Leipzig University (), in

Leipzig Leipzig (, ; ; Upper Saxon: ; ) is the most populous city in the States of Germany, German state of Saxony. The city has a population of 628,718 inhabitants as of 2023. It is the List of cities in Germany by population, eighth-largest city in Ge ...

Saxony Saxony, officially the Free State of Saxony, is a landlocked state of Germany, bordering the states of Brandenburg, Saxony-Anhalt, Thuringia, and Bavaria, as well as the countries of Poland and the Czech Republic. Its capital is Dresden, and ...

, Germany, is one of the world's oldest universities and the second-oldest university (by consecutive years of existence) in Germany. The university was founded on 2 December 1409 by

Frederick I, Elector of Saxony Frederick I, the Belligerent or the Warlike (; 11 April 1370 – 4 January 1428), a member of the House of Wettin, ruled as List of margraves of Meissen, Margrave of Meissen from 1407 and List of rulers of Saxony, Elector of Saxony (as Fred ...

and his brother William II, Margrave of Meissen, and originally comprised the four scholastic faculties. Since its inception, the university has engaged in teaching and research for over 600 years without interruption. Famous alumni include Angela Merkel, Gottfried Wilhelm von Leibniz,

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe Johann Wolfgang (von) Goethe (28 August 1749 – 22 March 1832) was a German polymath who is widely regarded as the most influential writer in the German language. His work has had a wide-ranging influence on Western literature, literary, Polit ...

, Leopold von Ranke,

Friedrich Nietzsche Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche (15 October 1844 – 25 August 1900) was a German philosopher. He began his career as a classical philology, classical philologist, turning to philosophy early in his academic career. In 1869, aged 24, Nietzsche bec ...

Robert Schumann Robert Schumann (; ; 8 June 181029 July 1856) was a German composer, pianist, and music critic of the early Romantic music, Romantic era. He composed in all the main musical genres of the time, writing for solo piano, voice and piano, chamber ...

Richard Wagner Wilhelm Richard Wagner ( ; ; 22 May 181313 February 1883) was a German composer, theatre director, essayist, and conductor who is chiefly known for his operas (or, as some of his mature works were later known, "music dramas"). Unlike most o ...

Tycho Brahe Tycho Brahe ( ; ; born Tyge Ottesen Brahe, ; 14 December 154624 October 1601), generally called Tycho for short, was a Danish astronomer of the Renaissance, known for his comprehensive and unprecedentedly accurate astronomical observations. He ...

Georgius Agricola Georgius Agricola (; born Georg Bauer; 24 March 1494 – 21 November 1555) was a German Humanist scholar, mineralogist and metallurgist. Born in the small town of Glauchau, in the Electorate of Saxony of the Holy Roman Empire, he was b ...

. The university is associated with ten Nobel laureates, most recently with Svante Pääbo who won the Nobel Prize for Medicine in 2022.

History

Founding and development until 1900

The university was modelled on the University of Prague, from which the German-speaking faculty members withdrew to Leipzig after the

Jan Hus Jan Hus (; ; 1369 – 6 July 1415), sometimes anglicized as John Hus or John Huss, and referred to in historical texts as ''Iohannes Hus'' or ''Johannes Huss'', was a Czechs, Czech theologian and philosopher who became a Church reformer and t ...

crisis and the Decree of Kutná Hora. The ''Alma mater Lipsiensis'' opened in 1409, after it had been officially chartered by Pope Alexander V in his '' Bull of Acknowledgment'' on (9 September of that year). Its first rector was Johannes Otto von Münsterberg. From its foundation, the Paulinerkirche served as the university church. After the

Reformation The Reformation, also known as the Protestant Reformation or the European Reformation, was a time of major Theology, theological movement in Western Christianity in 16th-century Europe that posed a religious and political challenge to the p ...

, the church and the monastery buildings were donated to the university in 1544. In order to secure independent and sustainable funding, the university was endowed with the lordship over nine villages east of

(university villages). It kept this status for nearly 400 years until land reforms were carried out in the 19th century. Like many European universities, the University of Leipzig was structured into colleges (''collegia'') responsible for organising accommodation and collegiate lecturing. Among the colleges of Leipzig were the Small College, the Large College, the Red College (''Rotes Kolleg'', also known as the New College), the college of our Lady (''Frauenkolleg'') and the Pauliner-College (''Pauliner Kolleg''). There were also private residential halls (''bursen'', see English 'bursaries'). The colleges had jurisdiction over their members. The college structure was abandoned later and today only the names survive. During the first centuries, the university grew slowly and was a rather regional institution. This changed, however, during the 19th century when the university became a world-class institution of higher education and research. At the end of the 19th century, important scholars such as Bernhard Windscheid (one of the fathers of the German Civil Code) and Wilhelm Ostwald (viewed as a founder of modern

physical chemistry Physical chemistry is the study of macroscopic and microscopic phenomena in chemical systems in terms of the principles, practices, and concepts of physics such as motion, energy, force, time, thermodynamics, quantum chemistry, statistical mech ...

) taught at Leipzig. Rotes Kolleg Leipzig

Leipzig University was one of the first German universities to allow women to register as "guest students". At its general assembly in 1873, the thanked the University of Leipzig and Prague for allowing women to attend as guest students. This was the year that the first woman in Germany obtained her JD, Johanna von Evreinov. During the decline and dissolution of the Ottoman Empire in the 19th and first decade of 20th century together with some other German universities Leipzig University turned into one of the centers of higher education for state administrations and elites of newly independent Balkan states (

Romania Romania is a country located at the crossroads of Central Europe, Central, Eastern Europe, Eastern and Southeast Europe. It borders Ukraine to the north and east, Hungary to the west, Serbia to the southwest, Bulgaria to the south, Moldova to ...

Greece Greece, officially the Hellenic Republic, is a country in Southeast Europe. Located on the southern tip of the Balkan peninsula, it shares land borders with Albania to the northwest, North Macedonia and Bulgaria to the north, and Turkey to th ...

Bulgaria Bulgaria, officially the Republic of Bulgaria, is a country in Southeast Europe. It is situated on the eastern portion of the Balkans directly south of the Danube river and west of the Black Sea. Bulgaria is bordered by Greece and Turkey t ...

and

Serbia , image_flag = Flag of Serbia.svg , national_motto = , image_coat = Coat of arms of Serbia.svg , national_anthem = () , image_map = , map_caption = Location of Serbia (gree ...

) educating over 5,500 students from the region in 1859–1909 period. Until the beginning of the

Second World War World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...

, Leipzig University attracted a number of renowned scholars and later Nobel Prize laureates, including Paul Ehrlich, Felix Bloch, Werner Heisenberg and Sin-Itiro Tomonaga. Many of the university's alumni became important scientists.

Nazi period

Under

Nazi Nazism (), formally named National Socialism (NS; , ), is the far-right politics, far-right Totalitarianism, totalitarian socio-political ideology and practices associated with Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party (NSDAP) in Germany. During H ...

rule many degrees of Jews were cancelled. Some were later reinstated as Karl-Marx University degrees by the GDR. Noteworthy Nazis, such as Max Clara (chair of anatomy) taught at the university and were appointed to positions with great authority. The university was kept open throughout World War II, even after the destruction of its buildings. During the war the acting rector, Erich Maschke, described the continuation of the university in a memo on 11 May 1945, announcing the vote for a new rector: By the end of the war 60 per cent of the university's buildings and 70 per cent of its books had been destroyed.

The university under the German Democratic Republic

The university reopened after the war on 5 February 1946, but it was affected by the uniformity imposed on social institutions in the Soviet occupation zone. In 1948 the freely elected student council was disbanded and replaced by Free German Youth members. The chairman of the Student Council, Wolfgang Natonek, and other members were arrested and imprisoned, but the university was also a nucleus of resistance. Thus began the Belter group, with flyers for free elections. The head of the group, Herbert Belter, was executed in 1951 in Moscow. The

German Democratic Republic East Germany, officially known as the German Democratic Republic (GDR), was a country in Central Europe from Foundation of East Germany, its formation on 7 October 1949 until German reunification, its reunification with West Germany (FRG) on ...

was created in 1949, and in 1953 for Karl Marx Year the university was renamed by its government the Karl Marx University, Leipzig after

Karl Marx Karl Marx (; 5 May 1818 – 14 March 1883) was a German philosopher, political theorist, economist, journalist, and revolutionary socialist. He is best-known for the 1848 pamphlet '' The Communist Manifesto'' (written with Friedrich Engels) ...

. In 1968, the partly damaged Augusteum, including Johanneum and Albertinum and the intact Paulinerkirche, were demolished to make way for a redevelopment of the university, carried out between 1973 and 1978. The dominant building of the university was the University Tower (now City-Hochhaus Leipzig), built between 1968 and 1972 in the form of an open book.

After the reunification of Germany

In 1991, following the

reunification of Germany German reunification () was the process of re-establishing Germany as a single sovereign state, which began on 9 November 1989 and culminated on 3 October 1990 with the dissolution of the German Democratic Republic and the integration of i ...

, the university's name was restored to the original Leipzig University (''Alma mater lipsiensis''). The reconstruction of the University Library, which was heavily damaged during the war and in the GDR barely secured, was completed in 2002. With the delivery of the University Tower to a private user, the university was forced to spread some faculties over several locations in the city. It controversially redesigned its historical centre at the Augustusplatz. In 2002, Behet Bonzio received the second prize in the architectural competition; a first prize was not awarded by the jury. A lobby with partial support of the provincial government called for the rebuilding of St. Paul's Church and Augusteum. This caused the resistance of the university leadership, the majority of the students and population of Leipzig. On 24 March 2004 a jury chose a design by Dutch architect Erick van Egeraat, which was well received by almost all parties. He recalls the outer form of the St. Paul's Church (today called Paulinum) and Augusteum, and abstracted the original building complex. Renovations began in the summer of 2005. In 2008 the university was able to prevail in the nationwide "Initiative of Excellence" of Germany and it was granted the graduate school " BuildMoNa: Leipzig School of Natural Sciences – Building with Molecules and Nano-objects". In addition, the university was able to receive grants from the Saxon excellence initiative for the "Life" project – a project that tries to explore common diseases more effectively. Also in 2008 the "Bach Archive" was associated with the university. In 2009, the Leipzig University celebrated its 600th anniversary with over 300 scientific and cultural lectures and exhibitions, reflecting the role of the university's research and teaching from its beginning.

Campus

The university's urban campus comprises several locations. All in all, the university is spread across 38 locations in Leipzig. The main buildings in the city center (district Mitte) are still located on the same land plots as the earliest university buildings in 1409. The university's buildings in the center of Leipzig underwent substantial reconstruction from 2005, the new university's main building being drafted by Dutch architect Erick van Egeraat. The estimated total cost for the renovation project is 140 million euros. The new buildings were scheduled to be completed in 2009/2010, in time for the university's 600th anniversary celebrations. Besides the faculties and other teaching institutions, several other bodies serve the university: the University Library, a university archive and administration, numerous museums (e.g. the Museum for Music Instruments and the Museum of Ancient Egypt) and the university hospital. The university's Leipzig Botanical Garden, the second-oldest botanical garden in Europe. was established in 1542. The university's Musical Instrument Museum includes one of the world's three surviving pianos built by Bartolomeo Cristofori, the piano's inventor. Five other Cristofori instruments are included in the museum's collections. Key Central institutions of the university are * Centre for Biotechnology and Biomedicine * Career Service * German Institute for Literature * German Centre for Integrative Biodiversity Research (iDiv) Halle-Jena-Leipzig * Higher Education Didactics Centre Saxony * Kustodie (Art Collection) * Leipzig University Music * Leipzig Research Centre Global Dynamics * Research Academy Leipzig * Language Centre * Studienkolleg Sachsen (The university's pathway and entrance examination provider) * Translational Centre for Regenerative Medicine Leipzig * University Archive * University Library * University Computer Centre * Centre for University Sport * Centre for Teacher Training and School Research * Centre for Media and Communication

Library

The University Library of Leipzig was established in 1543. It is one of the oldest German university libraries and it serves as a source of literature and information for the Leipzig University as well as the general public in the region. Its extensive historical and special collections are nationally and internationally recognized. The library consists of the main building "Bibliotheca Albertina" and forty branches situated near their respective academic institutions. The current stock comprises 5 million volumes and about 7,700 periodicals. Collections range from important medieval and modern manuscripts to incunabula, papyri, autographs, ostraka and coins. The Apel Codex, a manuscript of 16th century music, is housed in the Leipzig University library, as well as the Papyrus Ebers. The Leipzig University Library also owns parts of the Codex Sinaiticus, a Bible manuscript from the 4th century, brought from Sinai in 1843 by

Constantin von Tischendorf Constantin is an Aromanian language, Aromanian, Megleno-Romanian language, Megleno-Romanian and Romanian language, Romanian male given name. It can also be a surname. For a list of notable people called Constantin, see Constantine (name). See ...

. Papyrus Ebers is the longest and oldest surviving medical manuscript from ancient Egypt, dated to around 1600 BC. The Codex contains large parts of the Old Testament and a complete New Testament in ancient Greek, and is one of the most important known manuscripts of the Greek Old Testament and the New Testament. It is the oldest fully preserved copy of the New Testament. The Oriental Manuscripts of the Leipzig University Library are around 3,200 oriental manuscripts. Some of the University Library locations in Leipzig are: * Bibliotheca Albertina at Beethovenstraße 6 * Campus Library at Universitätsstr. 3 * Library of Deutsches Literaturinstitut at Wächterstr. 34 * Library of Arts at Dittrichring 18–20 * Library of Musicology at Neumarkt 9–19 * Library of Law at Burgstr. 27 * Library of Medicine at Johannisallee 34 * Library of Medicine at Käthe-Kollwitz-Str. 82 * Library of Veterinary Medicine at the Tierkliniken 5 * Library of Biosciences at Talstr. 35 * Library of Chemistry and Physics at Johannisallee 29 * Library of Earth Sciences at Talstr. 35 * Library of Geography at Johannisallee 19 * Library of Archaeology, Prehistory and Ancient History at Ritterstr. 14 * Library of Oriental Studies at Schillerstr. 6 * Library of Sports Science at Jahnallee 59 In addition to the university library, one of the two centers of the

German National Library The German National Library (DNB; ) is the central archival library and national bibliographic centre for the Federal Republic of Germany. It is one of the largest libraries in the world. Its task is to collect, permanently archive, comprehens ...

is based at Leipzig, the collections of which are open to use for academic research.

Faculties

The original four facilities were the Faculty of Arts, Theology, Medicine, and Law. As of November 2021, the university comprises the following 14 faculties with institutes and centers associated with each one. ; Faculty of Chemistry * Institute of Analytical Chemistry * Institute of Bioanalytical Chemistry * Institute of Chemical Technology * Institute of Inorganic Chemistry * Institute of Organic Chemistry * Wilhelm Ostwald Institut of Physical and Theoretical Chemistry ; Faculty of Economics and Management Science * Institute of Accounting, Finance and Taxation (IUFB) * Institute of Building Design and Management (IGB) * Institute of Business Education and Management Training (IFW) * Institute of Economic Policy (IWP) * Institute of Empirical Economic Research (IEW) * Institute of Information Systems * Institute of Infrastructure and Resource Management (IIRM) * Institute of Insurance Science (IVL) * Institute of Public Finance and Public Management (PFPM) * Institute of Real Estate Management (IIM) * Institute of Service and Relationship Management (ISRM) * Institute of Theoretical Economics (ITVWL) * Institute of Trade and Banking (IHB) * Institute of Urban Development and Construction Management (ISB) ; Faculty of Education * Institute of Educational Sciences * Institute of Pre-Primary and Primary Education * Institute of Special and Inclusive Education ; Faculty of History, Arts and Regional Studies * Department of History * Institute of African Studies * Institute of Ancient Near Eastern Studies * Institute of Anthropology * Institute of Art Education * Institute of Art History * Institute of East Asian Studies * Institute of Egyptology * Institute of Musicology * Institute of Oriental Studies * Institute of South and Central Asian Studies * Institute of the Study of Religions * Institute of Theatre Studies ; Faculty of Law * Ernst Jaeger Institute of Corporate Restructuring and Insolvency Law * Institute of Broadcasting Law * Institute of Energy and Regulatory Law * Institute of Environmental and Planning Law * Institute of Foreign and European Private and Procedural Law * Institute of German and International Law of Banking and Capital Markets * Institute of International Law * Institute of Labour and Social Law * Institute of Law and Politics * Institute of Public International Law, European Law and Foreign Public Law * Institute of Tax Law * Institute of the Foundations of Law * Institute of the Legal Profession ; Faculty of Life Sciences * Institute of Biochemistry * Institute of Biology * Wilhelm Wundt Institute for Psychology ; Faculty of Mathematics and Computer Science * Institute of Computer Science * Institute of Mathematics ; Faculty of Medicine * Carl Ludwig Institute of Physiology * Centre for Clinical Trials Leipzig * Centre for Environmental Medicine and Environmental Epidemiology * Clinical Pharmacology * Experimental Centre of the Faculty of Medicine * General Medicine Unit * Heart Center Leipzig GmbH * Innovation Center Computer Assisted Surgery (ICCAS) * Institute for Medical Physics and Biophysics * Institute of Anatomy * Institute of Biochemistry (medicine) * Institute of Legal Medicine * Institute of Medical Informatics, Statistics and Epidemiology * Institute of Social Medicine, Occupational Health and Public Health * Integrated Research and Treatment Center (IFB) AdiposityDiseases * Interdisciplinary Centre for Clinical Research * Karl-Sudhoff-Institute of History of Medicine and Science * LIFE Forschungszentrum für Zivilisationserkrankungen (LIFE) * Neurological Rehabilitation Centre * Paul Flechsig Institute for Brain Research * Rudolf Boehm Institute of Pharmacology and Toxicology ; Faculty of Philology * Institute of American Studies * Institute of Applied Linguistics and Translatology * Institute of British Studies * Institute of Classical Studies and Comparative Literature * Herder-Institute (German as a Foreign Language) * Institute of German Language and Literature * Institute of Linguistics * Institute of Romance Studies * Institute of Slavonic Studies * Institute of Sorbian Studies ; Faculty of Physics and Earth Sciences * Institute of Geography * Institute of Geophysics and Geology * Institute of Meteorology * Peter Debye Institute of Soft Matter Physics * Felix Bloch Institute of Solid State Physics * Institute of Theoretical Physics ; Faculty of Social Sciences and Philosophy * Institute of Communication and Media Studies * Institute of Global and European Studies * Institute of Philosophy * Institute of Political Science * Institute of Sociology * Institute of the Study of Culture ; Faculty of Sport Science * Institute of Sport Medicine and Prevention * Institute of General Kinesiology and Athletics Training * Institute of Movement and Training Science in Sports I * Institute of Movement and Training Science in Sports II * Institute of Exercise and Public Health * Institute of Sport Psychology and Physical Education ; Faculty of Theology * Institute of Church History * Institute of New Testament Science * Institute of Old Testament Studies * Institute of Practical Theology * Institute of Religious Education * Institute of Systematic Theology ; Faculty of Veterinary Medicine * Department for birds and reptiles * Department for horses * Department for ruminants and swine * Department for small animal * Institute of Anatomy, Histology and Embryology * Institute of Animal Hygiene and Veterinary Public Health * Institute of Animal Nutrition, Nutrition Diseases and Dietetics * Institute of Bacteriology and Mycology * Institute of Food Hygiene * Institute of Immunology * Institute of Parasitology * Institute of Pathology * Institute of Pharmacology, Pharmacy and Toxicology * Institute of Physiological Chemistry * Institute of Physiology * Institute of Virology * Oberholz Farm for Teaching and Research

Institutes affiliated with the university

* International Max Planck Research School- Mathematics in the Sciences (IMPRS MiS), in association with Max Planck Institute for Mathematics in the Sciences * International Max Planck Research School on Neuroscience of Communication: Function, Structure, and Plasticity, in association with Max Planck Institute for Human Cognitive and Brain Sciences * International Max Planck Research School "The Leipzig School of Human Origins", in association with

Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology The Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology (, shortened to MPI EVA) is a research institute based in Leipzig, Germany, that was founded in 1997. It is part of the Max Planck Society network. Well-known scientists currently based at ...

* Institute of Non-Classical Chemistry e.V * Institute for Applied Informatics * Simon Dubnow Institute for Jewish History and Culture at Leipzig University * Leipzig Centre for the History and Culture of East Central Europe * Translational Centre for Regenerative Medicine * German Centre for Integrative Biodiversity Research (iDiv) * Institute of East Asian Studies of the Leipzig University * Institute of Classical Archaeology of the Leipzig University * Institute for International Law, European Law and Foreign Public Law (InVEA) of the Leipzig University

Academics

Today, the university has 14 faculties. With over 29,000 students, it is Saxony's second-largest university. There are now more than 150 institutes and the university offers 190 study programs leading to

Bachelor's degree A bachelor's degree (from Medieval Latin ''baccalaureus'') or baccalaureate (from Modern Latin ''baccalaureatus'') is an undergraduate degree awarded by colleges and universities upon completion of a course of study lasting three to six years ...

s, Master's degrees, Staatsexamen,

Diplom A ''Diplom'' (, from ) is an academic degree in the German-speaking countries Germany, Austria, and Switzerland and a similarly named degree in some other European countries including Albania, Bulgaria, Belarus, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia ...

(equivalent to master's degree) and Ph.D.s. The university offers a number of courses in English and other foreign languages, and there are several programs which have been specially designed for foreign students. Exchange partner universities include the universities of

Arizona Arizona is a U.S. state, state in the Southwestern United States, Southwestern region of the United States, sharing the Four Corners region of the western United States with Colorado, New Mexico, and Utah. It also borders Nevada to the nort ...

Oklahoma Oklahoma ( ; Choctaw language, Choctaw: , ) is a landlocked U.S. state, state in the South Central United States, South Central region of the United States. It borders Texas to the south and west, Kansas to the north, Missouri to the northea ...

Houston Houston ( ) is the List of cities in Texas by population, most populous city in the U.S. state of Texas and in the Southern United States. Located in Southeast Texas near Galveston Bay and the Gulf of Mexico, it is the county seat, seat of ...

Alberta Alberta is a Provinces and territories of Canada, province in Canada. It is a part of Western Canada and is one of the three Canadian Prairies, prairie provinces. Alberta is bordered by British Columbia to its west, Saskatchewan to its east, t ...

Ohio Ohio ( ) is a U.S. state, state in the Midwestern United States, Midwestern region of the United States. It borders Lake Erie to the north, Pennsylvania to the east, West Virginia to the southeast, Kentucky to the southwest, Indiana to the ...

, and

Edinburgh Edinburgh is the capital city of Scotland and one of its 32 Council areas of Scotland, council areas. The city is located in southeast Scotland and is bounded to the north by the Firth of Forth and to the south by the Pentland Hills. Edinburgh ...

. Traditionally contacts to universities in Eastern Europe and the Far East are strong as well, e.g. there are cooperations with leading institutions such as Moscow's Lomonosov University and

Renmin University The Renmin University of China (RUC) is a public university in Haidian, Beijing, Haidian, Beijing, China. The university is affiliated with the Ministry of Education (China), Ministry of Education, and co-funded by the Ministry of Education and ...

in Beijing. Anatomie-Leipzig

There are several International Master's programs: American Studies, Global Studies, Sustainable Development Studies, SEPT (MBA in SME Promotion) and one Bachelor/Master's/Ph.D. program (International Physics Studies Program) taught in English. American Studies Leipzig was awarded three international professorships: The Fulbright-Leipzig Chair for American Studies, the DAAD Professorship for American and International Studies, and the Picador Guest Professorship for Literature. It is also the home of ''Aspeers – Emerging voices in American Studies'', a graduate-level peer-reviewed scholarly journal for

American studies American studies or American civilization is an interdisciplinarity, interdisciplinary field of scholarship that examines American literature, History of the United States, history, Society of the United States, society, and Culture of the Unit ...

. Erasmus Mundus Global Studies is an interdisciplinary, research-based Master offered by a consortium of five European universities: Leipzig University, the

London School of Economics The London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE), established in 1895, is a public research university in London, England, and a member institution of the University of London. The school specialises in the social sciences. Founded ...

University of Vienna The University of Vienna (, ) is a public university, public research university in Vienna, Austria. Founded by Rudolf IV, Duke of Austria, Duke Rudolph IV in 1365, it is the oldest university in the German-speaking world and among the largest ...

, University of Wroclaw and Roskilde University. In the field of anthropology, the university is cooperating with the Leipzig

. In 1995, the Leibniz-Institute for Jewish History and Culture named after

Simon Dubnow Simon Dubnow (alternatively spelled Dubnov; ; rus, Семён Ма́ркович Ду́бнов, Semyon Markovich Dubnov, sʲɪˈmʲɵn ˈmarkəvʲɪdʑ ˈdubnəf; 10 September 1860 – 8 December 1941) was a Jewish-Russian Empire, Russian h ...

was formed as a research institution related to the university. Since 2008 the university is also home to one of Germany's few Confucius Institutes. The institute is based on an agreement of June 2006 between the university administration and representatives of the Chinese Embassy to establish a Confucius Institute in cooperation with the Renmin University and the "National Office for Teaching Chinese as a Foreign Language". Leipzig University has been the home of the first German chair for Chinese and East Asian Languages in the 19th century, which later became the Institute of East Asian Studies, which still exists today (see Georg von der Gabelentz).

Rankings

Leipzig University is recognized in several university ranking systems. In the 2024

QS World University Rankings The ''QS World University Rankings'' is a portfolio of comparative college and university rankings compiled by Quacquarelli Symonds, a higher education analytics firm. Its first and earliest edition was published in collaboration with '' Times ...

, the university was ranked 479th globally, placing it within the top 30 (29th) nationally. The

Academic Ranking of World Universities The ''Academic Ranking of World Universities'' (''ARWU''), also known as the Shanghai Ranking, is one of the annual publications of world university rankings. The league table was originally compiled and issued by Shanghai Jiao Tong Universi ...

(ARWU), for 2023, positioned the university in the range of 201–300 on the global scale and somewhere between 10th and 19th within the country. The university is ranked 18th in Germany, 98th in Europe, and 264th in the world by the web-based Webometrics Ranking of World Universities, a ranking evaluating universities' scientific online publications.

International students

Leipzig university has a large body of international students. In winter term 2017, out of its 28,797 students about 11% (3,174) were foreign students.

Student life

Leipzig has a thriving student life with a large number of student run bars, sports clubs and recreational facilities for students. The student body in Leipzig is diverse, not only due to the broad spectrum of subjects at the university but also because of the other higher education institutions in the city. The Moritzbastei is the largest student club in Germany, it is part of the historic city fortifications of Leipzig and is famous for its atmosphere and large number of cultural events. The university is home to the Leipzig Academic Orchestra and the University Choir of Leipzig. There are numerous courses offered in performing arts every semester and a dance festival is organised by students once a year. In the field of sports, the university offers training opportunities and courses in almost all disciplines. During the annual Leipzig book fair, the university library and other university institutions organise public events for authors.

Notable people

Leipzig University has produced many notable individuals and noble laureates. Some famous people affiliated with Leipzig include:

Music

* Johann Christoph Altnickol, German composer, son-in-law to Johann Sebastian Bach * Johann Friedrich Agricola, German composer, pupil of Johann Sebastian Bach * Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach, German composer, second famous son of

Johann Sebastian Bach Johann Sebastian Bach (German: Help:IPA/Standard German, �joːhan zeˈbasti̯an baχ ( – 28 July 1750) was a German composer and musician of the late Baroque music, Baroque period. He is known for his prolific output across a variety ...

* Johann Christoph Friedrich Bach, German composer, 3rd famous son of Johann Sebastian Bach * Wilhelm Friedemann Bach, German composer, first famous son of Johann Sebastian Bach * Lorenz Christoph Mizler, German composer and music theorist, pupil of Johann Sebastian Bach *

Friedrich Blume Friedrich Blume (5 January 1893, in Schlüchtern, Hesse-Nassau – 22 November 1975, in Schlüchtern) was professor of musicology at the University of Kiel from 1938 to 1958. He was a student in Munich, Berlin and Leipzig, and taught in the last ...

, German music theorist *

, German music composer *

Christoph Graupner Christoph Graupner (10 May 1760) was a German composer and harpsichordist of late Baroque music who was a contemporary of Johann Sebastian Bach, Georg Philipp Telemann and George Frideric Handel. Life Born in Hartmannsdorf near Kirchberg i ...

, German composer * Johann Kuhnau, German composer,

Thomaskantor (Cantor at St. Thomas) is the common name for the musical director of the , now an internationally known boys' choir founded in Leipzig in 1212. The official historic title of the Thomaskantor in Latin, ', describes the two functions of Cantor ( ...

* Johann David Heinichen, German composer and music theorist, Royal Polish and Electoral Saxon Kapellmeister *

, German composer *

Georg Philipp Telemann Georg Philipp Telemann (; – 25 June 1767) was a German Baroque composer and multi-instrumentalist. He is one of the most prolific composers in history, at least in terms of surviving works. Telemann was considered by his contemporaries to b ...

, German composer

Humanities

Theodor Mommsen Christian Matthias Theodor Mommsen (; ; 30 November 1817 – 1 November 1903) was a German classical scholar, historian, jurist, journalist, politician and archaeologist. He is widely regarded as one of the greatest classicists of the 19th ce ...

, German historian, recipient of The Nobel Prize in Literature. *

Franz Delitzsch Franz Delitzsch (23 February 1813, in Leipzig – 4 March 1890, in Leipzig) was a German Lutheran theologian and Hebraist. Delitzsch wrote many commentaries on books of the Bible, Jewish antiquities, Biblical psychology, as well as a history of J ...

, German Theologian and Hebrew Scholar. * Michael Ranft, German historian and theologian. *

, German philosopher. * Christian August Crusius, German philosopher and theologian. * Adolf von Harnack, German theologian. * Karl Friedrich Bahrdt, controversial German Protestant, biblical scholar, theologian, and polemicist. * Christoph Ernst Luthardt German theologian. * Martin Petzoldt German theologian. *

Martin Noth Martin Noth (3 August 1902 – 30 May 1968) was a German scholar of the Hebrew Bible who specialized in the pre-Exilic history of the Hebrews and promoted the hypothesis that the Israelite tribes in the immediate period after the settlement in Can ...

German theologian and Old Testament Scholar. *

, German poet and polymath. * Max Muller, philologist and Orientalist who wrote authoritative works on Indology. *

Leonard Bloomfield Leonard Bloomfield (April 1, 1887 – April 18, 1949) was an American linguist who led the development of structural linguistics in the United States during the 1930s and the 1940s. He is considered to be the father of American distributionalis ...

, American linguist who led the development of structural linguistics in the United States during the 1930s and the 1940s. He is considered to be the father of American Distributionalism. * Hans-Georg Gadamer, German philosopher and rector of the university * Johann Christoph Gottsched, German poet, author, and critic. * Christian Friedrich Henrici, German poet, Saxon Actuary, Postal clerk, Postal Commissioner, and Wine inspector. *

Gotthold Ephraim Lessing Gotthold Ephraim Lessing (; ; 22 January 1729 – 15 February 1781) was a German philosopher, dramatist, publicist and art critic, and a representative of the Enlightenment era. His plays and theoretical writings substantially influenced the dev ...

, German philosopher and writer. * Lin Yutang, Chinese author and linguist. * Nathan Söderblom, Swedish clergyman, Nobel Peace Prize recipient. * C. F. W. Walther, first President of the

Lutheran Church–Missouri Synod Lutheranism is a major branch of Protestantism that emerged under the work of Martin Luther, the 16th-century German friar and Protestant Reformers, reformer whose efforts to reform the theology and practices of the Catholic Church launched ...

and its most influential theologian. * Ferdinand de Saussure, linguist, founder of structuralism. * Gert Jäger, Otto Kade and Albrecht Neubert, translation scholars and founders of the Leipzig School.

Sciences

* Gottfried Wilhelm von Leibniz, German philosopher, polymath, and mathematician who developed

calculus Calculus is the mathematics, mathematical study of continuous change, in the same way that geometry is the study of shape, and algebra is the study of generalizations of arithmetic operations. Originally called infinitesimal calculus or "the ...

Felix Klein Felix Christian Klein (; ; 25 April 1849 – 22 June 1925) was a German mathematician and Mathematics education, mathematics educator, known for his work in group theory, complex analysis, non-Euclidean geometry, and the associations betwe ...

, German mathematician, known for his work in group theory, complex analysis and non-Euclidean geometry *

Sophus Lie Marius Sophus Lie ( ; ; 17 December 1842 – 18 February 1899) was a Norwegian mathematician. He largely created the theory of continuous symmetry and applied it to the study of geometry and differential equations. He also made substantial cont ...

, Norwegian mathematician who developed

Lie algebra In mathematics, a Lie algebra (pronounced ) is a vector space \mathfrak g together with an operation called the Lie bracket, an alternating bilinear map \mathfrak g \times \mathfrak g \rightarrow \mathfrak g, that satisfies the Jacobi ident ...

* Friedrich Engel, German mathematician known for, amongst others,

Engel expansion The Engel expansion of a positive real number ''x'' is the unique non-decreasing sequence of positive integers (a_1,a_2,a_3,\dots) such that :x=\frac+\frac+\frac+\cdots = \frac\!\left(1 + \frac\!\left(1 + \frac\left(1+\cdots\right)\right)\right) ...

and Engel's theorem *

August Ferdinand Möbius August Ferdinand Möbius (, ; ; 17 November 1790 – 26 September 1868) was a German mathematician and theoretical astronomer. Life and education Möbius was born in Schulpforta, Electorate of Saxony, and was descended on his mothe ...

, German mathematician and theoretical astronomer, known for the

Möbius strip In mathematics, a Möbius strip, Möbius band, or Möbius loop is a Surface (topology), surface that can be formed by attaching the ends of a strip of paper together with a half-twist. As a mathematical object, it was discovered by Johann Bened ...

. * Karl Mollweide, German mathematician and astronomer, known for the Mollweide projection *

Hermann Hankel Hermann Hankel (14 February 1839 – 29 August 1873) was a German mathematician. Having worked on mathematical analysis during his career, he is best known for introducing the Hankel transform and the Hankel matrix. Biography Hankel was born on ...

, German mathematician, known for the Hankel transform *

Felix Hausdorff Felix Hausdorff ( , ; November 8, 1868 – January 26, 1942) was a German mathematician, pseudonym Paul Mongré (''à mogré' (Fr.) = "according to my taste"), who is considered to be one of the founders of modern topology and who contributed sig ...

, German mathematician, one of the founders of modern

topology Topology (from the Greek language, Greek words , and ) is the branch of mathematics concerned with the properties of a Mathematical object, geometric object that are preserved under Continuous function, continuous Deformation theory, deformat ...

, known for the

Hausdorff space In topology and related branches of mathematics, a Hausdorff space ( , ), T2 space or separated space, is a topological space where distinct points have disjoint neighbourhoods. Of the many separation axioms that can be imposed on a topologi ...

Bartel Leendert van der Waerden Bartel Leendert van der Waerden (; 2 February 1903 – 12 January 1996) was a Dutch mathematician and historian of mathematics. Biography Education and early career Van der Waerden learned advanced mathematics at the University of Amste ...

, Dutch mathematician * Johann Samuel Traugott Gehler German mathematician, physicist and lawyer, author of 'Physikalisches Wörterbuch' * Edgar Odell Lovett, American mathematician * Eberhard Zeidler, German mathematician and first managing director of Max Planck institute of mathematics in the sciences *

Wei-Liang Chow Chow Wei-Liang (; October 1, 1911, Shanghai – August 10, 1995, Baltimore) was a Chinese-American mathematician and stamp collector. He was well known for his work in algebraic geometry. Biography Chow was a student in the US, graduating from ...

, Chinese mathematician and stamp collector born in Shanghai, known for his work in algebraic geometry * Johann Heinrich Winckler, German physicist *

Werner Heisenberg Werner Karl Heisenberg (; ; 5 December 1901 – 1 February 1976) was a German theoretical physicist, one of the main pioneers of the theory of quantum mechanics and a principal scientist in the German nuclear program during World War II. He pub ...

, German physicist, Nobel Prize in Physics *

Felix Bloch Felix Bloch (; ; 23 October 1905 – 10 September 1983) was a Swiss-American physicist who shared the 1952 Nobel Prize in Physics with Edward Mills Purcell "for their development of new methods for nuclear magnetic precision measurements and di ...

, Swiss physicist, Nobel Prize in Physics * Klaus Fuchs, German theoretical physicist and atomic spy * Friedrich Hund, German physicist, discovered quantum tunnelling and is known for Hund's rules * Julius Edgar Lilienfeld, Austro-Hungarian physicist *

Ludwig Boltzmann Ludwig Eduard Boltzmann ( ; ; 20 February 1844 – 5 September 1906) was an Austrian mathematician and Theoretical physics, theoretical physicist. His greatest achievements were the development of statistical mechanics and the statistical ex ...

, Austrian physicist *

, Danish astronomer * Gustav Hertz, German physicist, Nobel Prize in Physics * Sin-Itiro Tomonaga, Japanese physicist, Nobel Prize in Physics * William Vermillion Houston, American physicist * Edward Teller, Hungaro-American nuclear scientist, member of the Manhattan Project * Peter Debye, Dutch-American physicist and chemist, Nobel Prize in Chemistry * Wilhelm Ostwald, German chemist, Nobel Prize in Chemistry * Emil Kraepelin, German Psychiatrist * Paul Ehrlich, German doctor, Nobel Prize in Medicine * Svante Pääbo, Nobel Prize in Medicine, currently teaches molecular evolutionary biology at the university * Felix Otto, German mathematician, currently teaches mathematical physics at the university * Gustav Theodor Fechner, German psychologist, founder of Psychophysics * Maximilian von Frey, physiologist, inventor of the esthesiometer *

Ernst Heinrich Weber Ernst Heinrich Weber (; ; 24 June 1795 – 26 January 1878) was a German physician who is considered one of the founders of experimental psychology. Ernst Weber was born into an academic background, with his father serving as a professor at t ...

, German physician and professor whose studies paved the way for the founding of

Psychology Psychology is the scientific study of mind and behavior. Its subject matter includes the behavior of humans and nonhumans, both consciousness, conscious and Unconscious mind, unconscious phenomena, and mental processes such as thoughts, feel ...

* Katja Werthmann, German ethnologist, regional focus

West Africa West Africa, also known as Western Africa, is the westernmost region of Africa. The United Nations geoscheme for Africa#Western Africa, United Nations defines Western Africa as the 16 countries of Benin, Burkina Faso, Cape Verde, The Gambia, Gha ...

, full professor at Leipzig University * Wilhelm Wundt, German psychologist, founded the first formal laboratory for psychological research * Friedrich Trendelenburg, German surgeon, described surgical removal of pulmonary emboliArch Klin Chir 86:686, 2908, 1908 * Dorothy Anna Hahn, American organic chemist, lifelong educator in organic chemistry at

Mount Holyoke College Mount Holyoke College is a Private college, private Women's colleges in the United States, women's Liberal arts colleges in the United States, liberal arts college in South Hadley, Massachusetts, United States. It is the oldest member of the h ...

Otto von Guericke Otto von Guericke ( , , ; spelled Gericke until 1666; – ) was a German scientist, inventor, mathematician and physicist. His pioneering scientific work, the development of experimental methods and repeatable demonstrations on the physics of ...

, German scientist, inventor, mathematician and physicist. * George Cecil Jaffe, Russian chemist, theorist of columnar ionisation.

Politics

* Luo Gan, Chinese Politician, Member of the Politburo Standing Committee * Johann Major, German

Lutheran Lutheranism is a major branch of Protestantism that emerged under the work of Martin Luther, the 16th-century German friar and Protestant Reformers, reformer whose efforts to reform the theology and practices of the Catholic Church launched ...

theologian, a principal author of the so-called Leipzig Interim, and author of the Majoristic Controversy * Angela Merkel, first female German Chancellor * Hans-Dietrich Genscher, German politician, Foreign Minister and Vice Chancellor * Rudolph Sohm, lawyer and Church historian * Cai Yuanpei, president of Peking University and leading thinker in the early Chinese communist movement * Michelle Bachelet, first female

President of Chile The president of Chile (), officially the president of the Republic of Chile (), is the head of state and head of government of the Republic of Chile. The president is responsible for both Government of Chile, government administration and s ...

between 2006 and 2010 * Selig Brodetsky, Israeli President of the

Hebrew University of Jerusalem The Hebrew University of Jerusalem (HUJI; ) is an Israeli public university, public research university based in Jerusalem. Co-founded by Albert Einstein and Chaim Weizmann in July 1918, the public university officially opened on 1 April 1925. ...

* Raila Amolo Odinga, Kenyan politician

Sports

* Luz Long, German Olympic long-jumper, noted for his sportsmanship

Notes

References

Literature

*
Scholars and Literati at the University of Leipzig (1409–1800)
i
Repertorium Eruditorum Totius Europae/RETE.

External links

* of Leipzig University
History of the Leipzig University
* {{Authority control 1400s establishments in the Holy Roman Empire 1409 establishments in Europe Educational institutions established in the 15th century Tourist attractions in Leipzig Universities and colleges in Saxony