Janez Bleiweis

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Janez Bleiweis

Janez Bleiweis (19 November 1808 - 29 November 1881) was a Slovene conservative politician and public figure. Already during his lifetime, he was called father of the nation.

Bleiweis was born in a family of wealthy merchants in the Carniolan town of Kranj, then part of the Austrian Empire. Since childhood, he was raised in a bilingual environment: he was fluent in both Slovene and German, as most of the members of the upper middle class in the Slovene Lands at the time. He frequented the lyceum in Ljubljana and then enrolled to the University of Vienna, where he studied medicine. After completing his studies, he worked as a professor of veterinary medicine and pathology in Ljubljana.

In 1843, Bleiweis launched the journal Kmetijske in rokodelske novice ("Farmers' and Craftsmen's News"), which dealt with economic, as well as with cultural issues in the Slovene Lands. In the spring of nations of 1848, he became involved in politics and supported the quest of United Slovenia. At the beginning of the constitutional period in the Austrian Empire, Bleiweis emerged as the leader of the Slovene national movement. Already in the late 1850s, however, his politically conservatitive leadership was challenged by the younger generation of Slovene nationalists, known as Young Slovenes, among whom were Fran Levstik, Josip Stritar and Josip Jurčič. Bleiweis'es group, formed by Lovro Toman and Etbin Henrik Costa, was indentified as Old Slovenes thereafter, although they themselves never accepted such name.

Bleiweis was a Habsburg legitimist and follower of the Austroslavist ideology. In politics, he followed the example of the Czech leader František Palacký who demanded autonomy for the Slavic peoples within the frame of a unified Austrian Empire.

He died in Ljubljana and is buried in the Navje cemetery in the Bežigrad district.