# Fame.am profile — machine-readable export
# Canonical URL: https://fame.am/person/helmuth-von-moltke-the-elder
# Generated: 2026-09-01T00:28:34.495Z

schema: https://schema.org/Person
url: "https://fame.am/person/helmuth-von-moltke-the-elder"
name: "Helmuth von Moltke the Elder"
slug: "helmuth-von-moltke-the-elder"
description: "The Prussian field marshal who rewrote how armies move and fight, then lived long enough to become the earliest-born human whose voice survives on record — born in 1800, recorded in 1889."
tagline: "German Field Marshal (1800–1891)"
image: "https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Special:FilePath/Helmuth_Karl_Bernhard_von_Moltke.jpg"
gender: "male"
country:
  name: "Germany"
  isoCode: "DE"
category:
  name: "Writers"
  slug: "writers"
profileType:
  name: "Writer / Author"
  slug: "writer"
birthDate: "1800-10-26"
deathDate: "1891-04-24"
livingStatus: "DECEASED"
scores:
  popularity:           59.08
  momentum:             0.4888942539835826
  historical:           25.41966
  currentAttention:     2.716079188797682
  sourceConfidence:     60
  profileCompleteness:  70
  trendDirection:       "STABLE"
ranks:
  global:   null
  country:  null
  category: null
tags:
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    slug: "historical-figures"
  - name: "Writer / Author"
    slug: "writer-author"
  - name: "Literature"
    slug: "literature"
  - name: "History"
    slug: "history"
  - name: "Politics"
    slug: "politics"
  - name: "19th Century"
    slug: "19th-century"
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    title: "هيلموت فون مولتكه"
    type:  "WIKIPEDIA"
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    title: "هيلموت ڤون مولتكا"
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    type:  "WIKIPEDIA"
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    type:  "WIKIPEDIA"
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    title: "Helmuth Karl Bernhard von Moltke"
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    title: "Гельмут Карл Бернхард фон Мольтке (старэйшы)"
    type:  "WIKIPEDIA"
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    title: "Helmuth von Moltke (Generalfeldmarschall)"
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    title: "Helmuth von Moltke"
    type:  "WIKIPEDIA"
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    title: "Helmuth Karl Bernhard von Moltke"
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    title: "Helmuth Karl Bernhard von Moltke"
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    title: "Wikiquote"
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    title: "Wikiquote"
    type:  "WEBSITE"
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    title: "Wikiquote"
    type:  "WEBSITE"
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    title: "Wikiquote"
    type:  "WEBSITE"
  - url: "https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Helmuth_von_Moltke_the_Elder"
    title: "Wikiquote"
    type:  "WEBSITE"

# bio (long form, separated for readability)
bio: |
  Helmuth Karl Bernhard von Moltke served as chief of staff of the Prussian Army for thirty years, a span in which he rebuilt the mechanics of command itself. He grasped what railways could do before most generals understood they mattered, and used them to direct troops across Europe and the Middle East through the Second Schleswig War, the Austro-Prussian War, and the Franco-Prussian War. His method — decentralized initiative within a coherent operational framework — became the template for modern staff work. In October 1889, at eighty-eight, he made four voice recordings; two survive, capturing a mind from the Napoleonic era speaking into the age of Edison. He died in 1891, leaving a nephew who would carry the same name into catastrophe at the Marne.