Editing Frederick the Great (section)

== Inheritance ==
[[File:Europe 1740 en.jpg|thumb|upright=1.35|alt=Political map of Europe in 1740|Europe at the time when Frederick came to the throne in 1740, with Brandenburg–Prussia in violet]]
[[File:Europe 1783-1792 en.jpg|thumb|upright=1.35|alt=Political map of Europe in 1786|Europe at the time of Frederick's death in 1786. Prussia's territory has been greatly extended by his [[Silesian Wars]], his inheritance of [[East Frisia]] and the [[First Partition of Poland]].]]
Frederick was twenty-eight years old when his father died and he ascended to the throne of Prussia.{{sfn|Luvaas|1966|p=[https://archive.org/details/frederickgreaton00fred/page/3 3]}} Frederick William&nbsp;I had left him with a highly militarised state. Prussia was the twelfth largest country in Europe in terms of population, but its army was the fourth largest, after France, [[Russian Empire#Eighteenth Century|Russia]] and Austria.{{sfn|Ergang|1941|p=[{{Google books|id=_xkkDwAAQBAJ|pg=PT73|plainurl=yes}} 38]}} Prussia had one soldier for every 28 citizens, whereas Britain only had one for every 310, and the military absorbed 86% of Prussia's state budget.{{sfn|Sontheimer|2016|pp=[https://web.archive.org/web/20180712115258/https://magazin.spiegel.de/EpubDelivery/spiegel/pdf/145028581 106–107]|ps=: {{lang|de|Bei der Thronbesteigung von Friedrich II. kam in Preußen auf 28 Bewohner ein Soldat, in Großbritannien auf 310. Da Preußen nur 2,24 Millionen Bewohner hatte, war die Armee mit 80000 Mann noch relativ klein, verschlang aber 86 Prozent des Staatshaushalts.}} [Upon Frederick II's accession to the throne Prussia had one soldier for every 28 inhabitants, Great Britain for every 310. Since Prussia had only 2.24 million residents the army was still relatively small with 80,000 men, but devoured 86% of the state budget.]}} The Prussian infantry trained by Frederick William I were, at the time of Frederick's accession, arguably unrivalled in discipline and firepower. By 1770, Frederick had doubled the size of the huge army he had inherited. The situation is summed up in a widely translated and quoted aphorism attributed to [[Victor de Riqueti, marquis de Mirabeau|Mirabeau]], who asserted in 1786 that "{{lang|fr|La Prusse n'est pas un pays qui a une armée, c'est une armée qui a un pays}}"{{sfn|Baron|2015}} ("Prussia is not a state that has an army, but an army that has a state").{{sfn|Billows|1995|p=[{{Google books|id=BOzcFqoMZlMC|page=PA17|plainurl=yes}} 17]}} Using the resources his frugal father had cultivated, Frederick was eventually able to establish Prussia as the fifth and smallest European [[great power]].{{sfn|Longman|1899|p=[https://archive.org/details/frederickgreata00unkngoog/page/n38 19]}}

When Frederick ascended the throne as the third "King in Prussia" in 1740, his realm consisted of scattered territories, including [[Duchy of Cleves|Cleves]], [[County of Mark|Mark]], and [[County of Ravensberg|Ravensberg]] in the west of the Holy Roman Empire; [[Margraviate of Brandenburg|Brandenburg]], [[Vorpommern|Hither Pomerania]], and [[Farther Pomerania]] in the east of the Empire; and the Kingdom of Prussia, the former [[Duchy of Prussia]], outside of the Empire bordering the [[Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth]]. He was titled ''King in Prussia'' because his kingdom included only part of historic Prussia; he was to declare himself ''King of Prussia'' after the [[First Partition of Poland]] in 1772.{{sfn|Kugler|1840|pp=[https://archive.org/details/pictorialhistor00menzgoog/page/n562 544–545]}}