Louis VI | |
Succession: | Elector Palatine |
Reign: | 26 October 1576 – 22 October 1583 |
Predecessor: | Frederick III |
Successor: | Frederick IV |
House: | Wittelsbach |
Father: | Frederick III, Elector Palatine |
Mother: | Marie of Brandenburg-Kulmbach |
Spouse: | |
Issue: |
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Birth Place: | Simmern |
Death Place: | Heidelberg |
Louis VI, Elector Palatine (4 July 1539 in Simmern - 22 October 1583 in Heidelberg), was an Elector from the Palatinate-Simmern branch of the house of Wittelsbach. He was the first-born son of Frederick III, Elector Palatine and Marie of Brandenburg-Kulmbach.
To learn French, the young prince Ludwig visited the Burgundian University of Dole in 1554. As presumptive heir of the Electorate in the Palatinate, he was already participating in government affairs at the court of Otto Henry, Elector Palatine. Since 1563, he was governor of the Upper Palatinate.
Unlike his father, he gave preference to Lutheranism over Calvinism, replacing Calvinists from positions at the University of Heidelberg. The Calvinist theologians found protection at the court of Prince John Casimir, the brother of Ludwig, in Neustadt an der Weinstrasse and established the "Casimirianum Neustadt". During the Cologne War Louis VI was the only Lutheran imperial prince who stood on the side of Cologne's Elector and Archbishop Gebhard Truchsess von Waldburg. With the Lutheran reorganization of the country Louis adopted a new court constitution, a police constitution and in 1582, a grand country constitution.
Ludwig VI was married twice. First, on 8 July 1560, he married Elisabeth of Hesse (13 February 1539 - 14 March 1582). They had the following children:
Second, he married on 12 July 1583 Countess Anne of Ostfriesland (26 June 1562 - 21 April 1621), but they had no children.