Church and Collegium of the Jesuit College in Ingolstadt (1701)

This engraving from Michael Wening's four-volume Historico-Topographica Descriptio (1701-26) shows the Jesuit College in Ingolstadt. In 1549, the Bavarian Duke Wilhelm IV appointed members of the Jesuit order as teachers at the University of Ingolstadt, which had been established in 1472. Among those called to service by the duke was the Dutch Jesuit Petrus Canisius. As it turns out, a separate Jesuit College was not actually founded in 1549, so the Jesuits were sent back to their previous posts. In 1576, a new building for the Jesuit College was built next to the Liebfrauenmünster. Over the years, through the educational work of the Jesuits at both the college and the university (where they also taught), Ingolstadt became an educational hub for the Counter-Reformation. Famous pupils included Emperor Ferdinand II (1578-1637) and Ferdinand of Bavaria (1577-1650), the Elector of Cologne, both of whom were central political figures in the Counter-Reformation in the Empire.