Classical education and modern society

There was a time when the classics were by far the most important subject in higher education. The numerous Latin schools and colleges scattered across the European continent in the 16^th, 17^th and 18^th centuries offered extensive education in Roman and, to a lesser extent, Greek literature. At these schools, other topics, such as history or geography, were not taught independently but only insofar as they were relevant to the study of classical texts. The classics were also prominently represented at the artes-faculties of the universities. Moreover, up to the late 18^th century, higher education, apart from centering on classical subjects, as a rule was conducted in Latin.

Until the late 18^th century, the dominance of classical education was practically justified by the unchallenged status of Latin as the universal language of scholarship and the church. Moreover, classical literature was still the fundament of important branches of human knowledge, such as law, medicine and philosophy. Finally, in most European countries, Latin retained its function as a literary language besides the national languages until far into the 18^th century. It was only by the end of the 18^th century that the practical relevance of the classics substantially decreased. Latin gradually ceded its position as academia’s official language to the national tongues and a diligent exploration of new areas of knowledge as well as the flourishing of national literatures marginalised the importance of the classical heritage.¹ Yet despite the weakening of the classics’ practical basis in scholarship, science and literature, throughout the 19^th century European higher education remained invariably cast in the classical mould. The curricula of the English public schools, the French lycées, the Italian ginnasi-licei, as well as the Gymnasien in Germany, Austria-Hungary and Russia were all dominated by the Roman and Greek classics. The same was true of the philosophical faculties of the European universities. Meanwhile, alongside the classical institutions, competing forms of both secondary and academic education emerged, especially in the second half of the 19^th century. The schools offering these new kinds of education, however, for the most part did not acquire a status remotely comparable with that of the classical institutions. Indeed, the classics succeeded in preserving a mighty sway over European education down to the outbreak of the Great War in 1914.²

Thus, the question arises how the continuity of classical education related to its abating practical relevance. How could the ideal of classical education enjoy such wide popularity at a time when both the Latin language and classical literature lost their traditional position in intellectual culture at an ever increasing pace? Of course, it is important not to overestimate the tempo of change. Although Latin lost its monopoly as the language of scholarship, far into the 19^th century scholars were expected to express themselves in Latin on official occasions. Yet despite unmistakable continuities, the marked stability of classical education seems drastically at odds with its evidently decreasing practical relevance in modern society.³

In this book, I will examine the relationship between classical education and modern society as exemplified by Germany, where the opposition between the two was particularly pronounced. On the one hand, the German ‘humanistic Gymnasium,’ as a secularised, state-directed institution, bore a manifestly modern stamp. On the other hand, most of its representatives were outspoken proponents of classical education, which they advocated and promoted with lyrical verve and unrelenting vigour. The humanistic Gymnasium remained firmly rooted in a classical curriculum throughout the 19^th century and functioned as a model for educational reforms in countries as diverse as Italy, Russia and the Netherlands. When it comes to the relationship between classical education and modern society, then, Germany can be seen as a paradigmatic case.

The concept of ‘neohumanism’

Since the late 19^th century, when the tension between the continuity of classical education and modern society was first seen as a problem, scholars have sought to make clear that despite its traditional appearance, the ideal of classical education pursued in the late 18^th and 19^th centuries was unmistakably a response to its own time. In his magisterial Geschichte des gelehrten Unterrichts auf den deutschen Schulen und Universitäten (1885), Friedrich Paulsen demonstrated that two of the most ardent champions of classical education, Friedrich August Wolf (1759 – 1824) and Wilhelm von Humboldt (1767 – 1835), advocated the study of classical literature in a distinctly modern way.⁴ Wolf, Paulsen pointed out, was fully aware that the importance of classical literature to modern science had substantially decreased and that Latin had lost its monopoly as the language of scholarship.⁵ Therefore, the practical ideal of imitation, which was the essence of “the older humanism,”⁶ in his view was no longer useful.⁷ Instead, classical studies should be conducted solely because of “their own, absolute value,”⁸ which both Wolf and Humboldt found, not in Roman culture – which had been the main focus of classical education in the past – but in Greek culture. In ancient Greece, and only in ancient Greece, they believed they beheld “the exemplary representation of the Idea of man.”⁹ By gathering a thorough historical knowledge of Greek antiquity, they contended, students enabled themselves to penetrate into the very nature of mankind and thus to acquire “self-knowledge and self-education (Selbstbildung).”¹⁰ In Wolf’s and Humboldt’s ideal of education, the traditional focus on the classical languages did not disappear, but these languages were understood in a distinctly different way. Whereas traditional education chiefly focused on the imitation of stylistic models, the classical languages were now philosophically understood as “the first artistic creations of the human mind [which] contain the entire supply of general ideas and of forms of [human] thought.”¹¹ With Wolf and Humboldt, then, the traditional, Latin-oriented ideal of practical imitation was replaced by a new, Greek-oriented ideal of historical contemplation. It was because of this innovative outlook, that Paulsen named Wolf’s and Humboldt’s ideal of classical education ‘neohumanism’ (Neuhumanismus), thereby coining this term.¹²

Paulsen emphasised that the transformation of humanism into ‘neohumanism’ correlated with the transformation of German society. Not only did the old practice of imitation no longer make sense at a time when the influence of Latin had substantially decreased, but confronting young people with the ideal image of Greek mankind seemed of particular importance to Wolf and Humboldt in an age “that paid more attention to things than to people (…) and focused more on outer values and usefulness than on inner content.”¹³ Wolf’s and Humboldt’s ideal of classical education, then, arose from dissatisfaction with the utilitarian tendency of their time, which they aimed to counterbalance with the historical study of a bygone but ideal civilisation. According to Paulsen, ‘neohumanism’ should primarily be understood as a critical response to the rise of modern society.

The concept of ‘neohumanism’ was widely adopted by later historians of education and acquired a firm place in the terminology of educational historiography.¹⁴ Especially after the Second World War, scholars have sought to further expose the modern foundations of Wolf’s and Humboldt’s educational ideal. For example, Humboldt expected classical education to contribute to cultivating values that were of particular importance to modern society. He deemed the study of Greek literature preeminently suited to achieving “the highest and most proportionate formation (Bildung) of man to a whole.”¹⁵ Calling freedom “the first and indispensable condition” of humanistic education,¹⁶ he aimed to develop a unified school system that would “make the meanest day labourer and the most finely cultivated man (…) like-minded.”¹⁷ In other words, Humboldt expected classical education to contribute to the making of a new society that would be grounded in the typically modern values of individuality, freedom and equality.¹⁸ In other words, on the prevailing view, early 19^th-century humanism gave the appearance of continuity, but was in fact an attempt to adapt the study of classical antiquity to distinctly modern needs.¹⁹ “Neohumanism,” we read in the Historisches Wörterbuch der Philosophie, “while sharing with Renaissance humanism the love of classical antiquity, differs from it by its philosophical depth, by the longing for ancient Greece (Griechensehnsucht) sprung from dissatisfaction with one’s own time, as well as by a new, anthropologically founded conception of literary, aesthetic and historical Bildung.”²⁰ Yet the sheer currency of the concept of ‘neohumanism’ allows us to easily overlook the fact that it was wholly unknown to the people to whom it refers. It is a telling fact that only shortly before the term ‘neohumanism’ was coined in 1885, classical education was seen in a very different light. In his history of the Gelehrtenschulwesen published in 1860, for instance, the classical philologist Friedrich Lübker described the late 18^th- and early 19^th-century reevaluation of classical studies as a “newly revived humanism” (neu belebter Humanismus); that is, as a revival of the ideal of education that had been propagated by the great Renaissance humanists.²¹ Some decades earlier, Benjamin Otto, a declared opponent of classical education, denounced the enormous enthusiasm of many schoolteachers for Latin education as the continuation of a “four-hundred-year-old prejudice.”²² Even after Paulsen, the concept of ‘neohumanism’ for a long time was not as established as it is today. Richard Needon, for example, in his history of the Gymnasium of Bautzen written in 1927, described the entire period from 1790 to 1895, when the classics were taught with particular zeal, as the era of “old humanism” (Althumanismus).²³ The fact that for a very long time, 19^th-century humanism was not yet seen as particularly ‘modern,’ but on the contrary as the continuation of an age-old tradition raises serious questions as to the validity of the current concept of ‘neohumanism.’ Is this concept, with its emphasis on innovation, truly suitable to describe the educational ideal embraced by late 18^th- and early 19^th-century classicists? Or must the ‘neohumanistic’ theory of Bildung that has been discussed above be distinguished from other, more traditional forms of humanism?

‘Neohumanism’ versus classical humanism

The common view of the displacement of a traditional humanism by ‘neohumanism’ is chiefly based on the example of academic philologists, such as Friedrich August Wolf, Friedrich Creuzer (1771 – 1858) and August Böckh (1785 – 1867), as well as on the example of the utopian pedagogues who were the driving force behind the foundation of the University of Berlin in 1810, above all Wilhelm von Humboldt and Johann Gottlieb Fichte (1762 – 1814). These scholars decisively contributed to the gradual transformation of classical studies into a professional, academic discipline (commonly known as ‘Altertumswissenschaft’) that would in turn be of pioneering importance to the genesis of the modern research university. ‘Neohumanism’ is best described as the educational philosophy that accompanied this momentous transformation of classical scholarship, which has attracted enormous scholarly interest in recent decades.²⁴ Yet it is a pressing question how the ‘neohumanistic’ ideal of education endorsed by 19^th-century academic philologists related to the practice of Gymnasium education. Which reasons do we have to believe that ‘neohumanism’ as represented by the above group of well-known educationalists made its entry into the schools? Most frequently mentioned as signaling the introduction of ‘neohumanism’ into the Gymnasien is the increased importance of classical Greek, which has been called the “external indicator of the entry of neohumanism.”²⁵ At the ‘neohumanistic ’ Gymnasium classical Greek was much more prominently represented than it was in the past. This can already be observed in the late 18^th century, when at some schools Greek literature was studied with great zeal.²⁶ With the Prussian reforms of 1809 – 1819, the requirements for ancient Greek were pitched exceptionally high. A Prussian examination regulation of 1812 decreed that “the examinandus [should] be capable of understanding, even without previous preparation, Attic prose, (…) the simpler dialogues of Sophocles and Euripides, next to Homer; of explaining a non-critically difficult choral [ode] and of producing a (…) translation from German into Greek without violating grammar or accent (!) [rules].”²⁷ In the school plan of the same year, the Greek-Latin ratio was set at 2:3, which was unusually high at the time.²⁸ Also in the Vormärz period, when the greatest upsurge of Hellenophilia was well past and even the Prussian government weakened its requirements,²⁹ Greek preserved a significantly larger share in the curriculum than had been common in the past. At most schools, this situation would remain unchanged in the late 19^th century.³⁰

However, despite its consolidated curricular position, classical Greek was hardly ever assigned sufficient scope as to make the curriculum truly correspond to Wolf’s and Humboldt’s conviction that true Bildung can only be acquired by studying the Greeks and that “the Romans do not provide desirable material for (…) study.”³¹ Only at a very small number of schools, educationalists temporarily experimented with giving Greek actual precedence over Latin.³² At most Gymnasien, however, even in the Prussian reform era (1809 – 1819), Greek was credited with substantially fewer weekly hours than Latin, a subordination that was only to be reinforced in Vormärz. Moreover, the broad historical perspective on the ancient world characteristic of the ‘neohumanistic’ view of classical education hardly ever gained a foothold at the schools. Throughout the century, Gymnasium education retained its primary focus on a select body of exemplary texts, which students approached as sources from which to borrow rhetorical and moral flourishes.

The largely traditional character of classical Gymnasium education raises serious doubts as to the validity of the common view of the replacement of a traditional humanism by ‘neohumanism.’ As the ‘neohumanistic’ theory of education was manifestly based upon giving priority to Greek over Roman culture, it seems hard to understand why even in the greatest heyday of German Hellenophilia, there was hardly any school to adopt an evidently ‘neohumanistic’ curriculum. Most scholars explain this discrepancy by pointing out that classical education was plagued by a tragic gulf between a lofty humanistic ideal and a sluggish, inert practice. On the common account, the early 19^th century was characterised by “an ever increasing tension between the high-pitched humanistic claim” and a “dusty educational reality” that failed to respond to it.³³ “The strong emphasis on Latin [in practice],” as has recently been stated, “entered into an almost absurd contrast with the (…) pronounced predilection of the Germans for the Greeks.”³⁴ Correspondingly, the heyday of 19^th-century humanism is commonly seen to virtually coincide with the Prussian reform era, when Greek was at the peak of its popularity. Ever since Paulsen described the school plan of 1812 as the “constitutive document of the new Gymnasium,”³⁵ most scholars have analysed the entire history of classical education in the late 18^th and early 19^th centuries in light of the Prussian reforms. Paulsen’s student Eduard Spranger (1882 –1963) described the revived interest in Greek culture in the late 18^th century as a “preparatory” phase of ‘neohumanism’ that pointed forward to its early 19^th-century “heyday.” Spranger described the decades following the Prussian reforms as the “mature” phase of ‘neohumanism,’ a period in which the juvenile enthusiasm of the preceding period fell prey to gradual decline.³⁶ This heyday/decline paradigm has dominated the historiography of the German Gymnasium ever since. The decreasing popularity of Greek from the 1830s onwards is usually interpreted as the dramatic failure of the august humanistic ideals that Wolf and Humboldt had put forward with such high expectations two decades earlier. Thus, it has been stated that at the Vormärz Gymnasium, “the subjects that Humboldt had in mind [were] nominally maintained, but had nothing in common any more with the humanistic theory of Bildung from which they originally emerged.”³⁷ The Vormärz Gymnasium effectuated a “relapse into the pre-reformatory state of knowledge,” which “wasted” the Prussian Gymnasium’s “lead with regard to modernity (Modernitätsvorsprung).”³⁸ This very widespread view of the failure of ‘neohumanistic’ ideals to take root in a slothful, Latin-based practice rests on an assumption that I deem worth bringing out with full precision. The underlying reasoning is this: in the 19^th century, classical education was justified on ‘neohumanistic’ grounds. In other words, 19^th-century humanism equals ‘neohumanism. ’ The ‘neohumanistic’ theory of education aims at historical understanding of the ancient world and prioritises the study of Greek over the study of Latin. Therefore, humanism can only be found where Greek is studied with exceptional ardour and where the old-fashioned imitation of rhetorical and moral examples is displaced from the centre of educational practice. Conversely, wherever this is not the case, there can be no humanism. Thus, the fact that traditional Latin education retained its dominance at the large majority of schools throughout the period in question proves the failed implementation of humanistic ideals in practice. This common view, which denies 19^th-century classical education a claim to humanistic values as soon as it does not correspond to the specific ‘neohumanistic’ ideals set forth by scholars like Wolf and Humboldt, is radically at odds with the facts. It was not exceptional figures like Wolf and Humboldt who gave concrete substance to classical education, but a very large group of local headmasters and ordinary teachers of much lesser fame. Throughout the period under consideration, the large majority of these “practical schoolteachers” (praktische Schulmänner), as they were called at the time, defended classical education in markedly traditional terms. Let us take the examples of Johann Georg Purmann (1733 – 1813), who taught classical literature from 1756 to 1806, from 1770 as headmaster of the Frankfurt Gymnasium; and Karl Gottfried Siebelis (1769 – 1843), who worked as a classics teacher from 1798 to 1841, from 1804 as headmaster of the Gymnasium in Bautzen (Saxony). The professional activity of these two practical schoolteachers spanned the entire period of ‘neohumanism: ’ its early phase, its heyday, as well as its decline. When we study their writings, we notice that their ideas on classical education substantially deviated from the ‘neohumanistic’ theory set forth by Wolf and Humboldt.³⁹ Firstly, although both Purmann and Siebelis, like most of their contemporaries, had a very high opinion of Greek literature and theoretically acknowledged the unique character of the ancient Greeks,⁴⁰ it was to Latin that they devoted themselves with most ardour. Not only did Latin occupy a considerably larger curricular share than Greek at the schools they directed, but moreover, they were known as accomplished Latin stylists, who produced Latin treatises, poems and speeches in great numbers throughout their lives.⁴¹ Secondly, in justifying classical education, Purmann and Siebelis made no essential distinction between Latin and Greek. They recommended the study of both Greek and Roman literature for its capacity to cultivate “humanness” (Humanität). By entering into a dialogue with the great authors of the past, they believed one could become a better person and refine one’s sense of beauty and morality. Thirdly, both teachers insisted that classical education not only focus on the interpretation of classical texts, but also on the acquisition of eloquence. They were firmly convinced that students could refine and ennoble their human nature by imitating the classical models. Purmann’s and Siebelis’ ideal of classical education, then, wholly lacked the typically ‘neohumanistic’ prioritisation of Greek over Latin. In their writings, there is hardly any trace of the exalted adoration of Greek culture or the abstract philosophy of language characteristic of ‘neohumanism.’ Yet, although Purmann’s and Siebelis’ ideal of education can hardly be called ‘neohumanistic, ’ it was emphatically humanistic. A single glance at their writings suffices to see that the ideal of Humanität was at the forefront of their minds. They recommended above all the study of classical, particularly Latin literature, because they expected it to contribute to refining our characteristically human features. Thus, there is simply no reason to assume that Purmann’s and Siebelis’ adherence to Latin-dominated curricula was caused by an inert reluctance to keep pace with the rise of ‘neohumanism.’ Both Purmann and Siebelis subscribed to a form of humanism that was distinctly more traditional than that propagated by their well-known ‘neohumanistic’ colleagues. Since this form of humanism was in fact very similar to that of their great Renaissance forerunners – whose sayings they addressed with telling regularity in their writings – it is best described not as ‘neo-’ but as ‘classical humanism.’⁴²

It is also important to note the striking similarity of the ideals of classical education set forth by Purmann and Siebelis. Although one could point to minor shifts of emphasis,⁴³ the core arguments in favour of classical education are precisely the same. Educational practice, as far as this can be judged from the available sources, also seems to have remained largely unchanged.⁴⁴ Since the professional activity of both men spanned nearly a full century, the ideal of classical education in this period seems not only to have been traditional, but remarkably constant as well. It is justifiable to presume, then, that in the historiography of classical education, disproportionate attention has been paid to the ‘neohumanistic’ theory of education that was closely correlated with the emergence of classical studies as a professional, academic discipline. It seems to have been largely neglected that to most practical schoolteachers, this complex, philosophical theory of education was only of marginal importance.⁴⁵

The paradigm of modernity

Before setting out how I will attempt in this book to discuss the ideal of classical education as conceived and transmitted by practical schoolteachers, it is worth considering that the pivotal significance commonly assigned to ‘neohumanism’ originates from a marked tendency among modern scholars to look upon classical education from the perspective of modernity. The late 18^th and early 19^th centuries are nowadays widely considered to be characterised by the rise of the professional middle class, the genesis of liberal civil society and the emergence of the modern bureaucratic state. Classical education is also mostly studied from these perspectives. Wolf’s ‘neohumanistic’ attempt to defend Greek education as an absolute value in itself should be seen against the background of an unprecedented occupational differentiation that made classical education seem useless to increasing numbers of professionals. Humboldt’s ideal of making classical education contribute to the cultivation of individuality, freedom, and equality points forward to modern liberal society in more than one respect. Finally, the gradual decline of the ‘neohumanistic’ ideal from the 1830s onwards is closely connected to the transformation of the humanistic Gymnasium into a training ground for officials of the modern bureaucratic state. The predominant attention paid to ‘neohumanism,’ then, points to the underlying aim of exposing classical education’s interrelation with the genesis of modern society.⁴⁶ The current tendency to look upon the late 18^th and 19^th centuries chiefly from a perspective of modernity is found among historians of widely different signature and has been frequently observed by theorists of historiography, most notably by Arno Mayer in The Persistence of the Old Regime (1981). In this book, Mayer demonstrates that the innovatory forces in 19^th-century European society were not nearly as omnipotent as is commonly assumed. “For too long,” Mayer writes, “historians have focused excessively on the advance of science and technology, of industrial and world capitalism, of the bourgeoisie and professional middle class, of liberal civil society, of democratic political society, and of cultural modernism. They have been far more preoccupied with these forces of innovation and the making of the new society than with the forces of inertia and resistance that slowed the waning of the old order.”⁴⁷ In his book, Mayer demonstrates in great detail that in all major respects – economics, politics, culture, world-view –19^th-century Europe remained pervaded by the hierarchic power structures inherited from the anciens régimes and by corresponding nobilitarian modes of thought. As Mayer argues, the fundamental problem with the common approach to the 19^th century is that it fails to acknowledge the actual strength and resilience of the omnipresent forces of historical perseverance. By an exclusive focus on the making of the new society, these forces of perseverance are either seen as unimportant relics of a dying past, or as delaying, deranging and complicating the inevitable advance of modern society.⁴⁸ Such a view might easily lead to a skewed reading of history, since, as Mayer puts it, “the ‘premodern’ elements [in 19^th-century society] were not the decaying and fragile remnants of an all but vanished past, but the very essence of Europe’s incumbent civil and political societies.”⁴⁹

Mayer’s viewpoint can well be applied to the historiography of classical education. For the striking focus on the innovatory features of 18^th- and 19^th-century humanism is paralleled by an equally striking neglect of, or indifference to, its traditional features. The making of modern society is generally considered of such overriding importance that the entire history of classical education is usually understood from this perspective. Nothing proves this better than the fact that the continued predominance of traditional Latin education, if deemed worth mentioning at all, is nearly always interpreted as proving the failure of progressive, ‘neohumanistic’ ideals. It is hardly ever recognised that continuing the tradition of Latin education is precisely what most humanists sought to do.⁵⁰

Structure and method

In this book I intend to discuss the ideal of classical education propagated and transmitted by practical schoolteachers in the period 1770 – 1860. Since I have found this ideal of education to have been strikingly continuous throughout this period, I will introduce this topic on the basis of a case study. The first part of my book highlights the ideal of classical education propagated by Karl Gottfried Siebelis (1769 – 1843), whom we have already met. Siebelis’ ideal of classical education can be seen as an ‘ideal type’ of humanism that was broadly representative for the period in question. Since it was emphatically conceived as a continuation of Renaissance humanism, I choose not to describe it as ‘neo-‘ but rather as classical humanism.

In the second part of my book I will investigate how this classical-humanistic ideal of education was challenged by a number of major intellectual and social developments: the rise of a new concept of ‘science,’ the rise of the Bürgerschule and the rise of Christian critique on the alleged pagan character of the humanistic Gymnasien. I will argue that these developments are best understood, not as being opposed to classical humanism, but as tending to stretch its boundaries. In the course of the period in question, various new perspectives on classical studies were incorporated into the classical-humanistic ideal of education. As I will argue, it was above all by its marked adaptability that classical humanism succeeded in securing its survival far into the 19^th century.

Since my focus is on an ‘ideal type’ of classical humanism as represented by average schoolteachers, I have avoided attaching primary importance to the handful of well-known and easily available writings by exceptional figures such as Wolf and Humboldt. Instead, I have primarily focused on other sources: the numerous locally published speeches, school programs, essays and pamphlets written by regional schoolteachers, often addressing a restricted, local readership. As a rule, such texts, directed as they were towards sympathetic audiences, attracted little opposition, which is why they frequently and rapidly fell into oblivion. However, it is not despite, but because of their obscurity that such texts are valuable to us. The very fact that they usually went unopposed might be taken as evidence that their content was widely shared. I have also amply drawn on articles on classical education published in journals, magazines and daily newspapers. Secondly, I have deliberately avoided focusing primarily on Prussia in general and the Prussian reform era in particular, as most scholars before me have done. As Manfred Landfester has shown, the public debate on classical education was an emphatically “pan-German phenomenon.”⁵¹ Not only were the debates conducted far beyond state boundaries, but moreover, there was a lively movement of classical humanists across Germany, especially in the 19^th century. In view of this pan-German character, I have drawn from texts from widely different provenance: Northern and Southern, urban and regional, Catholic and Protestant, etc.

Thirdly, since my aim was to construct an average ideal of classical education, it was of particular importance to consult a large number of primary sources. Thus, my account is based on a corpus of roughly 450 primary texts, most of which date from 1770 to 1860. Yet I have restricted myself in three ways: firstly, since my goal is to describe the public opinion about classical education, I have mainly drawn on published sources. Secondly, I focus on Gymnasium instead of university education for the following reason: up to the 19^th century, providing classical-humanistic education was the task both of what we now call secondary schools and of the artes-faculties of the universities. Although the philosophical faculty of the German universities did not officially abandon this function, from the early 19^th century onwards it was an increasingly ambivalent place as it offered scope for the professionalisation of classical scholarship that, as we will see, posed a serious challenge to the humanistic ideal of classical education. For the scholar interested in classical humanism, the philosophical faculty is therefore not the best place to look. My focus will therefore be mainly on the Gymnasien.

Finally, although classical humanism dominated German education right down to the Great War, I confine myself in this book to the period of its greatest heyday: c. 1770 – 1860. By the end of the 19^th century, an extensive network of Realschulen and Bürgerschulen had evolved alongside the humanistic Gymnasien and had broken the latter’s monopoly on university access for at least a select number of studies. Besides, a large array of technische Hochschulen provided professional instruction in the applied sciences and in engineering, topics consciously shunned by the humanistically oriented universities. Above all, in the wake of the German unification, the greatest upsurge of classical enthusiasm had passed. Emperor Wilhelm II famously stated that he wanted “to educate national young Germans, and not Greeks or Romans.”⁵² Besides, the arena was entered by people who openly declared education in the natural sciences to be superior to classical education.⁵³ By the 1900s, then, the classics’ traditional supremacy was at least seriously contested. I therefore focus on the period in which downright hostile voices as those mentioned above were still very rarely heard.