Ľudovít Štúr

Nationalism 1815–1856 ✕ Hunting accident

Slovak national revival leader and codifier of standard Slovak who raised the Slovak volunteers against the Hungarian government in 1848

Born in 1815 at Uhrovec in the Kingdom of Hungary, the son of a Lutheran teacher, he studied and taught at the Lutheran Lyceum in Pressburg (Bratislava). At the University of Halle he came under the influence of Hegel and Herder, and in 1843 he and his friends created a new standard Slovak language based on the central Slovak dialects. Elected to the Diet for Zvolen in 1847, he demanded the abolition of serfdom and the use of Slovak in elementary schools. In May 1848 he co-wrote the Demands of the Slovak Nation, which brought a Hungarian warrant for his arrest, and in June he attended the Slavic Congress in Prague. In September the Slovak National Council was founded in Vienna with him among its leaders, and it launched an armed uprising and the volunteer campaigns; when the volunteers were demobilised in 1849 he withdrew. He died in 1856 after a hunting accident.

Also known as: Ludovit Stur · Ľudovít Velislav Štúr