KANT IN THE CLASSROOM    Materials to aid the study of Kant’s lectures

Bibliography
Kant’s Writings
Academy Edition
Glossary
Biographies
Kant’s Life

> Universities

Students
Professors

Kant’s Lectures
The Student Notes

Introduction
Governance and Organization
Kant as Dean, Senator, & Rector
> List: Brief Descriptions of German Universities
List: Universities founded before 1815
Table: Average Enrollments [Graphs]
Table: Full Professors

Alphabetical
Index



Altdorf

Bamberg

Basel

Bonn

Braunsberg (Braniewo)

Breslau (Wroclaw)

Brünn

Bützow

Cologne (Köln)

Dillingen

Dorpat/Tartu

Duisburg

Erfurt

Erlangen

Frankfurt/Oder

Freiburg

Fulda

Gießen

Göttingen

Graz

Greifswald

Halle

Heidelberg

Helmstedt

Herborn

Ingolstadt

Innsbruck

Jena

Kassel

Kiel

Köln (Cologne)

Königsberg

Landshut

Leipzig

Lemberg

Linz

Mainz

Marburg

Münster

Olmütz

Osnabruck

Paderborn

Prague

Rinteln

Rostock

Salzburg

Straßburg

Stuttgart

Tartu

Trier

Tübingen

Wien (Vienna)

Wittenberg

Wroclaw (Breslau)

Würzburg

Chronological
Index



Middle Ages

Prague 1348

Vienna 1365

Heidelberg 1385

Cologne 1388-1798

Erfurt 1392-1816

Würzburg 1402-13, 1582

Leipzig 1409

Rostock 1419

Greifswald 1456

Basel 1460

Freiburg im Breisgau 1460

Ingolstadt 1472-1800

Trier 1473-1798

Mainz 1477-1798

Tübingen 1477

Wittenberg 1502-1817

Frankfurt/Oder 1506-1811


Territorial States

Marburg 1527

Königsberg 1544

Dillingen 1554-1804

Jena 1558

Braunsberg 1568, 1818

Helmstedt 1576-1809

Olmütz 1581-1782, 1827-55

Herborn 1584-1816

Graz 1585-1782, 1827

Gießen 1607-24, 1650

Paderborn 1614-1818, 1818

Rinteln 1621-1809

Straßburg 1621-1792, 1872

Altdorf 1622-1809

Salzburg 1622-1810

Osnabruck 1630-33

Dorpat 1632-1710, 1802-93

Kassel 1632-52

Linz 1636

Bamberg 1648-1803


The Absolute State

Duisburg 1655-1818

Kiel 1665

Innsbruck 1669-1782, 1792-1810, 1826

Halle 1694

Breslau 1702

Fulda 1734-1804

Göttingen 1736

Erlangen 1743

Bützow 1758-89

Brünn 1778-82?

Münster 1773-1818

Stuttgart 1781-94

Lemberg 1784-1805, 1816-71

Bonn 1786-98, 1818

Landshut 1800-26

List: 18th Century German Universities

In Kant’s day there were about forty universities in the German-speaking lands, and these were all quite small by today’s standards. Halle, the largest of them, enjoyed an enrollment of around 1000 students. Göttingen was the latest arrival, founded in 1736, and was also the fastest growing, with about 11-12% of the total student enrollment by 1775. The four largest German universities – Halle, Göttingen, Jena, and Leipzig – accounted for nearly half of the total student enrollment in Germany. This meant that some of the universities were vanishingly small (and as a result, many of them did indeed vanish). Königsberg, whose share of the students remained at about 5% throughout the 18th century (and growing slightly toward the end) had a student enrollment of about 370 when Kant began attending as a student, and enrollment oscillated between 250 and 380 during Kant’s years as a teacher (see the table on average enrollments here).

Four of these universities were Prussian: Halle, Königsberg, Frankfurt/Oder, and Duisburg. Königsberg had strong ties especially to Halle – for instance, in the early part of the century, all theology students were required to study for two years in Halle. Of those teaching in some capacity or other in the philosophy faculty at Königsberg during the 18th century for whom we have data (n=106), 17% studied, graduated, or had taught at Halle, another 17% at Jena; fewer came from Frankfurt/Oder, proportional to its smaller size; and 85% had either graduated from or studied at Königsberg – indeed, many of the faculty, like Kant, had grown up in Königsberg.


The set of highly abbreviated remarks on the fifty-two German-speaking universities that follow is somewhat haphazard and incomplete, based primarily on material provided in Eulenburg [1904], Clark [1986], and Ellwein [1997]. The purpose of this listing is to offer a rough and preliminary orientation to the community of German universities in which Kant and his associates were living and working. Additional information on student enrollment (All Universities, Königsberg) and staffing (Full Professors) is also available, as well as a modest list of 18th century professors at the different universities (and a few Gymnasia).

The founding year claimed for universities should be viewed with caution, as it was not always clear which event was used to determine the date (and as a result there are many inconsistencies to be found in the literature). The date might refer to when university privileges were granted; or to when classes were first held; or to when students could first matriculate; or to when the request for a charter was first made to the Holy Roman Emperor (or other secular authority) and to the Pope (or other ecclesiastical authority); or to when the public celebration of the founding took place.[1] Similarly, many of these universities led lives as other kinds of schools prior to receiving charters as universities, and sometimes these earlier dates are given. In general, I follow Ellwein [1997] on the dates.

With the chronological index, I follow the classification scheme and data in Ellwein [1997, 321-24]. Dates after 1800 (e.g., the re-founding of a university) have been omitted, and schools listed by Ellwein but not included here are: Lausanne (1537, theology; university since 1890), Molsheim (1618-1701), Anschaffenburg (1808-14), Passau (1773-1803, philosophy and theology), as well as the mining school at Freiberg (1765) and the art schools at Nürnberg (1662-4), Düsseldorf (1769-1805), and Dresden (1764).


[1] See, for instance, Walter Rüegg's discussion of the founding date for the University of Bologna: The date offered by the university – 1088 – would seem more closely tied to the need, in the late 19th century, to celebrate a significant jubilee and to support the unification of Italy, than to any identifiable event in the 11th century [1992, 4-6].