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==History== {{main|History of Heidelberg University}} ===Founding=== [[File:Ruprecht I mit Frauen.jpg|thumb|In 1386, Heidelberg University was founded by [[Rupert I, Elector Palatine|Rupert I]] on instruction of [[Pope Urban VI]] who demanded modelling it after the ancient [[University of Paris]].]] The [[Western Schism|Great Schism]] of 1378 made it possible for Heidelberg, a relatively small city and capital of the [[Electorate of the Palatinate]], to gain its own university.<ref name="Cser31">{{harvnb|Cser|2007|page=31}}</ref> The Great Schism was initiated by the election of two popes after the death of [[Pope Gregory XI]] in the same year.<ref name="Cser31" /> One successor resided in [[Avignon]] (elected by the French) and the other in Rome (elected by the Italian cardinals).<ref name="Cser31" /> The German secular and spiritual leaders voiced their support for the successor in Rome, which had far-reaching consequences for the German students and teachers in Paris: they lost their stipends and had to leave.<ref>{{harvnb|Wolgast|1986|page=1–2}}</ref> [[Rupert I, Elector Palatine of the Rhine|Rupert I]] recognized the opportunity and initiated talks with the [[Roman Curia|Curia]], which ultimately led to a [[papal bull]] for foundation of a university. After having received, on 23 October 1385, permission from pope [[Urban VI]] to create a school of general studies ({{langx|la|studium generale}}), the final decision to found the university was taken on 26 June 1386 at the behest of Rupert I, [[Count Palatine of the Rhine]].<ref name="Wolgast3">{{harvnb|Wolgast|1986|page=3}}</ref> As specified in the papal charter, the university was modelled after the [[University of Paris]] and included four faculties: philosophy, theology, [[jurisprudence]], and medicine.<ref name="Hermans2005">{{cite book|title=Charters of Foundation and Early Documents of the Universities of the Coimbra Group|series=Varia Letteren| editor-first1=Jos. M. M. |editor-last1=Hermans |editor-first2=Marc |editor-last2=Nelissen |edition=2 |publisher=Leuven University Press|year=2005 |isbn=978-90-5867-474-6 |pages=56–57}}</ref> On 18 October 1386 a special [[Pontifical High Mass]] in the ''[[Church of the Holy Spirit (Heidelberg)|Heiliggeistkirche]]'' was the ceremony that established the university.<ref name="Wolgast3"/> On 19 October 1386 the first lecture was held,<ref name="Wolgast3"/> making Heidelberg the [[List of oldest universities in continuous operation|oldest university in Germany]].<ref>{{harvnb|Wolgast|1986|page=1}}</ref> In November 1386, [[Marsilius of Inghen]] was elected first [[Rector (academia)|rector]] of the university.<ref name="Cser39">{{harvnb|Cser|2007|page=39}}</ref> The rector seal motto was ''semper apertus''—i.e., "the book of learning is always open."<ref>{{harvnb|Wolgast|1986|page=5–6}}</ref> The university grew quickly and in March 1390, 185 students were enrolled at the university.<ref>{{harvnb|Cser|2007|page=40}}</ref> [[File:2013.10.01.111339 Alte Brücke Heiliggeistkirche View City Heidelberg.jpg|thumb|A [[Solemn Mass]] was offered in the ''[[Church of the Holy Spirit (Heidelberg)|Heiliggeistkirche]]'' in 1386 to mark and bless the establishment of the university.]] ===Late Middle Ages=== Between 1414 and 1418, theology and jurisprudence professors of the university took part in the [[Council of Constance]] and acted as counselors for [[Louis III, Elector Palatine|Louis III]], who attended this council as representative of the emperor and chief magistrate of the realm. This resulted in establishing a good reputation for the university and its professors.<ref>{{harvnb|Cser|2007|p=43}}</ref> Due to the influence of Marsilius, the university initially taught the [[nominalism]] or ''via moderna''. In 1412, both realism and the teachings of [[John Wycliffe]] were forbidden at the university but later, around 1454, the university decided that [[Philosophical realism|realism]] or ''via antique'' would also be taught, thus introducing two parallel ways ({{lang|la|ambae viae}}).<ref name="Gabriel1974">{{harvnb|Gabriel|1974|pages = 459–61}}</ref> The transition from [[Scholasticism|scholastic]] to [[humanistic]] culture was effected by the chancellor and bishop [[Johann von Dalberg]] in the late 15th century. Humanism was represented at Heidelberg University particularly by the founder of the older German Humanistic School [[Rudolph Agricola]], [[Conrad Celtes]], [[Jakob Wimpfeling]], and [[Johann Reuchlin]]. [[Pope Pius II|Æneas Silvius Piccolomini]] was chancellor of the university in his capacity as provost of [[Worms, Germany|Worms]], and later always favored it with his friendship and good-will as [[Pope Pius II]]. In 1482, [[Pope Sixtus IV]] permitted laymen and married men to be appointed professors in the ordinary of medicine through a papal dispensation. In 1553, [[Pope Julius III]] sanctioned the allotment of ecclesiastical benefices to secular professors.<ref name="catholic1">{{cite web|url=http://www.catholic.org/encyclopedia/view.php?id=5611|title=Heidelberg University – Catholic Encyclopedia|access-date=16 May 2008|work=Catholic Online|archive-date=9 September 2017|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170909010059/http://www.catholic.org/encyclopedia/view.php?id=5611|url-status=live}}</ref> === Reformation and modern era === [[Martin Luther]]'s [[Heidelberg Disputation|disputation at Heidelberg in April 1518]] made a lasting impact, and his adherents among the masters and scholars soon became leading [[Protestant Reformation|Reformationists]] in Southwest Germany. With the [[Electorate of the Palatinate]] turn to the Reformed faith, [[Otto Henry, Elector Palatine]], converted the university into a [[calvinism|calvinistic]] institution. In 1563, the [[Heidelberg Catechism]] was created under collaboration of members of the university's divinity school. As the 16th century was passing, the late [[humanism]] stepped beside [[Calvinism]] as a predominant school of thought; and figures like [[Paul Schede]], [[Jan Gruter]], [[Martin Opitz]], and [[Matthäus Merian]] taught at the university. It attracted scholars from all over the continent and developed into a [[culture|cultural]] and [[academia|academic]] center.<ref name="ReferenceB">{{harvnb|Cser|2007|p={{Page needed|date=November 2010}}}}</ref> However, with the beginning of the [[Thirty Years' War]] in 1618, the intellectual and [[revenue|fiscal]] wealth of the university declined. In 1622, the then-world-famous [[Bibliotheca Palatina]] (the library of the university) was stolen from the [[Heiliggeistkirche|University Cathedral]] and taken to Rome. The reconstruction efforts thereafter were defeated by the troops of King [[Louis XIV]], who destroyed Heidelberg in 1693 almost completely.<ref name="histu">{{cite web |url=http://www.uni-heidelberg.de/university/welcome/history.html |title=History of the University |access-date=16 May 2008 |work=Heidelberg University Homepage |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20071219133606/http://www.uni-heidelberg.de/university/welcome/history.html |archive-date=19 December 2007 }}</ref><ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.sino.uni-heidelberg.de/students/tjuelch/Bauwerke%20Altstadt/Peterskirche.htm|title=A history of the Church of St. Peter|access-date=16 May 2008|work=Heidelberg University Homepage|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080102164028/http://www.sino.uni-heidelberg.de/students/tjuelch/Bauwerke%20Altstadt/Peterskirche.htm|archive-date=2 January 2008}}</ref> As a consequence of the late [[Counter-Reformation]], the university lost its Protestant character, and was channeled by [[Jesuits]]. From 1712 to 1728, the Old University was constructed at University Square, then known as Domus Wilhelmina. Through the efforts of the [[Jesuits]] a preparatory seminary was established, the Seminarium ad Carolum Borromæum, whose pupils were also registered in the university. After the suppression of the Jesuit Order, most of the schools they had conducted passed into the hands of the [[Lazarists|French Congregation of Lazarists]] in 1773. They deteriorated from that time forward. Meanwhile, the university itself continued to lose in prestige until the reign of the last elector [[Charles Theodore, Elector Palatine]], who established new chairs for all the faculties, founded scientific institutes such as the Electoral Academy of Science, and transferred the school of [[political economy]] from Kaiserslautern to Heidelberg, where it was combined with the university as the faculty of political economy. He also founded an [[observatory]] in the neighboring city of [[Mannheim]], where Jesuit [[Christian Mayer (astronomer)|Christian Mayer]] labored as director. In connection with the four hundredth anniversary of the university, the elector approved a revised statute book that several professors had been commissioned to prepare. The financial affairs of the university, its receipts and expenditures, were put in order. At that time, the number of students varied from 300 to 400; in the jubilee year, 133 matriculated. As a consequence of the disturbances caused by the [[French Revolution]], and particularly because of the [[Treaty of Lunéville]], the university lost all its property on the left bank of the [[Rhine]], so that its complete dissolution was expected.<ref name=catholic>{{cite Catholic Encyclopedia|wstitle=University of Heidelberg}}</ref> ===19th and early 20th century=== This decline did not stop until 1803, when the university was reestablished as a state-owned institution by [[Karl Friedrich, Grand Duke of Baden]], to whom the part of the Palatinate situated on the right bank of the Rhine was allotted. Since then, the university bears his name together with the name of [[Rupert I, Elector Palatine of the Rhine|Ruprecht I]]. Karl Friedrich divided the university into five faculties and placed himself at its head as rector, as did also his successors. During this decade, [[Romanticism]] found expression in Heidelberg through [[Clemens Brentano]], [[Achim von Arnim]], [[Ludwig Tieck]], [[Joseph Görres]], and [[Joseph von Eichendorff]], and there went forth a revival of the German [[Middle Ages]] in speech, poetry, and art.<ref name="ReferenceB"/> [[File:Heidlbergaula.JPG|left|thumb|The Old Assembly Hall or "Great Hall" was redesigned in 1886 in celebration of the university's quincentenary.]] The German [[Students Association]] exerted great influence, which was at first patriotic and later political. After Romanticism had eventually died out, Heidelberg became a center of Liberalism and the movement in favor of German national unity.<ref name="ReferenceB"/> The historians [[Friedrich Christoph Schlosser]] and [[Georg Gottfried Gervinus]] were the guides of the nation in [[political history]]. The modern scientific schools of medicine and [[natural science]], particularly [[astronomy]], were models in point of construction and equipment, and Heidelberg University was especially noted for its influential law school.<ref name="catholic"/> The university as a whole became the role model for the transformation of American [[liberal arts college]]s into [[research universities]], in particular for the then-newly established [[Johns Hopkins University]].<ref name=atlanticreview>{{cite web|url=http://atlanticreview.org/archives/448-When-German-Universities-Were-Models-for-American-Universities.html|title=When German Universities were Models for American Universities|access-date=10 January 2010|work=atlanticreview.org|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20161219185305/http://atlanticreview.org/archives/448-When-German-Universities-Were-Models-for-American-Universities.html|archive-date=19 December 2016|url-status=dead}}</ref> Heidelberg's professors were important supporters of the [[Vormärz]] revolution and many of them were members of the first freely elected German parliament, the [[Frankfurt Parliament|Frankfurt Parliament of 1848]]. During the late 19th century, the university housed a very liberal and open-minded spirit, which was deliberately fostered by [[Max Weber]], [[Ernst Troeltsch]] and a circle of colleagues around them. In February 1900, the [[Grand Duchy of Baden]] issued a decree that gave women the right to access universities in Baden. Thus, the universities of Freiburg and Heidelberg were the first ones to allow [[Women at German universities|women to study]]. In the [[Weimar Republic]], the university was widely recognized as a center of democratic thinking, coined by professors like [[Karl Jaspers]], [[Gustav Radbruch]], [[Martin Dibelius]] and [[Alfred Weber]].<ref name="ReferenceB"/> Unfortunately, there were also dark forces working within the university: [[Nazism|Nazi]] physicist [[Philipp Lenard]] was head of the physics institute at the time. Following the assassination of the liberal German-Jewish [[Foreign Minister]] [[Walther Rathenau]], he refused to [[half mast]] the national flag on the institute, thereby provoking its storming by [[communist]] students.<ref name="histu"/> [[File:Bundesarchiv B 145 Bild-F079107-0031, Heidelberg, Universität.jpg|thumb|upright|The main entrance of the New University building in 1988, showing the bronze bust of [[Athena]], the Greek goddess of wisdom]] ===Nazi Germany=== {{See also|University education in Nazi Germany}} After the establishment of [[Nazi Germany]] in 1933, the university supported [[Adolf Hitler]] and the [[Nazi]]s like all other German universities at the time. It dismissed a large number of staff and students for political and racial reasons. Many dissident fellows had to emigrate and most Jewish and [[Communist]] professors who did not leave Germany were deported. At least two professors directly fell victim to Nazi terror.<ref>{{harvnb|Wolgast|1986|p=146}}</ref> On 17 May 1933, members of the university faculty and students took part in [[book burning]]s at ''Universitätsplatz'' ('University Square')<ref>{{harvnb|Cser|2007|p=278}}</ref> and Heidelberg eventually became infamous as a [[NSDAP]] university. The inscription above the main entrance of the New University was changed from "The Living Spirit" to "The German Spirit",<ref>{{harvnb|Cser|2007|p=256}}</ref> and many professors paid homage to the new motto. The university was involved in [[Nazi eugenics]]: forced sterilizations were carried out at the women's clinic and the psychiatric clinic, then directed by [[Carl Schneider]], was involved in [[Action T4]] [[Euthanasia]] program.<ref>{{harvnb|Remy|2002|pp=72–3, 107–10}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.medizinische-fakultaet-hd.uni-heidelberg.de/index.php?id=109869&L=en|title=History|work=Medizinische Fakultät Heidelberg|access-date=27 October 2010|archive-date=22 May 2017|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170522052941/http://www.medizinische-fakultaet-hd.uni-heidelberg.de/index.php?id=109869&L=en|url-status=dead}}</ref> The heads of the university helped in the deportation of Jewish men, women and children directly to the gas chambers.{{citation needed|date=May 2022}} After the end of World War II, the university underwent an extensive [[denazification]].{{citation needed|date=March 2025}} ===Federal Republic of Germany=== Since Heidelberg was spared from destruction during World War II, the reconstruction of the university was realized rather quickly. With the foundation of the Collegium Academicum, Heidelberg University became the home of Germany's first and, until today, only self-governed student hall. Newly laid statutes obliged the university to "The Living Spirit of Truth, Justice and Humanity".<ref name="histu"/> During the 1960s and 1970s, the university grew dramatically in size. At this time, it developed into one of the main scenes of the left-wing [[student protests]] in Germany.<ref name="Ruprecht12.7.1995">{{cite web|url=http://mathphys.fsk.uni-heidelberg.de/ruprecht2.html |title=Student protests at Heidelberg |access-date=16 May 2008 |work=Ruprecht online – Heidelberg University Homepage |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090215141632/http://mathphys.fsk.uni-heidelberg.de/ruprecht2.html |archive-date=15 February 2009 }} from ''Ruprecht'', issue 37, 12.07.95</ref> In 1975, a massive police force arrested the entire student parliament [[AStA]]. Shortly thereafter, the building of the Collegium Academicum, a progressive college in immediate vicinity to the university's main grounds, was stormed by over 700 police officers and closed once and for all. On the outskirts of the city, in the Neuenheimer Feld area, a large campus for medicine and [[natural sciences]] was constructed.<ref name="histu"/> Today, about 29,000 students are enrolled for studies at Heidelberg University.<ref name="QS Profile">{{cite web|url=http://www.topuniversities.com/university/heidelberguniversity/|title=QS – Heidelberg University statistics|access-date=2 October 2010|work=QS – Top Universities|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20101005014556/http://www.topuniversities.com/university/heidelberguniversity|archive-date=5 October 2010}}</ref> There are 4,196 full-time faculty, including 476 university professors.<ref name="Eitel1"/> In 2007, and again in 2012, the university was appointed ''[[German Excellence Universities|University of Excellence]]'' under an initiative started by the [[Federal Ministry of Education and Research (Germany)|Federal Ministry of Education and Research]] and the [[Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft|German Research Foundation]]. This enhanced the German university system by establishing a small network of exceptionally well-funded universities, which are expected to generate strong international appeal.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.uni-heidelberg.de/press/news/538e.html|title=Press Releases – Rector Prof. Eitel: "An invaluable opportunity to aim at goals that would otherwise have been unattainable."|access-date=16 May 2008|work=Heidelberg University Homepage|archive-date=6 November 2016|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20161106170015/http://www.uni-heidelberg.de/press/news/538e.html|url-status=live}}</ref> In 2022, [[Heidelberg University shooting|a mass shooting occurred in the university]], killing a woman and injuring three other people. The gunman then committed suicide.<ref>{{Cite web|title=Mutmaßlicher Amoklauf auf Uni-Gelände in Heidelberg: Was wir wissen – und was nicht|trans-title=Suspected killing spree on university grounds in Heidelberg: what we know – and what we don't|url=https://www.swr.de/swraktuell/baden-wuerttemberg/mannheim/polizei-einsatz-heidelberg-neuenheim-100.html|access-date=24 January 2022|website=[[SWR.de]]|language=de|archive-date=15 April 2022|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220415005652/https://www.swr.de/swraktuell/baden-wuerttemberg/mannheim/polizei-einsatz-heidelberg-neuenheim-100.html|url-status=live}}</ref>
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