List of people from Königsberg

The following is a list of people associated with the former city of Königsberg (Duchy of Prussia, Kingdom of Prussia, Germany) which was renamed to Kaliningrad, Soviet Union in 1946.

Writing & Public thinking[]

Immanuel Kant, 1763

E. T. A. Hoffmann, pre-1822

Agnes Miegel monument

• Stanislovas Rapalionis (1485–1545), at Königsberg Albertina University first translator of the Bible into Lithuanian
• Abraomas Kulvietis (1509–1545), religious reformer at Königsberg Albertina University
• Stanisław Murzynowski (c.1527–1553), Polish writer, translator and a Lutheran activist during the Protestant Reformation.
• Caspar Schütz (c.1540 Eisleben – 1594 Danzig), historian at Königsberg and Danzig, interest in the history of Prussia.
• Martynas Mažvydas (1510–1563), priest, writer and translator
• Jan Kochanowski (1530 in Sycyna – 1584) Polish poet, attended the University of Königsberg after 1547 ^[1]
• Frederick I of Prussia (1657–1713), Elector of Brandenburg & Duke of Prussia ^[2]
• Immanuel Kant (1724–1804), philosopher ^[3]
• Johann Georg Hamann (1730–1788), philosopher ^[4]
• E. T. A. Hoffmann (1776–1822), author ^[5]
• Wincenty Pol (1807 in Lublin – 1872) Polish poet; was interned in Königsberg after the fall of the November Uprising in Russian partition of Poland.
• Abraham Mapu (1808–1867), Hebrew novelist ^[6]
• Ferdinand Nesselmann (1811 Fürstenau – 1881 Königsberg), mathematician, historian, orientalist and philologist
• Fanny Lewald (1811–1889), feminist and author ^[7]
• August Wilhelm Zumpt (1815–1877) a German classical scholar ^[8]
• Emma Goldman (1869–1940), author and political theorist
• Friedrich Radszuweit (1876–1932), author and publisher
• Agnes Miegel (1879–1964), author
• Walter Liebenthal (1886–1982), sinologist and philosopher
• Hannah Arendt (1906–1975), political theorist and philosopher
• Leah Goldberg (1911–1970), Israeli poet
• Annemarie Bostroem (1922-2015), author
• Hans-Joachim Newiger, (1925–2011), philologist
• Leah Rabin (née Schloßberg) (1928–2000), author and wife of Yitzhak Rabin

Scientists[]

Johann Friedrich Dieffenbach, 1840

Gustav Robert Kirchhoff

• Johann Bartsch (1709–1738), physician, botanist, and collaborator with Carl Linnaeus
• Karl Gottfried Hagen (1749–1829), chemist, opened first German chemistry lab at Königsberg's Albertina University
• Johann Friedrich Dieffenbach (1792–1847), surgeon ^[9]
• Gotthilf Hagen (1797–1884), physicist, contributed to fluid dynamics
• Philipp Johann Ferdinand Schur (1799–1878) a German-Austrian pharmacist and botanist
• Adolph Eduard Grube (1812–1880), zoologist
• Hermann August Hagen (1817–1893) Cambridge, U.S., German entomologist
• Gustav Kirchhoff (1824–1887), physicist and spectroscopist^[10]
• Karl Rudolf König (1832–1901), physicist ^[11]
• Franz Ernst Christian Neumann (1834–1918), pathologist
• Emanuel Kayser (1845–1927) geologist and palaeontologist ^[12]
• Ernst Hugo Heinrich Pfitzer (1846–1906), botanist
• Otto Wallach (1847–1931), chemist, recipient of the 1910 Nobel Prize in Chemistry
• Erich von Drygalski (1865–1949) geographer, geophysicist and polar scientist
• Siegfried Passarge (1866–1958), geographer
• Arnold Sommerfeld (1868–1951), physicist, pioneered atomic and quantum physics
• Friedrich Adolf Paneth (1887–1958), chemist
• Hermann Eichhorst (1849–1921), physician
• Max Wien (1866–1938), physicist
• Fritz Albert Lipmann (1899–1986), biochemist, shared the 1953 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine

Mathematicians[]

• Christian Goldbach (1690–1764), mathematician, developed Goldbach's conjecture
• Otto Hesse (1811–1874), mathematician, worked on algebraic invariants
• Carl Neumann (1832–1925), mathematician, worked on the Dirichlet principle
• Rudolf Lipschitz (1832–1903), mathematician, named the Lipschitz continuity condition
• Alfred Clebsch (1833–1872), mathematician, contributed to algebraic geometry
• Ludwig Scheeffer (1859–1885), mathematician, contributed to calculus
• Kurt Hensel (1861–1941) mathematician, introduced p-adic number
• David Hilbert (1862–1943), mathematician, developed invariant theory
• Hermann Minkowski (1864–1909), mathematician, developed the geometry of numbers

Arts and Music[]

Otto Nicolai, 1842

Veruschka Gräfin von Lehndorff, 2011

• Anton Möller (c.1563–1611), painter active mostly in Danzig (Gdańsk)
• August Kohn (1732–c.1801/2), violinist and composer active at the royal and margravial courts in Berlin
• Otto Nicolai (1810–1849), composer and conductor ^[13]
• Rudolf Siemering (1835–1905) German sculptor ^[14]
• Pavel Pabst (1854–1897), pianist/composer and professor at the Moscow Conservatory
• Käthe Kollwitz (1867–1945), painter and sculptor
• Ernst Behmer (1875–1938) a prolific German stage and film actor ^[15]
• Werner Funck (1881–1951), actor, singer, and film director ^[16]
• Harry Liedtke (1882–1945), actor
• Heinz Tiessen (1887–1971), composer
• Emy von Stetten (1898–1980), soprano
• Max Colpet (1905–1998), popular song lyricist ^[17]
• Michael Wieck (1928–2021), musician and author
• Veruschka von Lehndorff (born 1939), model, actress and artist ^[18]
• Eberhard Feltz (born 1937), German classical violinist
• Wilfried Gruhn (born 1939), German violinist, musicologist, music educator and emeritus professor

Military[]

Peter August, Duke of Schleswig-Holstein-Sonderburg-Beck

• Erhard Ernst von Röder (1665–1743), Prussian field marshal
• Peter August, Duke of Schleswig-Holstein-Sonderburg-Beck (1697–1775) Field Marshal in the Russian Imperial Army
• Friedrich von der Trenck (1726–1794), Prussian officer and adventurer
• Leopold von Rauch (1787-1860), Prussiand general
• Prince Albert of Prussia (1809–1872) Generaloberst
• Hans Feige, (1880–1953), Wehrmacht general
• Oskar von Hindenburg (1883–1960) a German Generalleutnant
• Wolff von Stutterheim (1893–1940) a German Generalmajor
• Werner Ostendorff (1903–1945), German SS Major General (Gruppenführer) of the 2nd SS Panzer Division Das Reich
• Gerhard Barkhorn (1919–1983), second-highest-ranking Luftwaffe fighter ace (301 victories).

Politicians[]

Eduard von Simson, ca.1870

Philipp zu Eulenburg, 1895

• Johann Jacoby (1805–1877), politician
• Eduard von Simson (1810–1899), jurist and politician ^[19]
• Philipp, Prince of Eulenburg (1847–1921) diplomat and close friend of Wilhelm II ^[20]
• Otto Braun, (1872–1955), statesman and politician, Minister President of Prussia
• Carl Friedrich Goerdeler (1884–1945), a monarchist conservative politician
• Wilhelm von Gayl (1879–1945), politician of the German National People's Party
• Karl-Hermann Flach (1929–1973) journalist at the Frankfurter Rundschau and FDP politician

Sport[]

• Eugen Sandow (1867–1925), first modern bodybuilder ^[21]
• Lilli Henoch (1899–1942), world record holder in the discus, shot put, and 4 × 100 meters relay, shot as a Jew by a Nazi Einsatzgruppen death squad
• brothers Kraft Schepke (born 1934) & Frank Schepke (1935–2017) German Olympic rowers

Others[]

• Kurt Van Riesen 1904-1958

Emigrated from Konigsberg in 1927 to San Francisco, California, U.S.A. Owned and operated “Van’s Bakery” in San Lorenzo, California.

• brothers Bruno Taut (1880–1938) & Max Taut (1884–1967), architects
• Moshe Smoira (1888–1961), first President of the Supreme Court of Israel
• Ehrenfried Günther Freiherr von Hünefeld (1892–1929) aviator, made the first east-west transatlantic flight in 1928
• Rabbi Josef Hirsch Dunner (1913–2007), Chief Rabbi of East Prussia 1936-1938
• Immanuel Jakobovits, Baron Jakobovits (1921–1999) Chief Rabbi of the United Hebrew Congregations of the Commonwealth, from 1967 to 1991
• Ulrich Schnaft (born 1923) Waffen-SS man in WWII, emigrated to Israel where he spied for Egypt
• Gerda Munsinger (1929–1998) an East German prostitute and alleged Soviet spy
• Thomas Eichelbaum (1931–2018), former Chief Justice of New Zealand
• Heinrich August Winkler (born 1938), historian, academic and author
• Reinhard Bonnke (1940–2019), televangelist, missionary in Africa from 1967

See also[]

• List of Poles from Königsberg

References[]