Stephan Ludwig Roth

Stephan Ludwig Roth (1796 to 1849) was a Transylvanian Saxon teacher, Lutheran pastor and political reformer who worked in the Principality of Transylvania. After studying theology at the University of Tubingen he spent time at Johann Heinrich Pestalozzi's institute in Yverdon, and on returning home he worked to bring Pestalozzian principles into Saxon schooling, beginning as a gymnasium professor in Mediasch and later serving as pastor in Nimesch and Meschen. His pastoral work led him into wider reform, including writing on guilds and agriculture and his 1842 publication on the language question in Transylvania, in which he argued for recognising Romanians alongside the Hungarians and Saxons. During the Hungarian Revolution of 1848 he was arrested and executed by firing squad in 1849, and he was later remembered by Transylvanian Saxons as a martyr of progressive education. Historians today also note his writing on Jewish people, which repeated antisemitic stereotypes.