William Louis of Nassau-Dillenburg (; ; 13 March 1560, Dillenburg,

Hesse Hesse or Hessen ( ), officially the State of Hesse (), is a States of Germany, state in Germany. Its capital city is Wiesbaden, and the largest urban area is Frankfurt, which is also the country's principal financial centre. Two other major hist ...

– 13 July 1620,

Leeuwarden Leeuwarden (; ; ; ) is a List of cities in the Netherlands by province, city and Municipalities of the Netherlands, municipality in Friesland, Netherlands, with a population of 127,073 (2023). It is the provincial capital and seat of the Provin ...

, Netherlands) was Count of Nassau-Dillenburg from 1606 to 1620, and

stadtholder In the Low Countries, a stadtholder ( ) was a steward, first appointed as a medieval official and ultimately functioning as a national leader. The ''stadtholder'' was the replacement of the duke or count of a province during the Burgundian and ...

Friesland Friesland ( ; ; official ), historically and traditionally known as Frisia (), named after the Frisians, is a Provinces of the Netherlands, province of the Netherlands located in the country's northern part. It is situated west of Groningen (p ...

Groningen Groningen ( , ; ; or ) is the capital city and main municipality of Groningen (province), Groningen province in the Netherlands. Dubbed the "capital of the north", Groningen is the largest place as well as the economic and cultural centre of ...

, and

Drenthe Drenthe () is a province of the Netherlands located in the northeastern part of the country. It is bordered by Overijssel to the south, Friesland to the west, Groningen to the north, and the German state of Lower Saxony to the east. As of Jan ...

Life

William Louis was the eldest son of John VI, Count of Nassau-Dillenburg and his first wife, Elisabeth of Leuchtenberg. He served as a cavalry officer under

William the Silent William the Silent or William the Taciturn (; 24 April 153310 July 1584), more commonly known in the Netherlands as William of Orange (), was the leader of the Dutch revolt against the Spanish Habsburg Netherlands, Habsburgs that set off the ...

. Together with his cousin (and brother-in-law)

Maurice of Nassau, Prince of Orange Maurice of Orange (; 14 November 1567 – 23 April 1625) was ''stadtholder'' of all the provinces of the Dutch Republic except for Lordship of Frisia, Friesland from 1585 at the earliest until his death on 23 April 1625. Before he became P ...

, he commanded the

Dutch States Army The Dutch States Army () was the army of the Dutch Republic. It was usually called this, because it was formally the army of the States-General of the Netherlands, the sovereign power of that federal republic. This army was brought to such a size ...

and helped plan the military strategy of the

Dutch Republic The United Provinces of the Netherlands, commonly referred to in historiography as the Dutch Republic, was a confederation that existed from 1579 until the Batavian Revolution in 1795. It was a predecessor state of the present-day Netherlands ...

against Spain from 1588 to 1609. William Louis played a significant part in the

Military Revolution The Military Revolution is the theory that a series of radical changes in military strategy and tactics during the 16th and 17th centuries resulted in major lasting changes in governments and society. The theory was introduced by Michael Roberts ...

of the 16th–17th centuries. In a letter to his cousin

which he composed on 8 December 1594, he set out (from reading Aelianus Tacticus) an argument based on the use of ranks by soldiers of Imperial Rome as discussed in Aelian's Tactica. Aelian was discussing the use of the counter march in the context of the Roman sword

gladius ''Gladius'' () is a Latin word properly referring to the type of sword that was used by Ancient Rome, ancient Roman foot soldiers starting from the 3rd century BC and until the 3rd century AD. Linguistically, within Latin, the word also came t ...

and spear pilium. William Louis in a 'crucial leap' realized that the same technique could work for men with firearms. :" I have discovered evolutionibus term that would eventually be translated as "drill"a method of getting the musketeers and others with guns not only to practice firing but to keep on doing so in a very effective battle order (that is to say, they do not fire at will or from behind a Just as soon as the first rank has fired, then by the drill hey have learnedthey will march to the back. The second rank either marching forward or standing still, will then fire just like the first. After that the third and following ranks will do the same. When the last rank has fired, the first will have reloaded, as the following diagram Geoffrey Parker (2008) p 21, footnote 4 On 25 November 1587, he married his cousin, Anna of Nassau, daughter of

and

Anna of Saxony Anna of Saxony (23 December 1544 – 18 December 1577) was the heiress of Maurice, Elector of Saxony, and Agnes, eldest daughter of Philip I, Landgrave of Hesse. Maurice's only son, Albert, died in infancy. Anna was the second wife of Willia ...

, and older sister of Maurice of Nassau. Anna died less than six months later on 13 June 1588, and William Louis never remarried. He was nicknamed ''"Us Heit"'' ( West Frisian for "our father"). He died in his home, the Stadhouderlijk hof in Leeuwarden, the city which honored him with a statue on the government square. His body was laid to rest in the Grote or Jacobijnerkerk.

Ancestors

References

External links

* * * , - , - , - {{Authority control 1560 births 1620 deaths People from Dillenburg Stadtholders of Frisia Dutch people of the Eighty Years' War (United Provinces) German Calvinist and Reformed Christians House of Nassau Counts of Nassau 17th-century Dutch military personnel 16th-century governors