Frederick II (Frederick Hohenstufen) was Emperor of Germany. He was born in 1994 and died in 1250. The grandson of Frederick I, he was the son of the Emperor Henry VI and of the Norman PrincessConstance, heiress of the Two Sicilies. He remained under the guardianship of Innocent III until 1209, when he took upon himself the government of Lower Italy and Sicily. The imperial crown of Germany was now worn by a rival, Otho IV, whose defeat at the battle of Bouvines opened the way to Frederick, who in 1215, after pledging himself to undertake a crusade, was crowned at Aix-la-Ohapelle.
He caused his eldest son Henry to be chosen king of Rome in 1220, and the same year received the imperial crown from the pope. His ambition aimed at the subjugation of Lombardy, the mastership of all Italy, and the reduction of the popes to their old spiritual office as the. leading bishops in Christendom. This led him into constant struggles in Germany and Italy. In 1227 he undertook a crusade; but when he did reach the Holy Land he was able to effect nothing permanent, although he had crowned himself at Jerusalem as king of Judea. On his return he had to suppress a revolt of his son Henry, whom he imprisoned for life.
In 1237 he broke the power of the LombardLeague by a victory at Corte Nuova in Lombardy, and marched on Rome, but did not attack it. The remainder of his life was occupied with his troubles in Italy, and he died in the midst of his wars in 1250. He was one of the ablest and most accomplished of the long line of German emperors, and art, literature, commerce, and agriculture received every encouragement at his hands. He himself was a good linguist, was acquainted with natural history, was a minnesinger, and a writer on philosophy.
Frederick II (Frederick The Great) was King of Prussia. He was born in 1712 and died in 1786.
He was the son of Frederick William I, and the PrincessSophia Dorothea of Hanover, sister of George II of England. Although he was instructed only in the details of military exercises and service, his taste for poetry and music was early developed. He was brutally treated by his father, and in 1733 he was obliged to marry the PrincessElizabethChristina, daughter of FerdinandAlbert, duke of Brunswick-Bevern. Frederick William gave the castle of Schonhausen to her, and to the prince the county of Ruppin, and in 1734 the town of Rheinsberg, where he lived, devoting himself chiefly to literary pursuits, composing several works, and corresponding with foreign scholars, particularly with Voltaire, whom he greatly admired. The death of his father raised him to the throne in 1740, and it was not long before he asserted the claims of the house of Brandenburg to a part of Silesia then held by Maria Theresa. But his proposals being rejected, he occupied Lower Silesia in December 1740, defeated the Austrians near Mollwitz, and at Czaslau and the first Silesian war was terminated by the peace signed at Berlin on July the 28th, 1742, leaving Frederick in possession of Silesia.
Soon the second Silesian war broke out, the result of which was equally favourable for Frederick. By the Peace of Dresden on December the 15th,1745 he retained Silesia and acknowledged the husband of Maria Theresa, Francis I, as emperor. During the eleven following years of peace Frederick devoted himself to the domestic administration, to the improvement of the army, and at the same time to the muses. He encouraged agriculture, the arts, manufactures, and commerce, reformed the laws, increased the revenues of the state, and perfected the organization of his army, which was increased to 160,000 men.
Secret information of an alliance between Austria, Russia, and Saxony gave him reason to fear an attack and the loss of Silesia. He hastened to anticipate his enemies by the invasion of Saxony in 1756, with which the Seven Years' war, or the third Silesian war, commenced. This was a far more severe struggle than either of the former. In it Frederick had against him Austria, Russia, France, Sweden, and greater part of Germany, though Britain and some of the German states were on his side. He gained victories at Prague, Rossbach, Leuthen, Zorndorf, Torgau, Freiberg, but suffered severe defeats in the battles of Kollin, Hochkirch and Kunersdorf. The Peace of Hubertsburg in 1763 terminated this war, Frederick keeping Silesia and ceding nothing. Frederick came out of the Seven Years' war with a reputation which promised him, in the future, a decisive influence in the affairs of Germany and Europe.
His next care was the relief of his kingdom, drained and exhausted by the contest. This he prosecuted with great diligence and liberality. On the partition of Poland in 1772 Frederick received a large accession to his dominions. In 1778-1779 he frustrated the designs of the Emperor Joseph II on Bavaria, and the war of the Bavarian Succession was terminated without a battle by the Peace of Teschen on May the 13th 1779.
Austria consented to the union of the principalities of Franconia with Prussia, and renounced the feudal claims of Bohemia to those countries. In the evening of his active life Frederick concluded, in connection with Saxony and Hanover, the confederation of the German princes, on July the 23rd, 1785. An incurable dropsy hastened the death of Frederick, who left to his nephew, Frederick William II, a kingdom increased by 29,000 square miles, a well-filled treasury, an army of 200,000 men, great credit with all the European powers, and a state distinguished for population, industry, wealth, and science. Frederick's works, relating chiefly to history, politics, military science, philosophy, and the belles-lettres, were all written in French, the language which he regularly used, as he despised German. He was a man of the highest abilities, but in some respects narrow and repellant. Among his closest friends was the Scottish exile Marshal Keith.
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