O

Otto Friedrich Ludwig of Wittelsbach

later Otto I. of Greece

born on June 1, 1815 in Salzburg, Austria
died on July 26, 1867 in Bamberg, Germany

He was King of Greece and the second-born son of King Ludwig I of Bavaria, who also stayed at the Goldener Adler several times.

Reference to the Goldener Adler

He was a guest at the Goldener Adler on December 7 and 8, 1832.

He arrived in the evening under the name of Count von Kehlheim. The following day he visited the Hofburg and the Hofkirche.

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xcursion tip

Many German academics came to Greece under Otto I. University education is also very important in Innsbruck and we can call ourselves a university city with about 34,000 enrolled students.

In 1776 the buildings of today’s Faculty of Theology were opened as the first building of the University of Innsbruck.

Visit this part of our city, also very worth seeing the Jesuit church there with its princely tombs in the crypt as well as the impressive 9200 kg “Schützenglocke”, one of the largest bells in Austria and certainly the largest free-swinging bell from the house of the Innsbruck bell foundry Grassmayr.

Life and facts

Otto I, King of Greece was the second-born son of King Ludwig I of Bavaria and Therese, Princess of Saxe-Hildburghausen.

After the end of the Greek War of Independence in 1830, there was a chaos in power politics in Greece. After an intervention of the great powers (Great Britain, France and Russia), Greece was declared an independent kingdom by the London Protocol and the then 16-year-old Otto I. of Bavaria, was proclaimed king.

Otto I. reigned in Greece from 1832 to 1862. He had his residence in Nafplio until the capital was moved to Athens in 1834.

Under his rule, many Germans came to Greece. Among them were craftsmen and academics. Their descendants are almost completely assimilated today.

Well known are the numerous buildings that were built under Otto, often with the support of local patrons, e.g. the new city of Sparta. Far more significant, however, are the administrative foundations of modern Greece introduced by him and his government.

Thus, to this day, Greek legislation is based on German legislation (the Bavarian purity law was also once valid in Greece). However, his zeal was countered by a large mountain of debt at the end of his reign.

He married the Duchess Amalie of Oldenburg in Oldenburg on November 22, 1836.

Various mistakes during his reign eventually led to his deposition in 1862. He left Greece and returned with his wife to Bavaria, where they lived in Bamberg until her death.

He always remained very attached to Greece.

Sources

data.cfm (innsbruck.gv.at) – Chronik von Innsbruck, zusammengestellt von Carl Unterkircher, Scriptor an der k.k. Universitäts-Bibliothek in Innsbruck. Druck und Verlag der Vereinsbuchhandlung. 1897. UB Innsbruck Separatabdruck der „Neuen Tiroler Stimmen“ 1892–1896.

Pusch’sche Chronik. 2309, Pusch’sche Chronik. 2310

https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Otto_(Griechenland)
https://www.hdbg.eu/koenigreich/index.php/personen/index/id/99
https://jesuitenkirche-innsbruck.at/at/index.php
https://www.uibk.ac.at/theol/index.html.de

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