August von Bethmann-Hollweg

Moritz August von Bethmann-Hollweg (8 April 1795 – 14 July 1877) was a German jurist and Prussian politician.

In the German Table Society, an exclusive society restricted to ethnic German Christians from birth, he met the brothers Leopold, Ernst Ludwig and Otto von Gerlach as well as Ernst Senfft von Pilsach and conversed with the Crown Prince, who would later, as king, elevate him to nobility.

He specialized in the history of civil legal procedure and made many pioneering contributions demonstrating a deep grasp of his subject and an independence from received doctrine, and showing the value of the historical viewpoint.

The beneficial influences of this small community permitted him to reconcile his religious and professional lives and understand the moral foundations of the law.

This represented a departure from his life of academic research, and gave him more access to the government in Berlin, and he turned his attention more to religious and political developments.

After his retirement he wrote the book for which he became chiefly known, Der Civilprozeß des Gemeinen Rechts in geschichtlicher Entwicklung (Civil Procedure in Common Law, A Historical Overview).

[6] Bethmann-Hollweg was married to Auguste Wilhelmine Gebser of the noble Prussian family dating back to the Teutonic Order of Knights.