Wilhelm Wolff
German politician (1809-1864)
Johann Friedrich Wilhelm Wolff, nicknamed "Lupus" (21 June 1809 – 9 May 1864) was a German schoolmaster, political activist and publicist.
Life
Wolff was born in Tarnau, a village in the Schweidnitz district of Silesia, Prussia (now Tarnawa, Lower Silesian Voivodeship, Gmina Żarów, Poland). His family were mainly farmers, his father being a hereditary serf. His mother was well-educated despite her low social class. He went to grammar school in Świdnica and university in Wrocław, mainly studying classical philology.
In 1831 he became a member of a radical students' association, for which he was imprisoned between 1834 and 1838 (mainly in Fort Srebrna Góra), following the resumption of persecution of these types of organisations by the Bundestag, in line with the Carlsbad Decrees. He was released on 30 July 1838, and moved back to Wrocław. There, he attempted to become a private tutor, having been legally excluded from public teaching due to the interruption of his studies by his arrest. However, his licence to teach privately was denied by the government there. Accordingly, he moved to Posen where he worked as a tutor until 1840, in the service of Tytus Działyński, a Polish landowner.
This brief starts where responsible research should: with the source description of “Wilhelm Wolff” as german politician (1809-1864). Everything that follows is an evidence route, not borrowed authority.
Why this record matters
The subject matters to the people & ideas register because the source frames it as german politician (1809-1864). Its deeper value depends on whether names, dates, institutions and citations support that framing.
Chronology provides the most reliable spine for this subject; interpretation should follow only after identities and dates are secure. The source revision retrieved here is dated May 18, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q71110. VIAF identifies the subject as 68951600. The Library of Congress control number is n85350931. 3 of 3 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1809, 1864, 1831 and 1834.
Later biographies can compress uncertainty and repeat inherited reputations, so apparently settled claims may still require comparison. The source lead contains qualifying language; that uncertainty should survive quotation, summary and reuse. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.
How to read it
Read biographical claims against dates, named institutions and the cited references. Distinguish a subject’s later reputation from evidence produced during their lifetime.
- Establishing names and roles
- Building a first chronology
- Locating cited institutions
Personal papers, civil or court records, institutional files and the scholarship cited by the source.
Three-step research path
- Establish the record: confirm the title “Wilhelm Wolff”, its source revision and the description used here.
- Expand the search: follow Wilhelm Wolff primary sources, Wilhelm Wolff archive and Wilhelm research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
- Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.
Questions for further research
- Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “Wilhelm Wolff”?
- How has the subject’s reputation changed across later accounts?
- Which primary records establish identity, chronology and institutional ties?
Search terms from this dossier
This entry incorporates text from “Wilhelm Wolff” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.