24 January: Frederick the Great

Frederick the Great was King of Prussia from 1740 to 1786. His 46 year reign was the longest of any monarch of his dynasty, the Hohenzollerns. He was born on 24 January 1712.

1. He wasn't the first Frederick to rule Prussia. His father was Frederick William I, also known as The Soldier King. His grandfather was Frederick I (hence Frederick the Great's regnal name was Frederick II). His mother was Sophia Dorothea of Hanover. Two years after Frederick was born, her father succeeded to the British throne as George I.
2. Frederick William wanted his son to have a simple, practical education based on religion and military matters. However, Frederick became fond of poetry, Music and the arts and began collecting a library, much to his father's annoyance. Frederick was 28 when his father died and he succeeded the throne. While he and his father had never got on, Frederick admired him for his fairness, intelligence and skill in politics.
3. It's generally accepted that Frederick the Great was gay. When he was 16, he became attached to his father's page, a 17 year old called Peter Karl Christoph von Keith. When his father found out, Keith was drafted into the army and sent to the Dutch frontier while Frederick was sent to his father's hunting lodge to "repent of his sin". A couple of years later he planned to run away to England with Hans Herman von Katte, one of his tutors. They were arrested and charged with treason, a capital offence. Frederick's father gave him a pardon, so he got away with merely losing his military rank, but Katte was beheaded and Frederick was forced to watch the execution. Frederick fainted. He would later write, "Fortune has it in for me; she is a woman, and I am not that way inclined."
4. The solution, Frederick William decided, was to marry his son off. A couple of proposed alliances failed, but in the end, Frederick was married to Elizabeth Christine of Brunswick-Bevern. He knew he could never love her, or even become friends with her. He even considered killing himself, but in the end went along with it. However, when he became king he provided her with her own palace and apartments and rarely saw her.
5. At the time, Machiavelli's work, The Prince, was the accepted blueprint for how a king should behave. Frederick didn't agree and wrote a book refuting it - Anti-Machiavel, which he had published anonymously.
6. He could also write music. He composed several symphonies and pieces for the flute.
7. As king, Frederick had to concentrate on politics and war rather than the arts. It was a learning curve - he made several tactical errors during his first battle as king, the Battle of Mollwitz, and almost lost. At one point he was advised to leave the battlefield because the Prussians were losing. He did, which led to embarrassment when they eventually won. He learned from his mistakes, though, with the help of one of the Prussian army commanders, Prince Eugene of Savoy. Unlike Frederick William, he could see that the young Frederick did have potential as a military leader, and mentored him. His interest in history helped here, too as he studied historical battles and their tactics, using them to win his own wars. He'd personally lead his forces into battle, so he was seen to be brave as well as a genius.
8. His achievements as king weren't just limited to winning battles. He did a lot to build up the infrastructure of his kingdom, including the world's first public school system, leading to his people having one of the highest literacy rates in the world. He took an interest in agriculture, too, and introduced the Potato as a crop, solving the problem of food shortages. He also passed a law giving peasants the right to approach him to ask favours.
9. He became known as an international statesman, too, with great powers coming to him for advice. America loved him, and after the War of Independence they asked him if his brother, Henry, could be made King of America. Frederick refused, knowing it would likely lead to a war with England or France. Napoleon was a great admirer of Frederick and studied his tactics. When he defeated the Prussians in 1806, Napoleon made a point of visiting Frederick's tomb, ordering his men to take off their hats, because, "If he were alive, we would not be here." Hitler, too, was a fan and had a picture of Frederick in his private rooms.
10. Needless to say, he never had any children, but he loved Dogs. In fact, it's said he was the one who coined the phrase "man's best friend" to describe a dog. When he died, he was surrounded by his dogs. His last words were "cover the dog, he's shivering". He also requested that he be buried next to his dogs in his vineyard, but his nephew and successor, Frederick William II, ordered that his uncle be buried in the churchyard at Potsdam. Later, Hitler would have his coffin moved to a salt mine to protect it during WWII. However, in 1991, his body was finally laid to rest in the vineyard as per his wishes.

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