uhdens were already among the exquisite guests of various salons , such as that of Henriette Herz . Rahel Varnhagen wrote to her husband in September 1814 that she had taken part in a tea party in the Salon der Herz and met "State Councilor Uhden and wife" there. Wilhelm Uhden is also known to have been a member of two clubs that still exist today: the “ Monday Club ” and the “ Lawless Society ”. In the year of his return, 1803, Uhden was appointed War and Domain Council in the General Directorate. As a Privy Council of War and Lecturing Council, he was initially given the task of serving under Friedrich Leopold von Schrötter in the Provincial Department for New East Prussia . Until 1808 he worked in the department for "spiritual, school and sovereign matters" on the educational and school reform . But he did not feel comfortable in his post. At the end of 1804 he was given a job that gave him a lot more pleasure. He was accepted into the Academy of Arts - as an honorary member and assessor . A few months later he was entrusted with the duties of a secretary at the Senate of the Academy of Arts. He had already shown enthusiasm and diplomatic skill in Rome and fully complied with the demands made on an "organ and head of academic negotiations in the Senate, for its correspondence with other academies".

Wilhelm von Humboldt returned to Berlin in 1809 and began his career as a politician and statesman. Humboldt was appointed a Privy Councilor of State and was made head of the Section for Culture and Education. Wilhelm Uhden then applied for the vacant post in Rome, which he had held before Humboldt, and was officially accepted; however, he never took it up. Humboldt then campaigned for Uhden, who had meanwhile been promoted to State Council, to receive an office in his section.

Berlin University around 1850

The foundation of the Berlin University

In 1807 the Prussian King Friedrich Wilhelm III approved . the establishment of the Alma Mater Berolinensis . In February 1809, Wilhelm von Humboldt was given responsibility for implementing the founding plan. He appointed Georg Heinrich Ludwig Nicolovius ( theologian ), Friedrich Schleiermacher , Johann Wilhelm Süvern (teacher and politician) and Wilhelm Uhden as his closest collaborators. Humboldt saw his relationship with Uhden as a special case in a high state authority. He assigned various tasks to him. Uhden became the supervisor of the library and he was supposed to ensure a harmonious connection between the university and the Academy of Sciences , which lost its library , observatory , botanical garden, etc. to the new institution. In the future university building, the Palais des Prinzen Heinrich , which was still inhabited by around 90 people with the right to live for life, he organized a hall that was to serve as an auditorium for the winter. From July to September 1810 Wilhelm Uhden traveled to the university cities of Dresden , Erfurt , Göttingen , Halle , Heidelberg , Leipzig , Marburg , Wittenberg and Würzburg in order to win professors for Berlin. For example, he was able to bring the classical philologist August Boeckh to Berlin.

On September 29, 1810, the Berlin University was opened with three faculties ( Philosophical , Legal and Medical ). Their first professors were Christoph Wilhelm Hufeland , Friedrich Schleiermacher, Friedrich Carl von Savigny , Johann Gottlieb Fichte and Bartholdt Georg Niebuhr . Wilhelm Uhden was appointed to the teaching staff of the university in the winter semester of 1813/14. He first read in Italian literature with a focus on Dante . Until 1826 he was also a lecturer in archeology. In 1814 he was awarded an honorary doctorate in archeology.

Uhden had been a member of the Prussian Academy of Sciences since 1808 and an honorary member of the Prussian Academy of the Arts, Section for Fine Arts, since 1804. In 1808 he was accepted as a corresponding member of the Bavarian Academy of Sciences .

literature

  • Erhard Roß: Wilhelm Uhden. Forty years as a Prussian civil servant in Rome and Berlin, 1795–1835 . In: Oswald Hauser (Ed.): Prussia, Europe and the Reich . (= New research on Brandenburg-Prussian history , Vol. 7). Böhlau, Cologne / Vienna 1987, pp. 151–193.
  • Erhard Roß: Goethe, the ancient world and Wilhelm Uhden . In: Goethe-Jahrbuch 104, 1987, pp. 367-375.
  • Detlev Kreikenbom : Spectatori harum formarum elegantissimo. To the Berlin archaeologist Wilhelm Uhden (1763–1835) . In: Henning Wrede (ed.): The archaeologist Eduard Gerhard, 1795–1867, on his 200th birthday . (Winkelmann Institute of the Humboldt University in Berlin 2). Verlag Willmuth Arenhövel, Berlin 1997, pp. 47-54.
  • Brigitte von Schönfels: Wilhelm Uhden. A life in Rome and Berlin . Arete Verlag, Hildesheim 2014. ISBN 978-3-942468-16-9 .

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Brigitte von Schönfels: Wilhelm Uhden. A life in Rome and Berlin . Hildesheim 2014, p. 11 f.
  2. ^ LH Fischer: The Royal Pedagogical Seminar in Berlin 1787–1887. According to the files of the Royal. Go State Archives and the Royal. Provincial School College in Berlin. In: Annual report of the Berlin Philological Society . Berlin 1888, p. 9 f.
  3. ^ Christian Gottlob Heyne on April 24, 1808 to Karl-Viktor von Bonstetten. In: Karl-Viktor Bonstetten: Writings on Italy: 1800–1808 , ed. v. Doris Walser-Wilhelm / Antje Kolde. Göttingen 2008, p. 631.
  4. ↑ In 1836, two excavation reports from him appeared posthumously in the “Archäologische Intellektivenblatt”: Wilhelm Uhden: Ausgrabungsberichte (from Uhden's archaeological estate). 1. The tombs and monuments of Gela. 1792. In: Intelligence Journal of the Allgemeine Literatur-Zeitung Archäologisches Intellektivenblatt with the participation of the Institute for Archaeological Correspondence in Rome . Eduard Gerhard, Halle 1836, 4th year, Sp. 281–284.
  5. ^ Friedrich Noack: German Life in Rome 1700 to 1900 . Berlin 1907, p. 141.
  6. ↑ Thorvaldsen's Brevarkiv Copenhagen No. 98 af 7976. Likewise: No. 76 af 5805.
  7. ^ "On January 13, 1803, the separation became valid under Prussian law." Brigitte von Schönfels: Wilhelm Uhden. A life in Rome and Berlin . Hildesheim 2014, p. 70.
  8. ^ Rainer Schmitz (Ed.): Henriette Herz in memories, letters and testimonials . Frankfurt a. M. 1984, p. 419.
  9. ^ Brigitte von Schönfels: Wilhelm Uhden. A life in Rome and Berlin . Hildesheim 2014, p. 102.
  10. ↑ Erhard Roß: Wilhelm Uhden. Forty years as a Prussian civil servant in Rome and Berlin, 1795–1835 . In: Oswald Hauser (Ed.): Prussia, Europe and the Reich . Cologne / Vienna 1987, p. 168.
  11. ^ Wilhelm von Humboldt: Politische Briefe vol. 1. Ed. By Wilhelm Richter. Berlin 1935, p. 30.
personal data
SURNAME Uhden, Wilhelm
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Uhden, Johann Daniel Wilhelm Otto
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Prussian civil servant and diplomat
DATE OF BIRTH August 23, 1763
PLACE OF BIRTH Berlin
DATE OF DEATH January 21, 1835
Place of death Berlin