Wilhelm von Humboldt

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The following text was originally published in Prospects:the quarterly review of comparative education

(Paris, UNESCO: International Bureau of Education), vol. XXIII, no. 3/4, 1993, p. 613–23.

©UNESCO:International Bureau of Education, 2000

This document may be reproduced free of charge as long as acknowledgement is made of the source

WILHELM VON HUMBOLDT

(1767-1835)

With his brother, Alexander, who was two years younger, Wilhelm von Humboldt belonged to a

generation which witnessed the collapse of absolute monarchies in the wake of the French Revolution

and helped to shape the construction of a new Europe. The two brothers were both educated in the

spirit of Rousseau and of the philanthropic school; in their youth, they adopted the ideas of the

enlightenment, lived through the Sturm und drang (Storm and stress) period and went on to join the

Weimar circle of poets where they enjoyed the friendship of Schiller and Goethe. While Alexander

travelled the world and guided natural science into new paths, Wilhelm paved the way for the

development of the modern moral sciences.

Wilhelm von Humboldt joined the circle of reformers who took the destiny of the Prussian

State into their own hands after the Napoleonic occupation. The administrative reform is associated

with the names of Stein and Hardenberg and the reform of the armed forces with those of Scharnhorst

and Gneisenau. Wilhelm von Humboldt’s appointed task was to lay the foundations of a new education

system in Prussia. Although he only served for sixteen months at the head of the Prussian educational

administration, his actions gave a fresh impetus to educational policy whose effects have been felt right

down to the present day; his ideas on a modern educational theory have been attracting increasing

attention of late.