Adelheid Amalie Gallitzin

Princess Adelheid Amalie Gallitzin (also known as Amalia Samuilovna Golitsyna or in Russian as Амалия Самуиловна Голицына; 28 August 1748 – 27 April 1806) was a German salonist.

[1] After leaving finishing school, Amalie was introduced into society and invited to become one of the maids of honor to Margravine Elisabeth Louise of Brandenburg-Schwedt, wife of Prince Ferdinand, brother of Frederick the Great.

She applied herself to the study of mathematics, classical philology, and philosophy under Franz Hemsterhuis, who kindled her enthusiasm for Socratic-Platonic idealism, and later under the name of "Diokles" dedicated to her the "Diotima", his Lettres sur l'atheisme.

[3] The educational reform introduced by Franz Friedrich Wilhelm von Fürstenberg, Vicar-General of Münster, induced her to take up her residence in the Westphalian capital.

This circle also included the gymnasial teachers (whom she incited to the deeper study of Plato), Bernhard Heinrich Overberg, the reformer of popular school education, Clemens August von Droste-Vischering, Count Leopold zu Stolberg, and the philosopher Johann Georg Hamann, who was interred in her garden.

In those revolutionary times, she provided for the spread of Christian writings, proved a support for the religious faith of many of her friends, and persuaded others, among them Count Stolberg, to make their peace with the Catholic Church in Germany.