Louis I | |
---|---|
Grand Duke of Baden | |
Reign | 8 December 1818 – 30 March 1830 |
Predecessor | Charles I |
Successor | Leopold I |
Born |
Karlsruhe |
9 February 1763
Died | 30 March 1830 Karlsruhe |
(aged 67)
House | Zähringen |
Father | Charles Frederick, Grand Duke of Baden |
Mother | Landgravine Caroline Louise of Hesse-Darmstadt |
Religion | Lutheranism |
Ludwig I, Grand Duke of Baden (9 February 1763 – 30 March 1830) succeeded as Grand Duke on 8 December 1818. He was the uncle of his predecessor Karl Ludwig Friedrich, and his death marked the end of the Zähringen line of the House of Baden. He was succeeded by his half brother, Leopold.
He secured the continued existence of the University of Freiburg in 1820, after which the University was called the Albert-Ludwig University. He also founded the Polytechnic Hochschule Karlsruhe in 1825. The Hochschule is the oldest technical school in Germany.
Ludwig's death in 1830 led to many rumors. His death also meant the extinction of his line of the Baden family. The succession then went to the children of the morganatic second marriage of Grand Duke Karl Friedrich and Louise Karoline Geyer von Geyersberg, who was created Countess of Hochberg in the Austrian nobility at the personal request of Karl Friedrich.
After Ludwig's death, there was much discussion about a mysterious seventeen-year-old man named Kaspar Hauser, who had appeared seemingly out of nowhere in 1828. Seventeen years previously, the first son of the future Grand Duke Karl Ludwig Friedrich and his wife Stephanie died under what were later portrayed as mysterious circumstances. There was at the time and still is today (in 2007) speculation that Hauser, who died (perhaps murdered) in 1833, was that child.
Working together with architect Friedrich Weinbrenner, Louis is responsible for most of the classical revival buildings in the city center and for building the pyramid.