 Wilhelm Windelband was born in 1848 in Potsdam, Germany. His father, Johann Friedrich Windelband was a state secretary for the Province of Brandenburg. Windelband studied in Jena, Berlin, and Göttingen, attending lectures by Kuno Fischer (1824–1907) in Jena and studying with Hermann Lotze (1817–1881) in Göttingen. Fischer and Lotze would deeply influence Windelband’s philosophical thinking, as well as his work as a historian of philosophy.