Louis VI, Elector Palatine
Elector Palatine
Louis VI, Elector Palatine (4 July 1539 in Simmern – 22 October 1583 in Heidelberg), was an Elector from the Palatinate-Simmern branch of the house of Wittelsbach. He was the first-born son of Frederick III, Elector Palatine and Marie of Brandenburg-Kulmbach.
Biography
To learn French, the young prince Ludwig visited the Burgundian University of Dole in 1554. As presumptive heir of the Electorate in the Palatinate, he was already participating in government affairs at the court of Otto Henry, Elector Palatine. Since 1563, he was governor of the Upper Palatinate.
Unlike his father, he gave preference to Lutheranism over Calvinism, replacing Calvinists from positions at the University of Heidelberg. The Calvinist theologians found protection at the court of Prince John Casimir, the brother of Ludwig, in Neustadt an der Weinstrasse and established the "Casimirianum Neustadt". During the Cologne War Louis VI was the only Lutheran imperial prince who stood on the side of Cologne's Elector and Archbishop Gebhard Truchsess von Waldburg. With the Lutheran reorganization of the country Louis adopted a new court constitution, a police constitution and in 1582, a grand country constitution.
Family and children
Ludwig VI was married twice.
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The citation trail is more important than the brevity of the summary: it shows where individual claims can be examined in context. The source revision retrieved here is dated Feb 8, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q63277. VIAF identifies the subject as 28924930. The Library of Congress control number is no99047993. 3 of 3 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1539, 1583, 1554 and 1563.
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