General Notes

Frederick I (of Prussia) (1657-1713), first king of Prussia (1701-13), and as
Frederick III, elector of Brandenburg (1688-1701), son of Frederick William,
the Great Elector, born in Königsberg, Prussia (now Kaliningrad, Russia).
Frederick endeavored to establish a court modeled on that of Louis XIV of
France. He wished to secure a royal title for himself, but could not do so as
ruler of Brandenburg, as the title king was forbidden to princes of the Holy
Roman Empire. Prussia, however, which was part of Frederick's domain, lay
outside the empire, and in 1701 Emperor Leopold I recognized Frederick as king
of Prussia in return for his military support in the War of the Spanish
Succession. Frederick crowned himself at Königsberg, expending vast sums of
money on his coronation. Although he depleted the public treasury during his
reign, he undertook some projects beneficial to the welfare of Prussia, such
as the establishment in 1694 of the University of Halle and the founding in
1707 of the Academy of Sciences, Berlin. He patronized scholars, including the
German philosopher and mathematician Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz, and encouraged
persecuted Protestants from other countries to settle in Prussia.