Prussian Academy of Science

The Royal Prussian Academy of Sciences (German: Königlich-Preußische Akademie der Wissenschaften) was an academy established in Berlin, Germany on 11 July 1700, four years after the Akademie der Künste, or "Arts Academy," to which "Berlin Academy" may also refer. In the 18th century, it was a French-language institution, and its most active members were Huguenots who had fled religious persecution in France.

Prince-elector Frederick III of Brandenburg, Germany founded the Academy under the name of Kurfürstlich Brandenburgische Societät der Wissenschaften ("Electoral Brandenburg Society of Sciences") upon the advice of Gottfried Leibniz, who was appointed president. Unlike other Academies, the Prussian Academy was not directly funded out of the state treasury. Frederick granted it the monopoly on producing and selling calendars in Brandenburg, a suggestion from Leibniz. As Frederick was crowned "King in Prussia" in 1701, creating the Kingdom of Prussia, the Academy was renamed Königlich Preußische Sozietät der Wissenschaften ("Royal Prussian Society of Sciences"). While other Academies focused on a few topics, the Prussian Academy was the first to teach both sciences and humanities. In 1710, the Academy statute was set, dividing the Academy into two sciences and two humanities classes. This was not changed until 1830, when the physics-mathematics and the philosophy-history classes replaced the four old classes.

The reign of King Frederick II of Prussia ("Frederick the Great") saw major changes to the Academy. In 1744, the Nouvelle Société Littéraire and the Society of Sciences were merged into the Königliche Akademie der Wissenschaften ("Royal Academy of Sciences"). An obligation from the new statute were public calls for ideas on unsolved scientific questions with a monetary reward for solutions. The Academy acquired its own research facilities in the 18th century, including an observatory in 1709; an anatomical theater in 1717; a Collegium medico-chirurgicum in 1723; a botanical garden in 1718; and a laboratory in 1753. However, those were later taken over by the University of Berlin.

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