FREDERICK V. elector palatine of the Rhine and king of Bohemia, son of the elector Frederick IV. by his wife, Louisa Juliana, daughter of William the Silent, prince of Orange, was born at Amberg on Aug. 26, 1596. He became elector on his father's death in Sept. 161o, and was under the guardian ship of his kinsman, John II., count palatine of Zweibrucken (d. 1635), until he was declared of age in July 1614. Frederick had married Elizabeth, daughter of the English king James I., in Feb. 1613, and was the recognized head of the Evangelical Union founded by his father to protect the interests of the Protestants. In 1619 he stepped into a larger arena. In Aug. 1619, a few months after the death of the emperor Matthias, the estates of Bohemia declared his successor, Ferdinand, afterwards the em peror Ferdinand II., deposed, and chose Frederick as their king. The elector was crowned king of Bohemia at Prague on Nov. 4, 1619. On Nov. 8, four days after his coronation, his forces were easily routed by the imperial army under Tilly at the White Hill, near Prague, and his short reign in Bohemia ended abruptly. The Palatinate was overrun by the Spaniards and Bavarians, and, after a futile attempt to dislodge them, Frederick, called in de rision the "winter king," sought refuge in the Netherlands. His electorate was given in 1623 to Maximilian I. of Bavaria.
The remainder of Frederick's life was spent in obscurity. He died at Mainz on Nov. 29, 1632.