Ludwig is a

German name Personal names in German-speaking Europe consist of one or several given names (''Vorname'', plural ''Vornamen'') and a surname (''Nachname, Familienname''). The ''Vorname'' is usually gender-specific. A name is usually cited in the " Western o ...

, deriving from

Old High German Old High German (OHG; german: Althochdeutsch (Ahd.)) is the earliest stage of the German language, conventionally covering the period from around 750 to 1050. There is no standardised or supra-regional form of German at this period, and Old High ...

''Hludwīg'', also spelled ''Hluotwīg''. Etymologically, the name can be traced back to the reconstructed

Proto-Germanic Proto-Germanic (abbreviated PGmc; also called Common Germanic) is the reconstructed proto-language of the Germanic branch of the Indo-European languages. Proto-Germanic eventually developed from pre-Proto-Germanic into three Germanic bra ...

name ''*hlūdazwiganą'', which is composed of two elements: ''*hlūdaz'' ("loud, famous") and ''*wiganą'' ("to battle, to fight") respectively, the resulting name meaning "famous warrior" or "famous in battle". Notable people with the name include:

People

:''Note: Individuals may appear in more than one subsection.''

German nobles

* Ludwig I, count of Württemberg (1143–1158) *

Ludwig II Ludwig II (Ludwig Otto Friedrich Wilhelm; 25 August 1845 – 13 June 1886) was King of Bavaria from 1864 until his death in 1886. He is sometimes called the Swan King or ('the Fairy Tale King'). He also held the titles of Count Palatine of th ...

, count of Württemberg (1158–1181) * Ludwig I, count of Württemberg-Urach (1419–1450) *

, count of Württemberg-Urach (1450–1457) * Ludwig IV, landgrave of Thuringia (1200–1227) *

Ludwig I of Bavaria en, Louis Charles Augustus , image = Joseph Karl Stieler - King Ludwig I in his Coronation Robes - WGA21796.jpg , caption = Portrait by Joseph Stieler, 1825 , succession=King of Bavaria , reign = , coronation ...

, king of Bavaria (1825–1848) * Ludwig II of Bavaria, king of Bavaria (1864–1886) *

Ludwig III of Bavaria Ludwig III (Ludwig Luitpold Josef Maria Aloys Alfried; 7 January 1845 – 18 October 1921) was the last King of Bavaria, reigning from 1913 to 1918. Initially he served in the Bavarian military as a lieutenant and went on to hold the rank of Oberl ...

, last king of Bavaria (1913–1918) * Ludwig V (disambiguation) * Ludwig IV, Grand Duke of Hesse and by Rhine (1877–1892)

Architects

* Ludwig Levy, German architect *

Ludwig Mies van der Rohe Ludwig Mies van der Rohe ( ; ; born Maria Ludwig Michael Mies; March 27, 1886August 17, 1969) was a German-American architect. He was commonly referred to as Mies, his surname. Along with Alvar Aalto, Le Corbusier, Walter Gropius and Frank Ll ...

, German-American architect

Artists

* Ludwig Mestler, Austrian artist noted for his watercolor painting *

Ernst Ludwig Kirchner Ernst Ludwig Kirchner (6 May 1880 – 15 June 1938) was a German expressionist painter and printmaker and one of the founders of the artists group Die Brücke or "The Bridge", a key group leading to the foundation of Expressionism in 20th-century ...

, German painter and printmaker * Ludwig Merwart, Austrian painter and graphic artist * Ludwig Richter, German painter

Authors and poets

Ludwig Bemelmans Ludwig Bemelmans (April 27, 1898 – October 1, 1962) was an Austrian-American writer and illustrator of children's books and adult novels. He is known best for the '' Madeline'' picture books. Six were published, the first in 1939. Early life ...

, American author and children's book writer and illustrator * Ludwig Thoma, German author *

Ludwig Tieck Johann Ludwig Tieck (; ; 31 May 177328 April 1853) was a German poet, fiction writer, translator, and critic. He was one of the founding fathers of the Romantic movement in the late 18th and early 19th centuries. Early life Tieck was born in B ...

, German poet *

Ludwig Uhland Johann Ludwig Uhland (26 April 1787 – 13 November 1862) was a German poet, philologist and literary historian. Biography He was born in Tübingen, Württemberg, and studied jurisprudence at the university there, but also took an interest ...

, German poet

Composers, conductors and musicians

Ludwig van Beethoven Ludwig van Beethoven (baptised 17 December 177026 March 1827) was a German composer and pianist. Beethoven remains one of the most admired composers in the history of Western music; his works rank amongst the most performed of the classical ...

(1770–1827), German composer and pianist * Ludwig Göransson, Swedish composer, conductor, and record producer *

Ludwig Minkus Ludwig Minkus (russian: link=no, Людвиг Минкус), also known as Léon Fyodorovich Minkus (23 March 1826, Vienna – 7 December 1917, Vienna), was a Jewish-Austrian composer of ballet music, a violin virtuoso and teacher. Minkus is no ...

, Austrian composer and violin virtuoso *

Ludwig Spohr Louis Spohr (, 5 April 178422 October 1859), baptized Ludewig Spohr, later often in the modern German form of the name Ludwig, was a German composer, violinist and conductor. Highly regarded during his lifetime, Spohr composed ten symphonies, t ...

(1784–1859), German composer, violinist and conductor

Philosophers

Ludwig Feuerbach Ludwig Andreas von Feuerbach (; 28 July 1804 – 13 September 1872) was a German anthropologist and philosopher, best known for his book '' The Essence of Christianity'', which provided a critique of Christianity that strongly influenced gene ...

(1804–1872), German philosopher and anthropologist *

Ludwig Wittgenstein Ludwig Josef Johann Wittgenstein ( ; ; 26 April 1889 – 29 April 1951) was an Austrian- British philosopher who worked primarily in logic, the philosophy of mathematics, the philosophy of mind, and the philosophy of language. He is con ...

, Austrian philosopher

Politicians

Ludwig von Cobenzl Johann Ludwig Joseph, Graf von Cobenzl (21 November 1753 – 22 February 1809) was a diplomat and politician of the Habsburg monarchy. Von Cobenzl was born in Brussels in 1753 as one out of ten children to Count Johann Karl Philipp von Cobenzl ...

(1753–1809), Austrian Habsburg diplomat and politician *

Ludwig Erhard Ludwig Wilhelm Erhard (; 4 February 1897 – 5 May 1977) was a German politician affiliated with the Christian Democratic Union (CDU), and chancellor of West Germany from 1963 until 1966. He is known for leading the West German postwar economi ...

, West German chancellor * Ludwig Mecklinger (1919–1994), East German politician and academic * Ludwig Scotty, president of Nauru

Scientists

Ludwig Aschoff Karl Albert Ludwig Aschoff (10 January 1866 – 24 June 1942) was a German physician and pathologist. He is considered to be one of the most influential pathologists of the early 20th century and is regarded as the most important German patholog ...

, German physician and pathologist *

Ludwig von Bertalanffy Karl Ludwig von Bertalanffy (19 September 1901 – 12 June 1972) was an Austrian biologist known as one of the founders of general systems theory (GST). This is an interdisciplinary practice that describes systems with interacting components, app ...

(1901–1972), Austrian-born biologist *

Ludwig Binswanger Ludwig Binswanger (; ; 13 April 1881 – 5 February 1966) was a Swiss psychiatrist and pioneer in the field of existential psychology. His parents were Robert Johann Binswanger (1850–1910) and Bertha Hasenclever (1847–1896). Robert's Ge ...

, Swiss psychiatrist *

Ludwig Boltzmann Ludwig Eduard Boltzmann (; 20 February 1844 – 5 September 1906) was an Austrian physicist and philosopher. His greatest achievements were the development of statistical mechanics, and the statistical explanation of the second law of thermodyn ...

, Austrian physicist *

(1804–1872), German anthropologist and philosopher *

Ludwig von Mises Ludwig Heinrich Edler von Mises (; 29 September 1881 – 10 October 1973) was an Austrian School economist, historian, logician, and sociologist. Mises wrote and lectured extensively on the societal contributions of classical liberalism. He is ...

, Austrian economist *

Ludwig Mond Ludwig Mond FRS (7 March 1839 – 11 December 1909) was a German-born, British chemist and industrialist. He discovered an important, previously unknown, class of compounds called metal carbonyls. Education and career Ludwig Mond was born ...

, German chemist *

Ludwig Prandtl Ludwig Prandtl (4 February 1875 – 15 August 1953) was a German fluid dynamicist, physicist and aerospace scientist. He was a pioneer in the development of rigorous systematic mathematical analyses which he used for underlying the science of ...

, German physicist *

Ludwig Reichenbach Heinrich Gottlieb Ludwig Reichenbach (8 January 1793 – 17 March 1879) was a German botanist and ornithologist. It was he who first requested Leopold Blaschka to make a set of glass marine invertebrate models for scientific education and museum ...

, German botanist *

Ludwig Schläfli Ludwig Schläfli (15 January 1814 – 20 March 1895) was a Swiss mathematician, specialising in geometry and complex analysis (at the time called function theory) who was one of the key figures in developing the notion of higher-dimensional space ...

, Swiss geometer

Soldiers

Ludwig Beck Ludwig August Theodor Beck (; 29 June 1880 – 20 July 1944) was a German general and Chief of the German General Staff during the early years of the Nazi regime in Germany before World War II. Although Beck never became a member of the Na ...

, German World War II general involved in the 20 July plot to assassinate Hitler *

Ludwig von Benedek Ludwig August Ritter von Benedek (14 July 1804 – 27 April 1881), also known as Lajos Benedek, was an Austro-Hungarian general (Feldzeugmeister), best known for commanding the imperial army in 1866 in their defeat at the Battle of Königg ...

, Austrian general (Feldzeugmeister) of Hungarian descent *

Ludwig Crüwell Ludwig Crüwell (20 March 1892 – 25 September 1958) was a German army general who served in the Afrika Korps of Nazi Germany during World War II. He was a recipient of the Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross with Oak Leaves. Crüwell surrendered to ...

, German World War II general * Ludwig Kübler, German

General der Gebirgstruppe General der Gebirgstruppe (Literally: General of the Mountain Troops) was a category of German Army three-star, a new example of the traditional German 'General der' rank introduced by the Wehrmacht in 1940, comparable to the NATO grade OF-8. ...

* Ludwig Plagge (1910–1948), German SS officer at Auschwitz, Buchenwald and Majdanek concentration camps executed for war crimes * Ludwig Runzheimer, German Nazi Gestapo officer executed for war crimes

Others

Ludwig W. Adamec Ludwig W. Adamec (10 March 1924 – 1 January 2019) was a noted scholar on the Middle East and Afghanistan. He was a professor emeritus in the School of Middle East and North African Studies at the University of Arizona.

(1924–2019), American academic and historian *

Ludwig Ahgren Ludwig Anders Ahgren (born July 6, 1995), known mononymously as Ludwig, is an American live streamer, YouTuber, podcaster, esports commentator and competitor. Ahgren is best known for his live streams on Twitch from 2018 through late 2021, ...

, American live streamer * Ludwig von Erlichshausen (1410–1467), Grand Master of the Teutonic Knights * Ludwig Fischer (1905–1947), German Nazi lawyer and government official executed for war crimes * Ludwig Gehre, German resistance fighter during World War II *

Ludwig Gumplowicz Ludwig Gumplowicz (March 9, 1838 – August 19, 1909), was a Polish sociologist, jurist, historian, and political scientist, who taught constitutional and administrative law at the University of Graz. Gumplowicz was the son of a Jewish carpet a ...

(1838–1909), Polish sociologist, jurist, historian, and political scientist *

Ludwig Leichhardt Friedrich Wilhelm Ludwig Leichhardt (), known as Ludwig Leichhardt, (23 October 1813 – c. 1848) was a German explorer and naturalist, most famous for his exploration of northern and central Australia.Ken Eastwood,'Cold case: Leichhardt's dis ...

, Prussian explorer * Ludwig Müller, leader of the Protestant Reich Church * Ludwig Ingwer Nommensen, German Lutheran missionary to Sumatra who also translated the New Testament into the native Batak language * Ludwig Ortiz, Venezuelan judoka * Ludwig Rödl, German chess master *

Ludwig Roselius Ludwig Roselius (2 June 1874 – 15 May 1943) was a German coffee merchant and founder of the company Kaffee HAG. He was born in Bremen and is credited with the development of commercial decaffeination of coffee. As a patron, he supported arti ...

(1874–1943), German coffee baron and company founder * Ludwig Rübekeil, German philologist * Ludwig Trepte, German actor

Fictional characters

* Ludwig Von Drake, in Walt Disney cartoons and comic books * Ludwig Von Koopa, one of the Koopalings from the Mario franchise * Ludwig, in the anime series '' Axis Powers Hetalia'' * Ludwig, in the video game ''

Bloodborne is a 2015 action role-playing game developed by FromSoftware and published by Sony Computer Entertainment for the PlayStation 4. ''Bloodborne'' follows the player's character, a Hunter, through the decrepit Gothic, Victorian-era–inspired ci ...

'' * Ludwig, the villain of the former Busch Gardens Williamsburg attraction '' The Curse of Darkastle''

References

{{given name German masculine given names