Life
Jahn was born in Lanz in Brandenburg. He studied theology and philology from 1796 to 1802 at Halle, Göttingen at the University of Greifswald. After the Battle of Jena-Auerstedt in 1806 he joined the Prussian army. In 1809 he went to Berlin, where he became a teacher at the Gymnasium zum Grauen Kloster and at the Plamann School.
Brooding upon what he saw as the humiliation of his native land by Napoleon, Jahn conceived the idea of restoring the spirits of his countrymen by the development of their physical and moral powers through the practice of gymnastics. The first Turnplatz, or open-air gymnasium, was opened by Jahn in Berlin in 1811, and the Turnverein (gymnastics association) movement spread rapidly. Young gymnasts were taught to regard themselves as members of a kind of guild for the emancipation of their fatherland. This nationalistic spirit was nourished in no small degree by the writings of Jahn.
Early in 1813 Jahn took an active part in the formation of the famous Lützow Free Corps, a volunteer force in the Prussian army fighting Napoleon. He commanded a battalion of the corps, though he was often employed in the secret service during the same period. After the war he returned to Berlin where he was appointed state teacher of gymnastics, and took on a role in the formation of the student patriotic fraternities, or Burschenschaften, in Jena.
A man of populistic nature, rugged, eccentric and outspoken, Jahn often came into collision with the authorities, and this conflict resulted in the closing of the Turnplatz in 1819 and Jahn's arrest. Kept in semi-confinement at the fortress of Kolberg until 1824, he was sentenced to imprisonment for two years. The sentence was reversed in 1825, but he was forbidden to live within ten miles of Berlin. He therefore took up residence at Freyburg on the Unstrut, where he remained until his death, with the exception of a short period in 1828, when he was exiled to Kölleda on a charge of sedition.
In 1840 Jahn was decorated by the Prussian government with the Iron Cross for bravery in the wars against Napoleon. In the spring of 1848 he was elected by the district of Naumburg to the German National Parliament. Jahn died in Freyburg, where a monument was erected in his honor in 1859.
Jahn popularized the motto "Frisch, Fromm, Fröhlich, Frei" ("Hardy, Pious, Cheerful, Free") in the early 19th century.
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