Heidelberg
- University of Heidelberg
Heidelberg,
a city of 41,000 inhabitants, is situated in the Grand Duchy of Baden
, on the left bank of the Neckar. From the obscurity of a legendary origin
the city emerges into the light of history in 1214, when the Hohenstaufen
Emperor Frederick II bestowed on Duke Louis I of Wittelsbach the dignity
of Count Palatine of the Rhine on account of his faithful services; from
that time, the fortunes of the Palatinate and its capital, Heidelberg,
were bound up with those of its thirty counts and electors, until, by
the Imperial Delegates Enactment of 1803 at Ratisbon, it passed from
the ranks of German states and was partitioned among the neighboring
states. The fame of Heidelberg is due to its university, which was founded
in 1386 by the warlike Rupert I of Wittelsbach when he was over seventy
years of age, on the model of the University of Paris. The same prince
erected the Heiliggeistkirche, formerly the university church, which
contains the graves of the Palatine Counts of Witttelsbach. After Pope
Urban VI had issued the Bull of authorization (23 October, 1385), the
founder granted the university a succession of privileges, exemptions,
and prerogatives. It was to consist of four faculties, theology, law,
medicine and art, each to have its separate organization. At first, the
rector was elected every quarter, after 1393 semi-annually, and after
1522, annually, like the deans of the faculties. Teachers and students
were provided with safe-conducts, were exempt from taxes and tolls in
the electorate, and were granted all the privileges that obtained at
the University of Paris. The Bishop of Worms, in whose diocese Heidelberg
was situated, was judge in ordinary of the clerics. The regulations were
publicly read and posted up in the Heiliggeistkirche every year. On 18
October, 1386, the feast of St. Luke the Evangelist, the university was
solemnly opened with Divine service, and the next day lectures on logic,
exegesis, and natural philosophy were begun. Dr. Marsilius from Inghen,
near Arnheim, Guelderland, former representative of Nominalism in Paris,
was chosen first rector. In accordance with the terms of the papal Bull
of authorization, the provost of the cathedral of Worms acted as chancellor
of the university, and until the end of the eighteenth century exercised
in the name of the Church the right of superintending and sanctioning
the conferring of academic degrees, either in person or through a vice-chancellor.
Soon after the opening of the university the faculties of theology and
law were reinforced by bachelors and licentiates from Prague and Paris.
But as most of the students came from the Rhenish provinces, the custom
followed by other universities of classifying them according to nationality
was not imitated here. The faculty of medicine was not organized until
1390. the faculty of arts, the alma totius Universitatis mater , was
here as everywhere else, the first in point of numbers. St. Catherine
was the patron saint, and her feast day (25 November) was observed with
great solemnity. In the first year of its existence the university had
in its roll 525 teachers and students. The foundations of the celebrated
library of Heidelberg were laid by means of donations from the bishops,
chancellors, and early professors. Louis III willed his large and valuable
collection to the university. Later, when Otto Henry had added the gift
of his books and MSS., the entire collection received the name of Bibliotheca
Palatina and was considered the most valuable in Germany. At the instance
of Elector Rupert III, later German king (1400-1410), Pope Boniface IX
, in 1399, relinquished twelve important livings and several patronages
to the university. Rupert's eldest son, Louis III, changed the Heilggeistkirche
into a collegiate church and united its twenty-four prebends to the university,
a measure sanctioned by Pope Martin V. Nominalism had been prevalent
from the time of Marsilius until after 1406, when Jerome of Prague, the
friend of John Hus, introduced realism, on which account he was expelled
by the faculty which, six years later, also condemned the teachings of
John Wycliffe. Several distinguished professors took part in the Council
of Constance and acted as counsellors for Louis III who, as representative
of the emperor and chief magistrate of the realm, attended this council
and had Hus executed as a heretic. In 1432 the university, pursuant to
papal and imperial requests, sent to the Council of Basle two delegates
who faithfully supported the legitimate pope. The transition from scholastic
to humanistic culture was effected by the learned chancellor and bishop,
Johann von Dalberg. Humanism was represented at Heidelberg by Rudolph
Agricola, founder of the older German Humanistic School, the younger
humanist Conrad Celtes, the pedagogue Jakob Wimpheling and that "marvel
in three languages", Johann Reuchlin. The learned Æneas Silvius Piccolomini
was chancellor of the university in his capacity of provost of Worms
and, as Pope Pius II , always favored it with his friendship and good-will.
In 1482 Sixtus IV , through a papal dispensation, permitted laymen and
even married men to be appointed professors in ordinary of medicine,
and in 1553 Pope Julius III sanctioned the allotment of ecclesiastical
benefices to secular professors. In April, 1518, the Augustinian monks
of Heidelberg held a convention in their monastery in which Dr. Martin
Luther from Wittenberg participated. In a public debate he maintained
forty theological and philosophical theses which maintained in part the
uselessness of moral effort and the doctrine of justification by faith
alone. The university as a body looked quite unfavourably upon the reform
movement which Luther and his followers had inaugurated. Pope Adrian
VI, in a Brief, dated 1 December, 1523, warned individual members of
the university who were inclined towards the new teachings, to oppose
the Reformation in speech and writing and to guide back to the path of
truth all who had gone astray - an admonition which the university accepted
in a spirit of gratitude. But when in consequence of the attitude of
certain professors, the Reformed teachings began to take a firmer hold
at Heidelberg, Elector Louis V in 1523 ordered an inquiry. Matters did
not then reach a crisis, though in spite of the Elector's exertions,
the university became more and more unsettled, its revenues were considerably
reduced, and the professors exceeded the students in numbers. In 1545
some of the citizens and university members declared themselves in favor
of Luther's teaching; Elector Frederick II remained a Catholic, but his
consort Dorothea, a Danish princess, and their household received Communion
under both kinds on Christmas Day of that year. The last two Catholic
electors, Louis V and Frederick II, with the support of learned advisers,
had made repeated attempts at timely reforms in the university. The only
outcome was a revision of the constitutions of the faculty of arts undertaken
by the professor of Greek, Jakob Mikyllus, and approved by the university
in 1551. To terminate the brawls between the occupants of the different
students' halls, the three halls were, in accordance with the elector's
desire, united in 1546 with the college of arts and by this means with
the university proper, and were thus consolidated under their own statutes
and administration. Frederick II also founded the Sapientia College in
1556, to accommodate sixty to eighty poor but talented students from
the Palatinate. With the consent of Pope Julius III it was established
in 1560 in the abandoned Augustinian monastery. Under Frederick III in
1561, it was transferred to the Protestant Consistory and turned into
a theological seminary; as such it continued until 1803 when its revenues
were given over to a more advanced institute at Heidelberg. In 1560 the
grammar school which had declined under Otto Henry was revived as a preparatory
college. The university recognized the pope's authority for the last
time, when, on the invitation of Julius III, it resolved to send two
professors as delegates to the Council of Trent, an intention which was
not after all carried into effect. Under Otto Henry (1556-59), who immediately
after his accession established Lutheranism as the State religion, the
last two Catholic professors resigned their chairs. Reforms affecting
economic management and administration, faculty organization, number,
subjects, and order of courses, and the appointment of professors, were
carried out by Otto Henry with the assistance of Mikyllus and Philip
Melanchthon, in 1556 and during the following years when the elector's
brother, the Palatine Count George John, was rector. The latter chose
a pro-rector from among the professors, and subsequently it became customary
to associate a pro-rector with the rector magnificentissimus. Through
these innovations, the university was transformed into a school of the
Evangelical-Lutheran and later of the Calvinistic stamp. At that time,
the rigid Calvinists of the theological faculty gave the Reformers their
most important doctrinal formulary in the Heidelberg Catechism. As under
Louis VI (1576-83) all the Calvinist professors were dismissed from the
university, so under his successor, John Casimir (1583-92), the Lutherans
were sent away and the Reformed readmitted. In 1588 some further regulations
for the faculties, discipline, and economy were proposed and were carried
out by Frederick IV. The university gained an international reputation,
but its prosperity was destroyed by the Thirty Years War. In September,
1622, the city and castle of Heidelberg were taken by Tilly and the university
practically abolished. It was reorganized in 1629 as a Catholic institution
and some of the chairs were filled by Jesuits ; but the tempestuous conditions
then prevalent made the fostering of science impossible and the work
was entirely suspended from 1631 to 1652. After the occupation of Heidelberg
the Bibliotheca Palatina was presented to the pope by Duke Maximillian
of Bavaria and sent in wagons to Rome, a fortunate arrangement for this
collection which otherwise would have been burned to ashes, with the
other libraries of the city, in May, 1693. In 1815 and 1816 a number
of these MS. were returned to Heidelberg. After the Peace of Westphalia,
Elector Charles Louis restored the university as a Protestant institution
and reorganized its economic management. On 1 November, 1652, it was
reopened and a number of distinguished scholars were invited there, among
others, Samuel Pufendorf, professor of natural and international law.
The philosopher Spinoza also received a call to Heidelberg but declined
it, fearing that on account of the religious conflicts philosophical
teaching would be restricted within narrow limits. In the Palatine-Orléans
war Heidelberg was burned by the troops of Louis XIV. At that time the
elector's castle also went up in flames. The foundation of this residence
had been laid by the Palatine Count Rudolph I (1294-1319), who built
for himself a castle on the Jettenbühl above the city, which is the oldest
part of the entire structure. When Rupert III became King of the Romans
(1400-10) he erected a stately building the interior of which was especially
rich in design. Opposite, near the picturesque group of fountains, stood
Louis's building. Both were fortified by Louis V, and the south wing
was completed by his brother, Frederick II. The actual edifice dates
from Otto Henry, Frederick IV and Frederick V. Otto Henry's building
is in the classic Early Renaissance style adorned with numerous plastic
escutcheons, ornaments, and statues. Of the later ruins, Frederick's
building is best preserved. It was erected in 1601-07 by the architect
Johannes Schoch, and, like Otto Henry's, is remarkable for its numerous
ornamental figures. In addition to these there is the English building,
with its exquisite, fairy-like gardens and fountains, built in Italian
later Renaissance style by order of Frederick V and his wife Elizabeth,
who was a granddaughter of Queen Mary Stuart. The castle was partly blown
up and partly burned by the French in May, 1693. During these terrible
times the professors and students sought safety in flight, and in 1694
established the university temporarily at Frankfort and then at Weinheim.
In 1700 it was moved back to Heidelberg. Three years later, under the
Catholic Elector John William of the House of Palatine Neuburg, the first
Jesuits were appointed as teachers. A Catholic faculty of theology was
established side by side with that of the Reformers and invested with
equal prerogatives. The first Jesuit rector served during the year 1709.
John William in 1712 began the new university buildings which were completed
in 1735 in the reign of Charles Philip, who, in 1720 transferred the
electoral residence, which had been maintained at Heidelberg for six
hundred years, to Mannheim, where he built a new palace. Through the
efforts of the Jesuits a preparatory seminary was established, the Seminarium
ad Carolum Borromæum, whose pupils were also registered in the university.
After the suppression of the Jesuit Order , most of the schools they
had conducted passed into the hands of the French Congregation of Lazarists
(1773). They deteriorated from that time forward. The university itself
continued to lose in brilliance and prestige until the reign of the last
elector, Charles Theodore, of the House of Sulzbach, who established
new chairs for all the faculties, founded scientific institutes such
as the Electoral Academy of Science, and transferred the school of political
economy from Kaiserslautern to Heidelberg, where it was combined with
the university as the faculty of political economy. He also founded an
observatory in the neighboring city of Mannheim, where the celebrated
Jesuit Christian Meyer laboured as director. In connexion with the commemoration
of the four hundredth anniversary of the university, a revised statute
book which several of the professors had been commissioned to prepare,
was approved by the elector, and the financial affairs of the university,
its receipts and expenditures, were put in order. At that period the
number of students varied from three to four hundred; in the jubilee
year 133 matriculated. In consequence of the disturbances caused by the
French Revolution and particularly through the Peace of Lunéeville, the
university lost all its property on the left bank of the Rhine, so that
its complete dissolution was expected. At this juncture, the elector
and (after 1806) Grand Duke Charles Frederick of Baden, to whom had been
allotted the part of the Palatinate situated on the right bank of the
Rhine, issued on 13 May, 1803, an edict of organization for the Baden
dependencies and determined the rights and constitution of Heidelberg,
now the State university. He divided it into five faculties and placed
himself at its head as rector, as did also his successors. From a local
college of Baden the present Ruperto-Carola became a renowned German
university. In 1807 the Catholic faculty of theology was removed to Freiburg.
Heidelberg then had 432 students on its register. During this decade
Romanticism found expression here through Clemens Brentano, Achim von
Arnim, Ludwig Tieck, Joseph Görres, and Joseph von Eichendorff, and there
went forth a revival of the German Middle Ages in speech, poetry, and
art. The German Students Association exerted great influence, which was
at first patriotic and later political in the sense of Radicalism. After
Romanticism had died out, Heidelberg became a centre of Liberalism and
of the movement in favour of national unity. The historians Friedrich
Christoph Schlosser, Georg Gervinus, and Ludwig Haüsser were the guides
of the nation in political history. The modern scientific schools of
medicine and natural science, particularly astronomy, were models in
point of construction and equipment. The law faculty was for a time the
first in Germany. Its most distinguished representatives were the professors
of Roman law, Thibaut, and von Vangerow; K. F. A. Mittermaier in the
departments of civil law, penal law, and criminal law; and in commercial
law L. Goldschmidt. The division of political economy was represented
for a long time by Karl Heinrich Rau, champion of the Liberal-individualist
movement, which was greatly influenced by the English, and by Karl Knies,
leader of the historic movement. Distinguished among the professors of
medicine are the anatomists Henle, Arnold, and Gegenbaur, and the surgeons,
von Chelius and Czerny, the latter the founder and head of the Institute
for the Investigation of Cancer. Robert Bunsen and Gustav Robert Kirchhoff
share the glory of the discovery of the spectrum analysis. Hermann von
Helmholtz, inventor of the opthalmoscope Erwin Rohde, the classical scholar
and philologian; and Kuno Fischer, historian of modern philosophy, should
be especially mentioned. In the summer of 1909 the family of the Mannheim
machine builder, Heinrich Lanz gave one million marks ($250,000) for
the foundation of an academy of science in connexion with Heidelberg
University. At present the number of professors in Heidelberg is about
150; students, 2200.<P> http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/07196a.htm
<P>CALENDAR <P>
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1385 Pope Urban VI grants permission
on 23 October for the establishment of a university with all four Faculties
by Count Palatine and Elector Ruprecht I in Heidelberg 1386 Opening ceremony
in the Church of the Holy Spirit on 18 October; first rector is Marsilius
von Inghen ; professors are appointed for theology, jurisprudence and
philosophy, with medicine following in 1388 1452 Realism (via antiqua)
and nominalism (via moderna) are taught side by side 1556 Elector Ottheinrich
introduces the Lutheran Reformation 1558 Reform of the university statutes
by Ottheinrich (largely unchanged until 1786) 1563 Publication of the
Heidelberg Catechism by Olevianus and Ursinius - Heidelberg a Calvinist
university (until 1685) 1622 The Bavarian-led Catholic League takes the
city by storm 1623 The Bibliotheca Palatina is sent to Rome as a gift
to the Pope by Maximilian I of Bavaria as compensation for the costs
of war 1652 Reopening after the Thirty Years' War 1693-1703 All teaching
discontinued after the destruction of Heidelberg in the War of the Palatinate
Succession 1712 Foundation stone laid for the Old University 1752 First
chair of mathematics and experimental physics 1784 The College of National
Economics is made part of the University 1803 Edict of the Grand Duke
of Baden reorganising the University, now on Baden territory; from 1805
the University is called Ruperto-Carola 1807 Establishment of the Philological-Pedagogical
Seminar as first University institute 1838 Seminar of Practical Theology
founded 1855 Completion of the Chemical Laboratory for Robert Bunsen
1888 Return of the Codex Manesse to Heidelberg 1890 Separation of the
Faculty of Science and Mathematics from the Faculty of Philosophy 1895
Katharina Winscheid the first woman to obtain a Ph. D. 1898 National
observatory set up on Königstuhl hill 1900 Georgine Sexauer the first
woman student to enrol (28 April) 1904 Foundation of the Cancer Institute
( Czerny House) 1919 Opening of the Mensa academica refectory 1923 Gerta
von Ubisch the first woman to be awarded a Habilitation ; 1929 Professor
of botany, 1933 driven out by the National Socialists 1930 Foundations
laid for the New University 1933 -1939 59 of the 214 teaching staff deprived
of their posts in the National Socialist era 1945 Gradual resumption
of teaching (15 August); first rector: Karl Heinrich Bauer (Medicine);
Collegium Academicum established 1962 Opening of the interdisciplinary
South Asia Institute 1962 Establishment of the Cancer Research Centre
(from 1972: German Cancer Research Centre) 1964 Opening of the University
hospital complex in Mannheim (1969: Faculty of Clinical Medicine, Mannheim)
1969 New constitution for the University: 16 Faculties instead of 5 1986
600th anniversary of Heidelberg University with Gisbert zu Pulitz as
rector 1994 The Faculty of Medicine is the largest in Germany; the University
now has 15 Faculties
