King of Prussia, b. 24 January 1712 (Potsdam, Prussia), d. 17 August 1786 (Potsdam).
Frederick's father, king Frederick William I, was a man of military taste and strict discipline, concerned about the minor role of his kingdom among European powers and dreaming of his own greatness. He held his son's artistic and intellectual interests in bitter contempt and enforced his paternal authority through derogatory public criticism, humiliation and beatings.
In 1730 the 18 year old Frederick hoped to escape from his father's rule by fleeing to France or Holland, assisted by a young officeer, Lieutenant von Kotte. His father learned about the plan and had von Kotte executed, while Frederick was sent to prison. After his release he was stripped of his military rank and ordered to work as a junior administration official.
The next ten years saw Frederick out of his father's eyes but without any official role. After brief military service under Prince Eugene in 1734 he spent his years reading and taking in the modern ideas of the time.
In 1740 his father died and Frederick let everyone at court know at once that from now on all political decisions would be made by him, and only by him. His intention was to make Prussia a member of the great European powers. When the Holy Roman Emperor Charles VI died the same year and Maria Theresia succeeded him on the Austrian throne, he decided to use the opportunity to wrest the wealthy and economically developed province of Sileasia from her. His father's 83,000 troops were in good shape, while Maria Theresia had inherited an army of 160,000 in poor state. The "War of the Austrian Succession" continued with varying success until 1745, when the Treaty of Dresden confirmed Prussian rule over Silesia.
Frederick's success raised anti-Prussian feelings, and during the next ten years Prussia survived only because of constantly shifting alliances against it. The main enemy was a Russian-Austrian alliance, first backed by British money, then by French support. In 1756 Frederick decided to go on the attack himself. His invasion of Saxony and Bohemia started the Seven Year's War, in which Prussia was opposed by Austria, France, Russia, Sweden and many smaller German states.
To survive the war Prussia's army had to be dramatically increased. Frederick forced many peasants into conscription, hired foreign soldiers and financed the war through heavy taxes on the cities. Every year for the seven years of the war he lost more than half of his troops, and at one point he contemplated suicide. His kingdom survived more by errors of his enemies than by own military success. He was rescued from defeat by the death of his most ardent foe, Russia's empress Elizabeth. Her successor Peter III admired Prussia and held Frederick in high regard; he signed an armistice, and Prussia could end the war with the other parties in the Treaty of Hubertusburg of 1763, which made its rule over Silesia final. Saxony and Bohemia had long been abandoned, and Prussia had lost 180,000 men.
Prussia and Russia were now on good terms and entered into an alliance, which lasted from 1764 to 1780. In 1772 the two powers decided to divide Poland between them. Prussia gained the Polish province of West Prussia, thus establishing its final territorial extent.
Of all the European monarchs of the 18th century Frederick the Great is probably the most difficult to judge. His role in history is undisputable; under his leadership Prussia joined the group of great states of Europe. His army, which at the end of his reign had grown to 190,000 men (of whom only 80,000 were Prussian subjects) was held in high regard and became the model for others.
As far as Frederick was concerned this was not an expression of nationalism - he admired French culture and spoke German only if absolutely necessary, preferring French otherwise. It was more a matter of the Prussian ethos of duty, effort and discipline, which he implanted in his subjects, and which became a major trait of one of the political powers of Europe for generations. This ethos found its expression in Frederick's words about his father, who caused him so much suffering:
The puritanical Prussian ethos produced a country with an efficient and honest administration free of corruption, but also nurtured a spirit of militarism and of blind acceptance of orders from above.
As a monarch Frederick the Great stood out from other rulers of his period for his religious tolerance and his support of the ideas of enlightenment. He invited many French intellectuals to Berlin, but the stifling climate of Prussian discipline meant that few took up the offer, and during Frederick's lifetime Berlin did not become an intellectual centre. (Voltaire lived in Berlin for three years but soon fell out with the king.)
Frederick's social policies were equally ambivalent. He abolished judicial torture as soon as he came to power. In 1763 his General-Landschulreglement (General Education Regulations), the most ambitious educational reform of 18th century Europe, introduced universal primary education into all Prussian villages. But its implementation suffered from lack of funds, and Frederick's economic policies stifled rapid growth of state finances. He considered the nobility the pillar of society and banned the granting of titles and the sale of estates to newly-rich bourgeois; and although he abolished serfdom he left the fate of the peasantry to feudal exploitation. His main way to recover from the losses of the Seven Years' War was to attract over 300,000 settlers from all parts of Europe. At the end of his reign one person in seven was not a born Prussian (and often a religious refugee from less tolerant regimes).